Abstract
Government officials adapted the theory advanced by E. M. Rogers in his Diffusion of Innovations (1962) to development in rural developing countries, but have been unable to achieve the goals they expected. Therefore, they have doubts regarding the validity of this theory, which appears to have a limited applicability. The purpose of this paper is to re-examine the Rogers theory, and to investigate steps for constructing a new theory in its place. A case study and examination of the alternative theories has revealed the following ;
(a) The distribution of the results of diffusion of innovation is greatly influenced not only by possession of social resources by each member of a social system, but also by the distribution of social resources in the system.
(b) The efficiency of diffusion and the equal distribution of the results thereof are competing values to be traded off ; the Rogers theory is established from the former point of view.
(c) The Rogers theory, which attaches importance to the factor of communication, holds true in a social system where all members have almost equal social resources, sufficient to adopt innovations.
(d) In social systems in which the members have unequal social resources, if the officials adapt the theory to the development carelessly, there will be undesired and unexpected consequences to diffusion, such as the unequal distribution of the results. Therefore, the officials must diffuse innovations according to the theory which takes into account not only the social-psychological but sociological factors as well.
