Theoretical Advances in Explaining Technological Transition, with Emphasis on Socio-technical Systems Approach

The emergence of new technologies means not only substitution or changes in existing technologies, but also emergence of new social settings and structures. Hence technological transition management is not simply supporting new technology development, but proper governance of change from a socio-technical system to a new socio-technical system. Some main frameworks and approaches such as innovation systems approach and multi-layer perspective explain these technological changes and transformations. Also some conceptual developments of theses main frameworks tend to follow a more prescriptive orientation. This paper compares these frameworks, the path of formation and theoretical foundations contributed to development of them. Growing convergence between innovation systems approach and multi-layer perspective framework based on socio-technical system thinking and their branches in recent researches is seen and shows that integration of insights of these approaches may provide new and more comprehensive rationale for policy making in the field of technological transition.