A new article by Adrian Smith and Pedro Prieto Martín analyses the activist development of digital platforms for direct democracy in Madrid and Barcelona. Going Beyond the Smart City? Implementing […]
Tremendous research, policy, and investment is directed towards a new wave of automation in modern societies. Most notable within discourse for the Fourth Industrial Revolution, but also in radical ideas […]
The book, Grassroots Innovation Movements, is now available open access. The book examines six diverse grassroots movements in India, South America & Europe, and explores for each the spaces where […]
A new open access article in the journal Futures by Adrian Smith and Mariano Fressoli contrasts grassroots subversion of some of the technologies of automation with the way automation is […]
This post reports research into the situated development over time of two digital platforms for democratic deliberation and decision. There has been renewed interest recently in techniques for facilitated citizen […]
Grassroots innovations in the development and use of digital technologies are generating important alternatives to the latest wave of automation in societies. A report explains more based on insights emerging […]
The relationship between technology and human capabilities is ambivalent and complex. A new article by Cian O’Donovan and Adrian Smith reports analysis of how users experience enhanced (or diminished) capabilities […]
Conventional models for digital technological developments tend to prioritise a linear approach around individual leaders (“founder worship”), a Venture Capital-based investment model, a high financial valuation, and market dominance through […]
En los ultimos años Adrian Smith ha tenido la privilegia de colaboración con colegas y comunidades en America Latina e España en el desarrollo de innovación de base y sostentabilidad. […]
Drawing upon Adrian Smith’s fieldwork in Barcelona under the Knowledge Politics of Smart Urbanism project, a team of researchers from the project have co-authored a chapter about shifts in digital […]
Developing out of research into grassroots appropriations of digital farbictation, Kat Braybrooke and Adrian Smith recently guest edited the publication of the Journal of Peer Production dedicated to research articles […]
A number of grassroots appropriations of ‘smart’ technologies in urban settings are being studied as part of the KNOWING project (the knowledge politics of smart urbanism). Adrian Smith is studying […]
Mari Martiskainen has published a new article (open access) with colleagues that builds on her work with the CISE project, and now looks at Energy Cafés. Community action has an […]
A new briefing from the STEPS Centre, called Making Futures, includes a summary of some activities we’ve initiated in recent years to help spread the word about grassroots innovation. More […]
Experimentation with radically open and collaborative ways of producing knowledge and material artefacts can be found everywhere, from the free/libre and open-source software movement to citizen science initiatives, and from […]
Last summer, Andy Stirling and Adrian Smith were invited to contribute a ‘thinkpiece’ about grassroots innovation to Friends of the Earth’s Big Ideas series. We explored how grassroots innovation initiatives, […]
Adrian Smith from SPRU recently published a new working paper that draws upon research in makerspaces in order to explore and illustrate some of the politics of social innovation, and […]
This week the 3S research group are launching our seven key insights resulting from our work on societal engagement with sustainability over the last five years. We believe these insights […]
This article focuses on the role of community leadership in the development of grass- roots innovations. It asks: When community leaders initiate energy projects, what types of skills and knowledge […]
Can you help us distribute the last of our Community Energy research highlight postcards? Our colourful and easily-digestible set of postcards distil 3 years of our research into 10 key findings, […]
Grassroots Innovations 