Theme Issue on Standards, Compatibility and Infrastructure Development Guest Editors' Introduction Infrastructures such as telecommunications, broadcasting, transportation, electricity, and waterways are complex, large socio-technical systems. Involved are institutions and technologies, both of which seem resilient to any significant change and evolve slowly. In the development of these infrastructures standards play a crucial role. They are generally a pre-condition for large systems to emerge and play a key role in mature infrastructure systems. Deliberations such as these form the basis of this issue of Knowledge, Technology & Policy. It is, in turn, the result of the 6th EURAS (European Academy for Standardisation) Workshop that took place the 28 th- 29 th of June 2001 at the Delft University of Technology in Delft, the Netherlands. The workshop theme was Standards, Compatibility and Infrastructure Development. There, we explored the relationship between these concepts, and focused in particular on the m a n n e r in which standards can be regarded as change agents for infrastructure development. The fifty workshop participants had diverse backgrounds (e.g., from technology, economy, policy and law). Different m e a n s were used to create a c o m m o n ground and to enhance the interactive character of the workshop. Discussants were organized for those who presented a paper; several special guests and experts in the field of standardization were invited to guarantee an interesting discussion; a dinner took place with standardization story telling; and two interactive experiments were held, that is, one on the main workshop t h e m e and the other on future standardization issues. An impression of the workshop is available on the workshop website 1 . Theoretical and empirical papers were solicited in areas such as the impact of consortium standards on networks; flexibility, standardization and infrastructure development; Intellectual Property Rights and infrastructure standards; and European Union policy and the compatibility of infrastructures. The papers that were presented have been published as workshop proceedings. 2 A special selection thereof was made for the current KT&P Knowledge, Technology, & Policy, Fail 2001,VoI. 14, No. 3, p. 5-7.
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Knowledge, Technology, & Policy / Fall 2001
issue. It further includes a few contributions from other workshop participants: two articles written by Raymund Werle and Ole Hanseth, respectively, and a book review byYves Chauvel. We have composed this issue for a reader audience with a broad interest in the relationship b e t w e e n standardization and technology development. This special issue examines the current stands and future issues in Standards, Compatibility and Infrastructure Development, and related social and policy-making dilemmas. The purpose of this is two-fold. First, to disseminate research results from a wide variety of academics, both from engineering and social science schools. Second, to suggest directions for future research and policy on the national as well as international level. In this respect, the contributions that follow provide food for thought on very different issues. To give an impression of the subjects the reader can expect, the article by Axel Czaya and Wilfried Hesser argues that, despite the similarity b e t w e e n standards bodies worldwide, there are significant differences as well. Using an institutional approach, this paper argues that the state of the standardization system may serve as an indicator of the respective overall mental, cultural and socio-economic states in different domains. Tineke Egyedi addresses the problem of system entrenchment, and explores in what manner standardization could be a means to build flexibility into infrastructures. Her focus is on standardised gateway technologies. The case of the eXtensible Markup Language and the standard for an intermodal freight container indicate that flexibility is a transient characteristic of gateway standards. Vladislav Fomin examines the relationship b e t w e e n the four driving forces of national innovation systems: globalisation, deregulation, changing d e m a n d patterns, and scientific and technological progress. His case is the cellular mobile telephony industry. He argues that standardization is a critical and necessary attribute for a sustainable innovation process in the wireless telecommunications sector. Ole Hanseth uses the example of the N o r d u n e t project and Internet development in Scandinavia to c o m m e n t on the d o m i n a n t view that standards are the only way to establish computer communication networks. He argues that gateways are often key tools for building and maintaining networks. The issue is therefore to combine and balance the use of gateways and standards in a proper way. The article by Mark Hartswood, Alexander Voss et al. reports on a participatory design project aimed to develop ICTs in a hospital ward working with deliberate self-harm patients. They focus on the way universalities (e.g. standards) emerge from local practices, and h o w the latter are reshaped to make t h e m more widely applicable. Timothy Schoechle examines the cultural roots of the Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) system and its relationship to innovation, creation and invention. He considers the political economy of IPR in the current business models and practices, the role of standards bodies and the n e e d to reconceptualise the public. He suggests that current IPR practices privatise knowledge and processes that ought to be kept public.
G u e s t Editors" I n t r o d u c t i o n
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R a y m u n d Werle's article examines the role of technical standards in a n d the principles according to which standards and standardization organizations are assessed by the international free trade regime of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). He concludes that an i m p o r t a n t m i s m a t c h exists bet w e e n the WTO's view a n d the c o n t e m p o r a r y hybrid international standards regime. Finally, we w o u l d like to t h a n k the a n o n y m o u s reviewers of the above contributions for their excellent feedback, and wish t h e m and the readers of this K T P issue a very g o o d reading. Koen Dittrich Tineke Egyedi Notes 1. 2. Dittrich, K., & T.M. Egyedi (Eds., 2001). Standards Compatibility and Infrastructure Development, Proceedings of the 6th EURASWorkshop, 28-29 June 2001, Delft, The Netherlands. [ISBN 90-5638-077-X].
