Multistep creation of a criteria catalogue for sociotechnical transitions in agriculture

To address today's grand challenges, socio-technical transitions need to be designed in different sectors (e.g., agriculture). Technology assessment (TA) is a valuable tool to identify interactions and consequences of transition processes, but it requires an appropriate assessment system to develop guidelines. This article addresses the question of how to assess technological transitions in agriculture from a stakeholder perspective and presents a multi-step TA procedure inspired by a multi-criteria decision analysis exemplified by one transition: electrical farming. The procedure contains three steps. First, assessment criteria for the transition are identified in the context of a classical TA using stakeholder interviews. On this basis, a multidimensional catalogue of 24 criteria was created. Finally, criteria are validated and weighted according to their relevance with a second sample. The results provide recommendations for communicating and evaluating transitions in rural areas and the agricultural sector.