This article deals with the question of technological innovation, reviewing its origins and the important role played by economics in its further consolidation. It presents the concepts of innovation context and environments, pointing out the task for sociology to handle with these theoretical tools. And the article also discusses the question of uncertainty within innovation practices, a special point for philosophy and sociology of technics. It focuses the need to set an agenda for innovation research incorporating the social sciences, and some authors have showed interest to shed some light on different social practices related to the innovation dimension.
Innovation; Context; Social sciences; Technology; Innovation environment