“Platform Thinking: Towards a Cross‑Sectoral Socio‑Technical Paradigm”

Call for Papers – Special Issue: “Platform Thinking: Towards a Cross‑Sectoral Socio‑Technical Paradigm”

Journal: Technological Forecasting and Social Change
Publisher: Elsevier
Impact Factor: 13.3 | CiteScore: 26.3
Submission deadline: 15 October 2026

Overview

This special issue investigates the evolution of “platform thinking” from a digital business model into a broader socio‑technical paradigm. It shifts the academic focus from platforms as purely technological infrastructures (e.g., software, algorithms, digital marketplaces) to platforms as organizing logics that reshape collaboration, governance, and value creation across diverse domains.

The issue aims to uncover how platform principles—such as modularity, generativity, orchestration, and multi‑sided value creation—operate in hybrid, civic, industrial, and public sector settings, even where digital infrastructure is only partial, peripheral, or absent.

Core Themes

1. Platform thinking beyond the digital

• Emergence and operation of platform‑like models in non‑digital or hybrid contexts, including innovation districts, science parks, coworking spaces, cooperative marketplaces, and asset‑heavy industrial settings.

• How physical proximity and human‑mediated coordination foster trust and knowledge exchange in the absence of fully digital/algorithmic matchmaking.

2. Civic and urban innovation

• Role of platform logic in civic and urban innovation, such as participatory urban platforms, GovTech initiatives, federated digital twins, and platform cooperatives.

• Governance of platforms that span multiple institutions, jurisdictions, or non‑profit/community‑led domains.

3. Internal organizational platformization

• The adoption of platform logics within traditional organizations to enhance modularity, cross‑functional collaboration, knowledge sharing, and interoperability between business units.

4. Governance and systemic transformations

• Reconfiguration of governance in complex systems (e.g., orchestration, data‑based coordination, API ecosystems, and hybrid human–algorithmic regulation).

• Addressing the frictions, trade‑offs, and challenges in adapting platform models to public, decentralized, or mission‑oriented systems (e.g., balancing scalability with inclusion, openness with control, and efficiency with equity).

5. Theoretical and methodological expansion

• Reinterpreting established platform constructs (transactional, orthogonal, innovation platforms) through organizational theory, institutional logics, and socio‑technical systems.

• New methodological approaches for studying complex, multi‑actor, and cross‑sector configurations, especially where digital tools play a supporting rather than central role.

Submission Details

• Submission window: Opens 15 January 2026.

• Submission deadline: 15 October 2026.

• Submission platform: Technological Forecasting and Social Change Editorial Manager:
  https://www.editorialmanager.com/

• When submitting, select article type: “VSI: Platform Thinking”.

• Submissions will undergo standard peer review in accordance with journal policies.

• Pre‑submission feedback: An optional special track is available at the International Conference Symplatform (abstracts due 1 April 2026).

Guest Editors

• Daniel Trabucchi, Politecnico di Milano, Italy

• Luca Mora, Edinburgh Napier University & Tallinn University of Technology

• Tommaso Buganza, Politecnico di Milano, Italy

• Paavo Ritala, LUT University, Finland

• Wim Vanhaverbeke, University of Antwerp, Belgium

Why This Issue Matters

• Platforms are no longer confined to tech giants like Amazon, Uber, or Airbnb; they are becoming a foundational organizing paradigm for societal change.

• By bridging disciplines—innovation management, urban studies, public administration, and organizational theory—this issue seeks to reposition platform research within a broader socio‑technical and institutional framework, helping scholars and policymakers understand how these logics are reshaping the future of collaboration, governance, and value creation.

ServiceSetu Academics — Premier Platform for Academic Opportunities & Research Collaboration

Visit official website of the publisher