Innovation

This page considers innovation, sometimes vaunted as a distinctive feature of the 'new economy'.

It covers -

• theoretical and historical studies
• industry-academic links
• a global innovation society?
• local

Innovation, in particular the interrelationship between discovery and markets, is one of the most contentious areas of economics, history and sociology. From the vast literature we have highlighted some works we found thought provoking and entertaining. The Digital Environment guide and incentives page in the Intellectual Property guide highlight other writing.

     theoretical and historical studies

Nathan Rosenberg's Exploring the Black Box: Technology, Economics & History (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni Press 1994) and Schumpeter & the Endogeneity of Technology: Some American Perspectives (London: Routledge 2000) are useful academic studies. He collaborated with David Mowery on the outstanding Paths of Innovation: Technological Change in 20th-Century America (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni Press 1998). Works by and on Schumpeter are highlighted here.

The essays in Sources of Industrial Leadership: Studies of Seven Industries (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni Press 1999) edited by Mowery & Richard Nelson extend the discussion in that work. Mowery also edited The International Computer Software Industry: A Comparative Study of Industry Evolution & Structure (Oxford: Oxford Uni Press 1995).

For an exploration of 'fashion' see Bandwagon Effects in High-Technology Industries (Cambridge: MIT Press 2001) by Jeffrey Rohlfs. Of Bicycles, Bakelites & Bulbs: Toward A Theory of Sociotechnical Change (Cambridge: MIT Press 1997) by Wiebe Bijker is quirkier and might be accompanied by the exploration in How users matter: The co-construction of users and technology (Cambridge: MIT Press 2003) edited by Nelly Oudshoorn & Trevor Pinch of "how users consume, modify, domesticate, reconfigure, and resist technologies". There is a more popular account in Beyond Engineering: How Society Shapes Technology (New York: Oxford Uni Press 1997) by Robert Pool.

Those seeking a broad, multinational historical overview might benefit from David Landes' The Wealth & Poverty of Nations (New York: Little Brown 1998). Arguments in Joel Mokyr's The Lever of Riches: Technological Creativity & Economic Progress (Oxford: Oxford Uni Press 1990) are extended in the more theoretical - and for us less successful - The Gifts of Athena: Historical Origins of the Knowledge Economy (Princeton: Princeton Uni Press 2002). The latter's complemented by William Baumol's The Free-Market Innovation Machine (Princeton: Princeton Uni Press 2002)

The Social Life of Information (Boston: Harvard Business School Press 2000) by John Seely Brown & Paul Duguid and Manuel Castell's The Information Society (Oxford: Blackwell 1999) are invaluable for considering the adoption of technologies in the information economy.

The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail (Boston: Harvard Business School Press 1997) and After The Goldrush: Patterns of Success & Failure on the Internet report by Clayton Christensen, along with John Howkins' The Creative Economy (London: Allen Lane 2001) and the macro/micro-economic studies in Technological Innovation & Economic Performance (Princeton: Princeton Uni Press 2001) edited by Benn Steil, David Victor & Richard Nelson are of particular importance in considering business use of digital technologies.  

The Carrier Wave: New Information Technology & the Geography of Innovation, 1846-2003 (London: Unwin Hyman 1988) by Peter Hall & Paschal Preston looks at the information infrastructure and Kondratieff waves. Eamonn Fingleton's revisionist In Praise of Hard Industries: Why Manufacturing, Not the Information Economy, Is the Key to Future Prosperity (Boston: Houghton Mifflin 1999) and The Dynamic Firm: The Role of Technology, Strategy, Organization & Regions (Oxford: Oxford Uni Press 1998) edited by Alfred Chandler, Peter Hagstrom & Orjan Solvell are insightful.

Donald Reinertsen's  Managing The Design Factory: A Product Developer's Toolkit (New York: Free Press 1997) and other works highlighted in our Design guide offer other perspectives.

     industry-academic links

For an introduction to questions about industry and university relationships see Industrializing Knowledge: University-Industry Linkages in Japan & the United States (Cambridge: MIT Press 1999) edited by Lewis Branscomb, Fumio Kodama & Richard Florida.

     a global innovation society?

Global Economic Commerce: Theory & Case Studies (Cambridge: MIT Press 1999) by J Christopher Westland & Theodore Clark is an excellent introduction, broader than the title suggests.  

Alan Burton-Jones' Knowledge Capitalism: Business, Work & Learning in the New Economy (Oxford: Oxford Uni Press 1999) and Information Feudalism: Who Owns the Knowledge Economy (London: Earthscan 2002) by Peter Drahos with John Braithwaite supply perspectives on how the new infrastructure will be used. 

James Cortada edited an excellent introduction to the 'economy of symbolic analysts' - people who like you who work with facts & figures - in Rise of the Knowledge Worker (Boston: Butterworth-Heinemann 1998), part of a series that includes volumes on The Knowledge Economy and The Economic Impact of Knowledge (both edited by Dale Neef).

The Governance of Innovation in Europe: Regional Perspectives on Global Competitiveness (New York: Pinter 2000) by Philip Cooke & Franz Todtling offers a view of the EU's dirigiste approach to innovation, the results of which have generally been underwhelming.

     local

For local perspectives on innovation and the information economy a useful starting point is  Sleepers, Wake! Technology & the Future of Work (Melbourne: Oxford Uni Press 1998) by Barry Jones and his April 1999 address on The Information Revolution in Australia: Its impact on Politics, the Economy & Society. 

The Knowledge Based Economy (KBE) site of the Commonwealth Department of Industry, Science & Resources includes Measuring the Knowledge-Based Economy - How does Australia Compare and the earlier Conceptual Paper on the Knowledge-Based Economy.  

Christopher Arup, in Innovation, Policy & Law: Australia & the International High Technology Economy (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni Press 1993), makes connections between copyright law, economic development and innovation policy. Michael Connors' The Race to the Intelligent State: Charting the Global Information Economy into the 21st Century (Oxford: Capstone 1997) looks at national information society initiatives. 

The Australian National Innovation Summit (NIS), followed by the announcement of a "high-level Implementation Group to carry forward the outcomes", was another digital potemkin village strong on rhetoric and ministerial photo opportunities but thin on substance.  Curious, isn't it, that we encourage innovation by cutting funding for tertiary sector research and - as importantly - reducing incentives for industry development.

The intellectual property guide elsewhere on this site considers innovation, business patents and other matters



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