Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Innovation studies-an emerging discipline (or what)? A study of the global network of innovation scholars

Contents:

Author Info

  • Jan Fagerberg

    (Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture, University of Oslo)

  • Bart Verspagen

    (Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture, University of Oslo)

Abstract

Although innovation is not a new topic for scholarly research, the academic literature on innovation was, for a long time, not very voluminous. However, more recently innovation has become a major focus among scholars of different backgrounds, and this change is also reflected in an increasing number of academic publications in this area. In parallel with this we have seen the emergence of a number of new journals and professional associations devoted to the subject. The research reported in this paper is motivated by these trends. We wish to find an answer to the question to what extent it now exists a unified community of innovation scholars that identify themselves with innovation studies as a field rather than particular sub-fields within other, more traditional disciplines. Moreover, we want to explore the factors (sources of inspiration, academic leadership, professional societies, publishing outlets etc.) that bind scholars together or - alternatively - continue to keep them divided. The research reported in this paper is based on a web-survey carried out in during 2004 and 2005. The results suggest that a global innovation studies community exists as a collection of a large number of relatively small groups (characterized dense internal relationships) defined along geographical and disciplinary lines. Although the field has spread over many countries and disciplines, it is particularly developed in Europe and among scholars with a background in economics. These smaller groups, however, are embedded in larger transnational groups or clusters that are kept together by what is commonly referred to as "weak ties". Leading scholars, professional associations and journals all play an important role in keeping these larger groups together (as well as distinguishing them from each other).

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://folk.uio.no/janf/downloadable_papers/06Fagerberg-Verspagen.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture, University of Oslo in its series Working Papers on Innovation Studies with number 20060911.

as in new window
Length: 24 pages
Date of creation: Sep 2006
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:tik:inowpp:20060911

Note: Presented at the SPRU 40th Anniversary Conference on "The Future of Science, Technology and Innovation Policy", University of Sussex, September 11 - 13, 2006.
Contact details of provider:
Postal: Postboks 1108 Blindern N-0317 Oslo
Phone: 22 84 16 00
Fax: : 22 84 16 01
Email:
Web page: http://www.tik.uio.no/Innovation
More information through EDIRC

Related research

Keywords: Innovation; Networks;

Find related papers by JEL classification:

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
as in new window
  1. Verspagen, Bart & Werker, Claudia, 2004. "Keith Pavitt and the Invisible College of the Economics of Technology and Innovation," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(9), pages 1419-1431, November.
  2. Jan Fagerberg, 2003. "Innovation: A Guide to the Literature," Working Papers on Innovation Studies 20031012, Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture, University of Oslo.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

Citations

Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
as in new window

Cited by:
  1. Edward Bergman, 2009. "Embedding network analysis in spatial studies of innovation," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer, vol. 43(3), pages 559-565, September.
  2. Voeten, Jaap & Haan, Job de & Groot, Gerard de, 2009. "Is that Innovation? Assessing Examples of Revitalized Economic Dynamics among Clusters of Small Producers in Northern Vietnam," UNU-MERIT Working Paper Series 055, United Nations University, Maastricht Economic and social Research and training centre on Innovation and Technology.

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:tik:inowpp:20060911

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Koson Sapprasert) The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask Koson Sapprasert to update the entry or send us the correct address.

If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

If references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link to it, you can help with this form.

If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.