Value Chain Responsibility in Nanomedicine

Abstract

Nanotechnology is an emerging technology with large potential. Emerging technologies can bring about questions on social, economical and political implications. All technological products are produced through a complex web of agents: the value chain. This research intends to find where the responsibility for the societal impact of nanotechnology lies within a value chain, by studying the distribution of responsibility within three value chains which are in different stages of development. Data was gathered by firm-level interviews with different agents in the value chain and by gathering different written data on the companies. This research concludes that the definition for social responsibility differs in the cases: larger and established companies have a broader understanding of social responsibility than smaller and immature companies. When a large player is present in the value chain, the responsibility distribution seems to concentrated at the large firm, while in other chains the responsibility is distributed among the firms. Lastly, nanotechnology does not always change the social responsibility approaches that firms have. Recommendations for how and why this could be done are given.