Co-creation in support of responsible research and innovation: an analysis of three stakeholder workshops on nanotechnology for health

Co-creation, a form of engagement in which stakeholders jointly generate value, has increasingly received attention as a way to enhance responsible research and innovation (RRI). To explore the extent to which co-creation might support RRI, this paper analyses three co-creation workshops with different types of stakeholders in the area of nanotechnology for health. The analysis considers the potential of co-creation to enhance the legitimacy of and add value to innovation based on the four dimensions of RRI: reflexivity, inclusion, anticipation, and adaptation. The results show that it is difficult to address all the dimensions at once. A trade-off between creating legitimacy and added value can be detected: a co-creation process focusing on added value requires deliberation early in the innovation process, a certain specificity and an action-oriented perspective. This comes at the cost of the inclusion and anticipation of societal values, which are important dimensions of a legitimate innovation process.