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Paper short abstract:

Socio-technical futures shape and are shaped by organizations. This paper explores this interrelation in the case of “Industrie 4.0” in Germany. It combines concepts from STS and organizational theory to develop a more elaborate understanding of how imagined future technologies affect the present.

Paper long abstract:

Socio-technical futures shape the development of many organizations, while organizations are the main actors which create, and maintain such imaginations of technology. Regardless of this intimate relation, neither STS nor organization studies have scrutinized its dynamics substantially. This paper presents an attempt to bridge these two perspectives to gain a more detailed understanding of the dynamic of socio-technical futures and organizations. The empirical case used to analyze this relation is the vision of a fourth industrial revolution labeled "Industrie 4.0" in Germany. Coined in 2011 by state actors and industry associations, the term has gained considerable momentum on both a discursive and a practical level.

To understand, why this imaginary future gained so much footing, while others did not, it is necessary to understand the dynamic between the socio-technical futures, organizations and the field forming around this issue. This paper will elaborate on these: "Industrie 4.0" is the consequence of the sense making (Weick 1995) by different organizations, which try to reduce uncertainty. By doing so, they enact (ibid.) not only their own environment but also that of many other organizations, especially industrial companies. In such a perspective, "Industrie 4.0" gained so much momentum, because it enabled policy makers and industry associations in their sense making process. In their interaction with other organizations, they create an organizational field (DiMaggio/Powell) in which crucial aspects of the socio-technical future get institutionalized in a self-reinforcing dynamic. The paper presents a theoretical model to describe such dynamics and gives examples from Germany and Europe.