ABSTRACT
Technology can transform our society in dramatic ways, as the development of electricity, railways, the steam-engine or the printing-press have illustrated. What Schumpeter (1968; pp. 25-26) fi rst termed “creative destruction” involves the giving up of existing social and economic structures to embrace the new. Overcoming signifi cant resistance to change may thus often be a diffi cult political and social process. In the long run the success of a technology will frequently depend not necessarily on its merit, but rather on its social use and acceptance. The dynamics of numerous political, societal, legal and economic factors therefore have to be analyzed to adequately assess the long-term prospects of a forthcoming technology.1
