Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in
Book cover

Innovation and Regional Growth in the European Union pp 9–29Cite as

Theoretical Framework: A Spatial Perspective On Innovation and the Genesis of Regional Growth

  • Chapter
  • First Online:

Part of the book series: Advances in Spatial Science ((ADVSPATIAL))

Abstract

Technological change seems to be making innovation not only more “globalised” but also more “territorially-specific”. Innovation relies on “global” knowledge flows of formal codified knowledge, but as these flows become progressively easier to access and exchange, the territorial aspect of innovation and learning has become a key resource in competitive advantage. In order to understand this process, however, it is necessary to reconsider the linear model of innovation. As we will discuss in this chapter, innovation is a collective learning and socially embedded process that is crucially dependent on tacit knowledge and “untraded interdependencies”. Consequently a dialectical linkage has been established between innovation and space. While territories, with their social, cultural and institutional realm, are crucial for successful innovation, innovation is in turn a key source of competitive advantage for territories and regions. However, different streams of literature have shed light upon specific factors and “conditions” involved in the process without bringing them together in an analytical model.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Chapter
USD   29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD   84.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD   109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD   109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Learn about institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    Evolutionary and interactive learning approaches can be easily reconciled when, following Edquist (1997), interactive learning is considered as a selection mechanism in an evolutionary process.

  2. 2.

    In this area there is no agreement in the literature about the most convincing approach. Some authors (Nelson and Rosemberg, 1993 and Lundvall 1993) even question the rationale for the study of national systems of innovation preferring the idea of the emergence of a truly global system.

  3. 3.

    “Each (…) set of conventions describes a framework of action, different for each basic kind of product, which we label a world of production.” (Storper 1997, p. 112).

  4. 4.

    Henderson et al. (1995) find that Jacobs-type externalities prevail in high tech and MAR in capital goods industries.

  5. 5.

    Duranton and Puga (2001) suggest that firms develop new products in diversified creative urban contexts, subsequently, relocating to specialised cities in the mass production phase in order to exploit cost advantage.

  6. 6.

    “… at the present state of the art, defining the limits of a system of innovation in this way (as all determinants) is a “catch 22” problem. (…) We will, for the time being, specify systems as including all important determinants of innovation. (…) In this way the approaches serve as ‘focusing devices’ (…): interesting conjectures that need to be specified and then verified or disproved through further research.”(Edquist 1997, p. 15).

  7. 7.

    Cantwell and Iammarino (2003) make this specificity explicit when stating that “proper regional systems of innovation are found only in a few well-defined areas: in most regions systemic interactions and knowledge flows between relevant actors are simply too sparse and too weak to reveal the presence of systems of innovation at work” (p. 5).

  8. 8.

    “(…) the mere introduction of sets of social and political variables into linear models of growth does not by itself solve the problem of what type of relationship there is between the socio-political setting and economic growth” (Rodríguez-Pose 1998, p. 46).

References

  • Abramovitz M (1985) “Catching up and falling behind”, Economic research report n.1. Stockholm: Trade Union Institute for Economic Research

    Google Scholar 

  • Abramovitz M (1986) Catching up, forcing ahead and falling behind. J Econ Hist 46(2):386–406

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Adams JD (2002) Comparative localization of academic and industrial spillovers. J Econ Geogr 2:253–278

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Adams JD, Jaffe AB (2002) Bounding the effects of R&D: an investigation using matched firm and establishment data. Rand J Econ 27:700–721

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Aghion P, Howitt P (1992) A model of growth through creative destruction. Econometrica 60(2):323–351

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Amin A. and Thrift N (1995) Institutional issues for the European regions: From markets and plans to socioeconomics and powers of association. Economy and Society 24: 41–66

    Google Scholar 

  • Anselin L, Varga A, Acs Z (1997) Local geographic spillovers between University research and high technology innovations. J Urban Econ 42:422–448

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Armstrong HW, Taylor J (2000) Regional economics and policy. Blackwell, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  • Audretsch DB (2003) Innovation and spatial externalities. Int Reg Sci Rev 26(2):167–174

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Audretsch DB, Feldman MP (1996a) R&D spillovers and the geography of innovation and production. Am Econ Rev 86:630–640

    Google Scholar 

  • Audretsch DB, Feldman M (2004) Knowledge spillovers and the geography of innovation. In: Henderson JV, Thisse JF (eds) Handbook of urban and regional economics, vol 4. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp 2713–2739

    Google Scholar 

  • Bathelt H (2001) Regional competence and economic recovery: Divergent growth paths in Boston’s high technology economy. Entrepreneurship and Regional Development 13: 287–314

    Google Scholar 

  • Beugelsdijk S, de Groot H and van Schaik T (2004) Trust and economic growth, a robustness analysis, Oxford Economic Papers, 56: 118–134

    Google Scholar 

  • Borts GH, Stein JL (1964) Economic growth in a free market. Columbia University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Burroni L (2001) Allontanarsi crescendo: Politica e sviluppo locale in Veneto e Toscana. Turin, Italy:Rosenberg & Sellier

    Google Scholar 

  • Bush V (1945) Science: the endless frontier. Ayer, North Stanford

    Google Scholar 

  • Camagni R (1995a) The concept of innovative milieu and its relevance for public policies in European lagging regions. Pap Reg Sci 74:317–340

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Camagni R, Capello R (2003) La città come “milieu” e i “milieux” urbani: teoria e evidenza empirica. In: Garofoli G (ed) Impresa e territorio. Il Mulino, Bologna

    Google Scholar 

  • Cantwell J, Iammarino S (1998) MNCs, Technological innovation and regional systems in the EU: Some evidence in the Italian case. Int J Econ Bus 5:383–408

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cantwell J, Iammarino S (2003) Multinational corporations and European regional systems of innovation. Routledge, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Carlino G, Chatterjee S, Hunt R (2001) Knowledge spillovers and the new economy of cities, Working Paper n. 01–14. Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, Mimeo

    Google Scholar 

  • Cheshire PC, Magrini S (2000) Endogenous processes in European regional growth: convergence and policy. Growth Change 31:455–479

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cheshire PC, Magrini S (2002) The distinctive determinants of European urban growth: does one size fit all? In: Research papers in environmental and spatial analysis no. 73. Department of Geography and Environment, London School of Economics

    Google Scholar 

  • Coe NM, Bunnell TG (2003) ‘Spatialising’ knowledge communities: towards a conceptualisation of transnational innovation networks. Glob Networks 3(4):437–456

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cooke P (1997) Regions in a global market: the experiences of Wales and Baden-Wurttemberg. Review of International Political Economy 4

    Google Scholar 

  • Cooke P (1998) Origins of the concept. In: Braczyk H, Cooke P, Heidenreich M (eds) Regional innovation systems. UCL Press, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Cooke P and Morgan K (1998) The associational economy: Firms, regions and innovation. Oxford, U.K.: Oxford University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Cooke P, Gomez UM, Etxeberria G (1997) Regional innovation systems: institutional and organizational dimensions. Res Policy 26:475–491

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • De Bondt R (1996) Spillovers and innovation activities, International Journal of Industrial Organization 15: 1–28.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dosi G, Freeman C, Nelson R, Silveberg G, Soete L (eds) (1988) Technological change and economic theory. Pinter, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Easterly W and Levine R (1997) Africa’s growth tragedy: Politics and ethnic divisions. Quarterly Journal of Economics 112: 1203–50

    Google Scholar 

  • Edquist C (1997) Systems of innovation approaches – their emergence and characteristics. In: Edquist C (ed) Systems of innovation: technologies, institutions and organizations. Pinter Publishers/Cassell Academic, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Engelbrecht H-J (1997) International R & D spillovers, human capital and productivity in OECD economies: an empirical investigation. European Economic Review 41 (8), 1479–1488

    Google Scholar 

  • Fageberg J (1988) Why growth rates differ. In: Dosi G, Freeman C, Nelson R, Silveberg G, Soete L (eds) Technological change and economic theory. Pinter, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Fagerberg J, Verspagen B, Caniels M (1997) Technology, growth and unemployment across European regions. Reg Stud 31(5):457–466

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Faulconbridge JR (2006) Stretching tacit knowledge beyond a local fix? Global spaces of learning in advertising professional service firms. J Econ Geogr 6:517–540

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Feldman M, Audretsch DB (1999) Innovation in cities: science-based diversity, specialisation and localised competition. Eur Econ Rev 43(2):409–429

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Feldman MP, Florida R (1994) The geographic sources of innovation – technological infrastructure and product innovation in the US. Ann Assoc Am Geogr 84(2):210–229

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Freeman C (1987) Technology policy and economic performance: lessons from Japan. Pinter, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Freeman C (1994) Critical survey: the economics of technical change. Camb J Econ 18:463–512

    Google Scholar 

  • Freeman C, Soete L (1997) The economics of industrial innovation. MIT, Cambridge (MA)

    Google Scholar 

  • Furman JL, Porter ME, Stern S (2002) The determinants of national innovative capacity. Res Policy 31(6):899–933

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gertler, M. S., Wolfe, D. A., and Garkut, D. (2000) No place like home? The embeddedness of innovation in a regional economy. Review of International Political Economy 7:688–718

    Google Scholar 

  • Glaeser E, Kallal H, Scheinkman J, Schleifer A (1992) Growth in cities. J Polit Econ 100(6):1126–1152

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gregersen B, Johnson B (1996) Learning economies, innovation systems and European integration. Reg Stud 31:479–490

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Griliches Z (1986) Productivity, R&D, and basic research at the firm level in the 1970s. Am Econ Rev 76:141–154

    Google Scholar 

  • Grossman GM, Helpman E (1991) Innovation and growth in the global economy. MIT, Cambridge (MA)

    Google Scholar 

  • Grossman GM and Helpman E (1994) Endogenous Innovation in the Theory of Growth. Journal of Economic Perspectives 8: 23–44

    Google Scholar 

  • Guiso L, Sapienza P, Zingales L (2004) The role of social capital in financial development. American Economic Review 94:526–56

    Google Scholar 

  • Henderson JV (1999) Marshall’s economies National Bureau of Economic Research. Working Paper 7358

    Google Scholar 

  • Henry N and Pinch S (2000) Spatialising knowledge: Placing the knowledge community of Motor Sport Valley. Geoforum 31: 191–208

    Google Scholar 

  • Howells J (1999) Regional systems of innovation? In: Archibugi D, Howells J, Michie J (eds) Innovation policy in a global economy. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  • Iammarino S (2005) An evolutionary integrated view of regional systems of innovation: concepts, measures and historical perspectives. Eur Plan Stud 13(4):497–519

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jaffe AB (1986) Technological opportunity and spillovers of R&D: Evidence from firms’ patents, profits and market share. Am Econ Rev 76:984–1001

    Google Scholar 

  • Knack S, and Keefer P (1997) Does social capital have an economic impact? A cross-country investigation. Quarterly Journal of Economics 112:1252–88

    Google Scholar 

  • Kristensen, P. H. (1992) Industrial districts in West Jutland, Denmark. In Industrial districts and local economic regeneration, ed. F. Pyke and W. Sengenberger, 122–73. Geneva:International Institute for Labour Studies, International Labour Organization

    Google Scholar 

  • Leamer EE, Storper S (2001) The economic geography of the Internet age

    Google Scholar 

  • Lucas R (1988) On the mechanics of economic development. J Monetary Econ 22(1):3–42

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lundvall BÅ (1992) National systems of innovation: towards a theory of innovation and interactive learning. Pinter, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Lundvall BÅ (2001) Innovation policy in the globalising learning economy. In: Archibugi D, Lundvall BÅ (eds) The globalising learning economy. Oxford University Press, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  • Maclaurin WR (1953) The sequence from invention to innovation and its relation to economic growth. Q J Econ 67(1):97–111

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Maurset PB, Verspagen B (1999) Europe: one or several systems of innovation? An analysis based on patent citations. In: Fagerberg J, Guerrieri P, Verspagnen B (eds) The economic challenge for Europe. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham

    Google Scholar 

  • Morgan K (1997) The learning region: institutions, innovation and regional renewal. Reg Stud 31:491–503

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Morgan K (2004) The exaggerated death of geography: learning, proximity and territorial innovation systems. J Econ Geogr 4:3–21

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nelson RR, Winter SG (1982) An evolutionary theory of economic change. Belknap, Cambridge (MA)

    Google Scholar 

  • Piore, M., and Sabel, C. (1984) The second industrial divide. New York: Basic Books

    Google Scholar 

  • Putnam, R. (1993) Making democracy work: Civic traditions in modern Italy, Princeton: Princeton University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Rebelo ST (1991) Long-Run Policy Analysis and Long-Run Growth, Journal of Political Economy, 99(3): 500–521

    Google Scholar 

  • Richardson HW (1973) Regional growth theory. Macmillan, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Rodríguez-Pose A (1994) Socioeconomic restructuring and regional change: rethinking growth in the European community. Econ Geogr 70(4):325–343

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rodríguez-Pose A (1998a) The dynamics of regional growth in Europe: social and political factors. Oxford University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Rodríguez-Pose A (1999) Innovation prone and innovation averse societies. Economic performance in Europe. Growth Change 30:75–105

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • RodrÚguez-Pose A. and Storper M (2006) Better rules or stronger communities? On the social foundations of institutional change and its economic effects. Economic Geography 82(1): 1–25

    Google Scholar 

  • Romer PM (1986) Increasing returns and long-run growth. J Polit Econ 94(5):1002–1037

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Romer PM (1990) Endogenous technological change. J Polit Econ 98(5):97–103

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Romer, PM (1994) The Origins of Endogenous Growth. The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 8(1): 3–22

    Google Scholar 

  • Rosenberg N (1994) Exploring the black box: technology, economics, and history. Cambridge University Press, New York

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Semlinger K (1993) Economic development and industrial policy in Baden-Württemberg: Small firms in a benevolent environment. European Planning Studies 1: 435–63

    Google Scholar 

  • Solow R (1957) Technical change and the aggregate production function. Rev Econ Stat 39:312–320

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sonn JW, Storper M (2008) The increasing importance of geographical proximity in technological innovation: an analysis of US patent citations, 1975–1997. Environ Plann A 40(5):1020–1039

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Storper M (1997) The regional world: territorial development in a global economy. Guilford, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Storper M, Venables AJ (2004) Buzz: face-to-face contact and the urban economy. J Econ Geogr 4:351–370

    Google Scholar 

  • Trigilia, C. (1992) Sviluppo senza autonomia.Effetti perversi delle politiche nel Mezzogiorno Bologna: Il Mulino

    Google Scholar 

  • Verspagen B (1991) A new empirical approach to catching up and falling behind. Struct Change Econ Dyn 12:374–397

    Google Scholar 

  • Zak P, and Knack S (2001) Trust and growth. Economic Journal 111:295–321

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Geography and Environment, London School of Economics, Houghton Street, WC2A 2AE, London, UK

    Riccardo Crescenzi & Andrés Rodríguez-Pose

  2. IMDEA Social Sciences, Madrid, Spain

    Andrés Rodríguez-Pose

Authors
  1. Riccardo Crescenzi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Andrés Rodríguez-Pose
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Riccardo Crescenzi .

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Crescenzi, R., Rodríguez-Pose, A. (2011). Theoretical Framework: A Spatial Perspective On Innovation and the Genesis of Regional Growth. In: Innovation and Regional Growth in the European Union. Advances in Spatial Science. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-17761-3_2

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-17761-3_2

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-17760-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-17761-3

  • eBook Packages: Business and EconomicsEconomics and Finance (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation