This article proposes three states in an actor-network and a global/local distinction among actants. This theoretical framework is applied to two invention networks: one created by an inventor of solar heating systems and another created by a designer who wanted to create an environmentally sustainable furniture fabric. Both solar inventor and fabric designer wanted to develop technologies that would improve the environment and also make money. The article concludes by considering whether invention networks that intend to turn “good into gold” (...) have to evolve a shared representation or whether it is sufficient for a new design to serve as a boundary object for actants. (shrink)

This article presents a framework for practitioners who may be interested in maintaining adaptive stability of sociotechnical networks. The framework is developed from assembling several concepts that are useful for assessing and for drawing on appropriate moral reasoning strategies as sociotechnical networks are designed, constructed, and adapted. One such strategy involves the ability to assess degrees of perspective sharing and trading relationships in networks using moral imagination. The article uses the case of the design of an environmentally sustainable fabric to (...) illustrate these strategic concepts. The framework also draws on other examples of cases in which sociotechnical networks have become destabilized to illustrate instances in which the framework may have been useful for decreasing a tendency for destabilization. (shrink)

At the forefront of international concerns about global legislation and regulation, a host of noted environmentalists and business ethicists examine ethical issues in consumption from the points of view of environmental sustainability, economic development, and free enterprise.