| Abstract: |
The systems of innovation (SI) approach has been established and extended
during the last two decades. Although elementary goals and progress have been
reached through seminal contributions by Freeman (1987), Lundvall (1992) or
Nelson (1993), in designing a generic approach, displaying the dynamics of
collaboration, networking and interactive learning, criticism has been raised
that systems of innovation are still “undertheorized”. The objective of this
paper is to describe briefly the historical evolution of the SI concept within
the academic literature and the policy sphere. This review primarily attempts
to highlight some of the most important contributions that strongly assisted
to the framework, by providing more consistency and a more theory- oriented
perspective. Consequently, the system concept itself seems to be a kind of
“boundary object”. Within both, the academic and the policy field, different
levels of conceptualization have been challenged and advanced in the course of
time. These conceptualizations basically differ in their scale of analysis,
taking geographical perspectives, technologies or sectoral classifications as
foci for theorizing and empirical research. Despite these substantial levels
of research, the SI framework is increasingly challenged, analyzed and
extended in the context of globalization. As a result, regarding the openness
and flexibility of the SI approach, this paper particularly tries to focus on
the difficulties of contemporary research in defining functional and spatial
boundaries in theory and empirical research. Agglomeration tendencies,
knowledge externalities and localized learning are primarily based upon the
concepts of knowledge diffusion, tacit knowledge and proximity. In spite of
that, ICT and global business linkages foster inter-regional and trans-border
knowledge flows. Thus, knowledge diffusion is also related to international
and global “pipelines” that could support, strengthen and reinforce localized
learning. |
| Keywords: |
National, Sectoral, Technological and Regional Systems of Innovation, Geography of Innovation, Knowledge Externalities, Localized Knowledge Spillovers, Knowledge Diffusion, Tacit Knowledge |