Towards a theory of industrial modernity

Abstract

The deepening socio-environmental polycrisis has stimulated calls to rethink industrial modernity: the currently dominant societal assumptions about the natural environment, science and technology. However, the genesis and long-term co-evolution of these deep macro-level assumptions has rarely gained systematic attention in innovation studies. This is an important oversight given that the historical legacy of industrial modernity continues to shape the policy framing of current sustainability challenges as well as the design of appropriate interventions. In this paper we seek to develop a conceptual vocabulary for theorizing the historical evolution of industrial modernity. Combining the Deep Transitions framework from sustainability transitions studies with insights on long-term industrialization-related trends from various fields, we 1) present a systematically validated inventory of 38 constituent ideas, institutions and practices of industrial modernity; 2) map their emergence over the past 250 years; 3) identify 10 recurrent controversial outcomes generated by the interactions of these traits; 4) distinguish between three phases in the long-term evolution of industrial modernity. We conclude with a research agenda for studying the historical evolution, current impacts and policy implications of industrial modernity