a model of demand with interactions among consumers abstract the aim of this paper is to study emergent patterns of demand when there are social interactions between different consumers specifically our concern is with the case in which consumers preferences are influenced by the consumption behaviour of others the analysis recognises three reference groups the first is a peer group of similar consumers with whom the individual interacts on a regular basis and with whom the individual desires to share some consumption activities the second is one or several contrast group s with which the individual seeks actively not to interact and from whom the individual wishes to distinguish himself herself the third is an aspirational group with whom the individual does not interact on a regular basis but wishes that he she did and with whom the individual would like to share consumption activities but cannot in this relatively simple model these groups influence the individual s behaviour the paper derives steady state and dynamic properties of the distribution of consumption over users the degree to which consumption is restricted to a small group of similar agents is determined by the strength of the contrast and aspiration effects these effects also drive the distribution away from the natural distribution i e the one that would prevail were consumers to consider only the properties of the good and not the actions of other consumers the paper discusses the potential application of this modeling framework in a large number of consumption settings

an aggregate model of technical change a simple aggregate growth model is presented in which technology is described by a probability distribution from which new plants are drawn especially good draws are viewed as technological innovations that shift the mean of the following period s plant distribution function the resulting technical change is endogenous random and cumulative in contrast to conventional growth models the model s growth path displays nonstationary drift rather than deterministic trend and the long run per capita growth rate has positive rather than zero sensitivity to the model s saving parameter

r d and technology policy in nics as learning processes abstract this paper presents a dynamic learning perspective to research and development activity and to policies promoting these activities and technological development more generally the basic idea is that successful penetration of research and development rd multidisciplinary learning both technoeconomic and managerial organizational and learning which is cumulative through time this is especially so at an early infant phase of diffusion of this process through the economy a dynamic view of externalities and market failures is presented one that provides the basis for a catalytic perspective of technological policy this perspective is based on the distinction between an infant and a mature phase of policy where massive flexible search oriented support in the early phase sets the base for endogenization routinization of r d in the economy and for the possibility of drastic reductions in government support for traditional forms of r d in the later phase

managing technological development lessons from the newly industrializing countries this survey looks at the technological development of the newly industrializing countries to draw some important lessons for firms and governments in other developing countries first inventing products and processes is not at the center of the technological development needed for successful industrialization it is at the fringe what is at the center is acquiring the capabilities needed for efficient production and investment second some countries have overemphasized the drive for technological self sufficiency and paid a high price in poor productivity what makes the best economic sense is to combine foreign and local technological elements and to do this in a way that progressively develops local capabilities in areas where they can be more efficient third the acquisition of technological capability does not come merely from experience though experience is important fourth the economic environment through its influence on the technological efforts of firms is very important in determining the productivity of a country s resources

technology diffusion and the rate of technical change the way in which the process of technical change is formulated at the macroeconomic level implies generally speaking immediate diffusion or adoption of new technologies whether primarily disembodied in nature accounting for any shift in the production function as in the early technology index formulations or embodied in new investment as in the subsequent vintage growth models technical progress will be identified with advances in inventiveness or best practice technologies at first this might well seem the most appropriate way to separate out the contribution of the technology production factor from the other production factors from a straightforward economic point of view though advances in technology or best practice productivity levels are only relevant to the extent that they have been translated in actual achieved productivity levels the issue is a well known one in most empirical research on the measurement of the contribution of technical change to economic growth and has received much attention in the recent productivity slowdown debate denison i 979 griliches i980 nordhaus i980 and i 98i in particular there it was generally agreed that other technology factors including a slowdown in the rate of the spread of technology to use kendrick s i 98i term were more important than the actual decline in r d expenditure in contributing to the overall slowdown in productivity the importance of the diffusion of innovation rather than the mere occurrence of innovations is of course the major factor underlying most of the microeconomic diffusion literature the fundamental reasons for delay in adopting the so called retardation factors have been found to relate both to uncertainty and lack of information about the new technology and the often proprietary nature of the new technology since griliches i957 and mansfield s i96i seminal papers most of this literature has focused on the theoretical arguments underlying the traditional s shaped epidemic diffusion curve in more recent research particularly the mechanical static nature of these diffusion models has been questioned and various alternative diffusion models suggested including dynamic supply models metcalfe 1981 i982 stoneman i983 in which both the economic characteristics of the innovation and its diffusion environment have been made endogenous to the diffusion process these latter models in particular allow for an interpretation of the diffusion of technology in a broader macroeconomic growth and structural change perspective

history friendly models of industry evolution the computer industry the model presented in this paper is the first of a new generation of evolutionary economic models history friendly models history friendly models are formal models that aim to capture in stylized form qualitative and appreciative theories about the mechanisms and factors affecting industry evolution technological advance and institutional change put forth by empirical scholars of industrial economics technological change business organization and strategy and other social scientists in this paper we have analyzed the long term evolution of the computer industry in particular we have examined the emergence of a dominant firm in mainframes the introduction of a major innovation microprocessor the opening up of a new market segment personal computers ad the competition there between newcomers and diversified old established firms we have taken a body of verbal appreciative theorizing developed a formal representation of that theory and found that the formal version of that theory is consistent and capable of generating the stylized facts the appreciative theory purports to explain going through this analytic exercise has significantly sharpened our theoretical understanding of the key factors behind salient aspects of the evolution of the computer industry copyright 1999 by oxford university press

the evolution of economic institutions as a propagation process based on some notions from recent game theoretic approaches to explain the emergence of institutions a model is put forward which implies some generalizations and extensions first the evolution of institutions is interpreted as a diffusion process this interpretation provides a general formal framework to cover both the case of strategic and that of non strategic interaction second different forms of interdependency effects between the individuals involved are identified as making the crucial difference between the case where institutions emerge spontaneously in an unorganized form and the case where they do not

cooperative agreements and the theory of the firm focusing on barriers to change abstract cooperative agreements between firms have become a significant phenomenon in the 1980s and have been analyzed by various approaches including economics organizational theory and business strategy this paper draws on these different strands of the literature to argue that cooperative agreements have led to focus the analysis of firms organization on the issue of change as a consequence cooperative agreements have contributed to recent developments of the theory of the firm in favor of competence based and evolutionary approaches the analysis is then extended to the case of multinational firms

a coevolutionary framework for analysing a transition to a sustainable low carbon economy this paper proposes a coevolutionary framework for analysing a transition to a sustainable low carbon economy based on the coevolution of ecosystems technologies institutions business strategies and user practices within a multi level micro meso macro perspective this builds on and develops previous coevolutionary analyses of long term technological and industrial change and recent renewed interest within ecological economics on coevolutionary approaches previous work has analysed how the coevolution of technologies and institutions has led to the lock in of current high carbon energy systems and how the coevolution of physical and social technologies and business strategies has brought significant material and welfare benefits to the minority of the world s population living in industrialised countries the coevolutionary framework proposed here may be used to undertake 1 detailed empirical analyses at a micro meso level of the challenges relating to the innovation and adoption of particularly low carbon technologies 2 as a framework for analysing the multi level interaction of social and technological elements within potential transition pathways to a low carbon energy system 3 to assess the implications for economic growth and prosperity of a transition to a low carbon economy and 4 to assist in the development of more formal multi level evolutionary economic models

evolutionary theories in environmental and resource economics approaches and applications recent advances in evolutionary theory have important implications for environmental economics a short overview is offered of evolutionarythinking in economics subsequently major concepts and approaches inevolutionary biology and evolutionary economics are presented andcompared attention is devoted among others to darwinian selection punctuated equilibrium sorting mechanisms lamarckian evolution coevolution and self organization basic features of evolution such assustained change irreversible change unpredictability qualitativechange and disequilibrium are examined it is argued that there are anumber of fundamental differences as well as similarities betweenbiological and economic evolution next some general implications ofevolutionary thinking for environmental economics are outlined this isfollowed by a more detailed examination of potential uses ofevolutionary theories in specific areas of environmental economics including sustainability and long run development theories technologyand environment ecosystem management and resilience spatial evolutionand environmental processes and design of environmental policy

explaining the attacker s advantage technological paradigms organizational dynamics and the value network abstract understanding when entrants might have an advantage over an industry s incumbent firms in developing and adopting new technologies is a question which several scholars have explained in terms of technological capabilities or organizational dynamics this paper proposes that the value network the context within which a firm competes and solves customers problems is an important factor affecting whether incumbent or entrant firms will most successfully innovate in a study of technology development in the disk drive industry the authors found that incumbents led the industry in developing and adopting new technologies of every sort identified by earlier scholars at component and architectural levels competency enhancing and competency destroying incremental and radical as long as the technology addressed customers needs within the value network in which the incumbents competed entrants led in developing and adopting technologies which addressed user needs in different emerging value networks it is in these innovations which disrupted established trajectories of technological progress in established markets that attackers proved to have an advantage the rate of improvement in product performance which technologists provide may exceed the rate of improvement demanded in established markets this mismatch between trajectories enables firms entering emerging value networks subsequently to attack the industry s established markets as well

sources procedures and microeconomic effects of innovation fabio arcangeli paul david frank engelman christopher freeman massimo moggi richard nelson luigi orsenigo nathan rosenberg michele salvati g n von tunzelman two anonymous referees and the participants at the meeting of the committee on distribution growth and technical progress of the italian national research council cnr rome november 16 1985 have helped with various redraftings a particularly grateful acknowledgment is for the insightful and patient help of moses abramovitz this work has been undertaken at the science policy research unit spru university of sussex as part of the research program of the designated research centre sponsored by the economic and social research council esrc earlier support to the research that led to this paper by the italian national research council cnr is also gratefully acknowledged the statistical research has been undertaken with the assistance of stephano brioschi ilaria fornari and giovannu prennushi

a political economy approach to the neoclassical gradualist model of transition a political economy approach to the neoclassical gradualist model of transition requires the exposition of what i define the primary elements of the model which are economic analysis definition of a good society speed political structure ideological structure and whether the initial conditions were incorporated in the model after the identification of the primary elements of the neoclassical gradualist model the next step is to identify secondary elements the desired changes with respect to price liberalization stabilization privatization institutional structure monetary policy and the financial system fiscal policy international trade and foreign aid and social policy the analytical framework developed makes possible to understand the neoclassical gradualist model from a new and more enlightening perspective we are better able to comprehend the complexities involved and the disagreements about the reform process the adoption of a gradual process of transition did not only involve specifying the required policies of a successful transition but also entailed a process a sequence by which the reforms should be introduced as such a process of transition consistent with the policies recommended by the neoclassical gradualists economists is developed the conclusion reveals the inconsistencies in the model copyright blackwell publishers ltd 2005

innovation strategies matter latin america s middle income trap meets china and globalisation productive transformation from commodity production to higher value added activities is at the heart of the transition from a middle income to a high income economy the key is the development of d

absorptive capacity socially enabling mechanisms and the role of learning from trial and error experiments a tribute to dan levinthal s contribution to international business research the concept of absorptive capacity ac of firms cohen and levinthal 1989 and 1990 is a foundational feature of organizational learning and adaptation that has had enormous influence in international business ib and innovation studies and management research in general in this tribute to dan levinthal we discuss the close connection between ac and learning two areas central to dan levinthal s research in relation to different contexts where ac comes into play in extant ib research we discuss four specific aspects of the nexus of ac and learning in the context of ib 1 bridging between intra and inter firm learning 2 a routine based framing of ac that emphasizes processes and capabilities underlying seeking assimilating and innovation in a global setting 3 the role of socially enabling mechanisms and 4 the logic of learning through trial and error experiments within firms and countries

industrial districts old wine in new bottles harrison b 1992 industrial districts old wine in new bottles reg studies 26 469 483 according to the theory of industrial districts a new wave of economic growth is being led in a number of regions in europe north america and east asia by spatially concentrated networks of mostly small and medium sized enterprises often using flexible production technology and characterized by extensive local interfirm linkages does this amount to a re emergence of the dominance of what urban and regional economists call agglomeration economies over the well known pressures on business to spatially disperse its operations neoclassical economic theorizing from marshall to perroux provides one perspective on the contemporary industrial district phenomenon another is afforded by granovetter s more recent elaboration of the ideas of embedding under and over socialization confronting each of these theoretical approaches with the other leads me to conclude that the industrial district prototypes involv

evolutionary diffusion internal and external methods used to acquire encompassing complementary and incremental technological changes in the lithotripsy industry this study links theories concerning methods that firms use to acquire technology with theories concerning types of technological change we place particular emphasis on interorganizational relationships we predict that firms will often acquire know how needed for encompassing technological change through equity based arrangements with other organizations complementary technological changes through nonequity interorganizational arrangements and incremental changes through internal r d our theory draws on perspectives that emphasize the need to develop new competencies within a business organization and to protect the value of existing competencies our empirical analysis examines methods of technology acquisition that firms have used in the commercialization of medical lithotripters which are devices that fragment stones in the kidney and gall bladder the analysis contributes to a better understanding of how technology acquisition methods vary with the manner in which technological change relates to a firm s existing capabilities the study also helps develop our understanding of the evolutionary processes by which capabilities diffuse through an industry 1998 john wiley sons ltd

on the life cycle metaphor where ecology and economics diverge abstract there is an attractive analogy between nature and industry based on the similarity of natural functions and certain industrial activities for instance animals ingest eat and digest food finally there are metabolic wastes firms are analogous to organisms in several respects insofar as they consume material resources process digest them and produce output products and excrete wastes firms like organisms also compete with each other for resources curiously enough one of the apparent differences between natural and man made systems is actually not one like the industrial system the natural system does not recycle everything however there are at least four real and important differences between the biosphere ecology and the technosphere economy first there is no primary producer in the economic system analogous to what photosynthesizers play in the biosphere inputs to the economy are mostly natural resources capital services and labor second in the economic system output is a heterogeneous mix of manufactured products and services labor in economics is an input but not an output the economic system recycles much less than the ecological system but utilizes a far greater suite of elements in the biosphere there are no products as such growth is tantamount to accumulation of embodied solar exergy in the form of cellulose sugars lipids and proteins the biosphere produces only wastes and more of itself plus dead matter third in the biosphere there are no markets there is no medium of exchange like money and there is nothing analogous to paid labor exchanges are involuntary i e by predation parasitism or theft fourth evolution in nature is driven by differentiation by random mutations of the genome and darwinian selection based on reproductive success in economics differentiation is based on discovery invention and innovation by intelligent economic agents and selection is based on competition at the individual or firm level either way the economic system is not closely analogous to an ecosystem attempts to use ecological concepts in an economic context are often misleading and unjustified the paper discusses the implications of the eco eco mismatch for resource accounting and life cycle analysis

a post consumer waste management model for determining optimal levels of recycling and landfilling the present study examines the optimal recycling rate for municipal solid waste first an optimal control model is developed to account for the physical costs of recycling the social costs of landfilling and consumers environmental preferences second an optimal solution is simulated using waste disposal data from the helsinki region in finland the benefits from recycling are included in the simulation using the results of a recent contingent valuation study the results of the present research suggest that mandates for achieving 50 recycling in municipalities are not far fetched and are both economically and environmentally justified

new economic policies and the diffusion of machine tools in latin america abstract this paper argues that both old and new economic regimes in latin america only partially ensured the successful diffusion of machine tools in the region import substitution policies focused on suppliers with resulting advances in domestic imitative adaptive and innovating capabilities but at high cost for users in expensive and technically inferior machine tools the new economic model nem focus on the user has provided wider availability and lower price of technologies with resulting increases in productivity and efficiency but domestic suppliers cannot establish themselves nor make the technologically crucial jump into the electronics era the paper suggests an approach focusing on the joint upgrading of users and suppliers and proposes policy initiatives aimed at addressing market failure and systemic issues

productivity and employment dynamics of us manufacturing plants abstract this study estimates the plant level dynamics of productivity and employment in the united states we use the annual survey of manufactures from the us census bureau for the period 1972 1997 applying the system generalized method of moments estimation developed by blundell and bond 1998 we find that productivity and employment processes are both strongly persistent

the concept of joint production and ecological economics joint production is suggested as one of the conceptual foundations of ecological economics the notion of joint production springs immediately from the application of thermodynamics and has a long history in economic analysis considerations of joint production give rise to philosophical concerns relating to responsibility and knowledge the concept of joint production is easily comprehensible and is also constitutive and supportive of a range of concepts current in ecological economic thought 2001 elsevier science b v all rights reserved

markets technology and environmental regulation price ambivalence of waste paper in germany abstract we examine the price ambivalence of low quality waste paper grades 1 02 and 1 04 on the german market since 1990 the price of these grades is at times positive and at times negative the underlying reason is the combination of three institutional and technical characteristics of the market i as a result of waste management legislation the supply of waste paper is mostly independent of its price and its demand supply is bounded from below by collection and utilization quotas fixed by the regulation on packaging waste enacted in 1991 ii the only alternative to costly disposal of waste paper by dumping or incineration is its use as a secondary resource in the production of new paper as only the paper industry is capable of using waste paper in a productive manner in significant amount iii yet its use as a substitute for primary inputs is technically limited in this article we describe the technical and institutional conditions leading to price ambivalence and discuss the consequences for supply demand and trade of waste paper

cross sectoral variation in the volatility of plant level idiosyncratic shocks we estimate the volatility of plant level idiosyncratic shocks in u s manufacturing we measure the variation in revenue total factor productivity not explained by either industry or economy wide factors or by establishments characteristics we find that idiosyncratic shocks are much larger than aggregate shocks accounting for about 80 of the overall uncertainty faced by plants plants in the most volatile sector are subject to about six times as much idiosyncratic uncertainty as plants in the least volatile we provide evidence suggesting that idiosyncratic risk is higher in industries where the extent of creative destruction is likely to be greater

a new approach to assessing the technological complexity of different categories of r d with examples from singapore abstract this paper attempts to develop a set of generic questions the answers to which allow any given r d activity to be correctly classified in one or another conventional r d box basic applied development etc such systematic pigeon holing allows latecomer countries to gauge the distance of their r d activity from the world frontier and how policies may be designed to overcome the hurdle that divides applied research and developmental research

toward a new conception of the environment competitiveness relationship accepting a fixed trade off between environmental regulation and competitiveness unnecessarily raises costs and slows down environmental progress studies finding high environmental compliance costs have traditionally focused on static cost impacts ignoring any offsetting productivity benefits from innovation they typically overestimated compliance costs neglected innovation offsets and disregarded the affected industry s initial competitiveness rather than simply adding to cost properly crafted environmental standards can trigger innovation offsets allowing companies to improve their resource productivity shifting the debate from pollution control to pollution prevention was a step forward it is now necessary to make the next step and focus on resource productivity

light emitting diodes and the lighting revolution the emergence of a solid state lighting industry emergence of new industries from evolving technologies is critical to the global economy yet has been relatively understudied due to the paucity of available data this study draws lessons on industry emergence by analyzing how a solid state lighting ssl industry grew out of light emitting diode led technologies that evolved for half a century with participation by tens of thousands of researchers in universities national laboratories and firms using data on publications patents and firms combined with business history we trace the evolution of ssl through a succession of market niches at times a few researchers with unorthodox research approaches made breakthroughs that greatly advanced particular technology trajectories and pushed led research in unexpected directions a succession of led market niches advanced the technology and provided profits to incentivize continuing research while reducing cost and improving efficacy of leds innovating firms developed a thicket of patents and captured substantial profit but were embroiled in extensive litigation that was ultimately resolved through cross licensing a major new generation of lighting products is now disrupting the traditional lighting industry although the leading incumbent lighting firms all invested early and heavily in ssl the industry s future leadership is uncertain

latin america s new economic model micro responses and economic restructuring abstract this paper introduces a special issue on the microeconomics of latin america under the new economic model nem the paper reviews the rationale and policies of the nem and analyzes the impact of the reforms at the macroeconomic sectoral and microeconomic levels at the firm level the contributions to this issue demonstrate that a considerable adjustment process is taking place as sectoral structural change indices demonstrate however this has not resulted in widespread shifts of resources between sectors nor has it resulted in significant improvement in overall employment productivity and growth the authors analyze the reasons for this disjuncture and suggest policy alternatives

economics and the biologists a review of geerat j vermeij s nature an economic history this essay reviews and criticizes vermeij s nature an economic history and places it in the context of evolutionary economics vermeij presents a natural history written in what he considers economic terms and argues that biologists should know more about economics while the exchanges between economics and biology can sometimes be hazardous and misleading quite a bit could be learned by economists from reading this book

institutional voids or organizational resilience business groups innovation and market development in latin america summary the paper compares the innovativeness of group affiliated firms gafs and standalone firms safs and it investigates how country specific institutional factors affect the group innovation relationship the paper analyzes the contrasting predictions of two competing views the institutional voids and the organizational resilience theses the empirical analysis focuses on a large sample of firms in latin america in line with the organizational resilience thesis the results point out that the superior innovation performance of gafs is stronger for national economies with more efficient financial legal and labor market institutions

innovation systems and technological specialization in latin america and the caribbean abstract this paper examines the national systems of innovation nsi of latin american and caribbean lac countries and attempts to assess their performances although it points out at a number of specific successes overall the region s nsi have evolved since their inception in the 1950s into weak entities science and technology institutions and organisations are not fully performing an enabling role links and interactions between government support organisations businesses and academia are tenuous investment in intangibles and human capital is low and public policy is only partially effective the main result of such weakness is that lac countries innovative performance has as measured by the index of the technological specialisation its which relates the world s normalised shares of high to low tech exports with the only exception perhaps of mexico remained stagnant or has fallen and has lost relatively to many countries that started at similar levels twenty years ago

managing r d in technology followers the r d effort even of the largest most technologically advanced developing countries and their most sophisticated firms cannot match that of the major industrial nations or the largest corporations our objective in this paper is to analyse innovation technical change and r d management in technology leaders to build a framework for r d in technology followers outside of those major nations this framework emphasises the importance of specific learning mechanisms and puts forward an argument that in house r d is indeed required in technology followers but a profoundly different type of r d r d units based in the firm can become the location for organised learning the problem solver of last resort in production the in house knowledge store and gatekeeper and the focus for independent design and product development capacity

the narrow moving band the dutch disease and the competitive consequences of mrs thatcher notes on trade in the presence of dynamic scale economies abstract this paper presents a model of trade in which comparative advantage instead of being determined by underlying attributes of countries evolves over time through learning by doing in this model arbitrary patterns of specialization once established tend to become entrenched over time the model sheds light on three widely held views that do not make sense in more conventional models first is the view that temporary protection of selected sectors can permanently alter the pattern of comparative advantage in the protecting country s favor second is the view that seemingly favorable developments such as the discovery of exportable natural resources may lead to a permanent loss of other sectors and reduce welfare in the long run third is the possibility that a temporary overvaluation of a currency due to tight money can lead to a permanent loss of competitiveness in some sectors

evolution roots and influence of the literature on national systems of innovation a bibliometric account the literature on the national systems of innovation nsi is a relatively new field of research that has spread remarkably in the past 20 years this article offers a complementary quantitative description of the state of the art of the literature based on bibliometric methods by explicitly addressing the roots evolution and influence of nsi literature the exercise shows that over time the rate of published articles was quite irregular and that contributions on nsi have not yet converged to an integrated analytical framework although historically detailed descriptions on nsi showed a noticeable increase in the more recent period 2006 2010 analyses using more formal and diversified quantitative methodologies for assessing the performance of nsi remained lacking reflecting its persisting methodological weaknesses the roots of the nsi literature can be found at the core of innovation studies by certain well known scholars in the area of economics of innovation and science policy research even though publications on nsi are falling in relative importance and are highly concentrated on a small set of countries united kingdom denmark and the united states their influence is global they are cited by authors affiliated in organisations around the world notably in latin america and asia such an influence goes far beyond the area of innovation studies and has resonated in fields such as economic geography environmental studies international business and managerial sciences this demonstrates that the nsi literature is not self referential

green electricity in the market place the policy challenge the paper explores the implications of the liberalization of electricity markets in europe and north america for policy means and mechanisms to enhance the market penetration of renewables applying a co evolutionary approach the argument highlights the need for policy intervention to help producers and consumers move out of technological trajectories favoring non renewable electricity on the production side energy generation is locked into the central power station system deriving from more than a hundred years of technological development along a specific system trajectory on the consumption side the locked in effect results from a similarly long experience with electricity provision by monopoly suppliers and the associated lack of consumer choice and responsibility for product differentiation as the analysis shows policy strategies targeting both the production and consumption sides of the electricity market are needed for effective intervention furthermore policy strategies should draw on a clear analysis of the inertia and dynamism underlying the production and consumption of electricity in the light of such evolutionary dynamics the analysis demonstrates the insufficiency of the policy approaches currently employed to foster the market share of renewables based electricity instead the authors suggest a reflexive policy approach to initiate and support a reorientation towards green electricity emphasizing the need for learning and communication between and among societal actors

reconsidering the bayh dole act and the current university invention ownership model abstract the bayh dole act of 1980 provided u s universities with the right to commercialize employees inventions made while engaged in government funded research this paper argues that the current university invention ownership model in which universities maintain de jure ownership of inventions is not optimal either in terms of economic efficiency or for advancing the social interest of rapidly commercializing technology and encouraging entrepreneurship we argue that this model is plagued by ineffective incentives information asymmetries and contradictory motivations for the university the inventors potential licensees and university technology licensing offices tlos these structural uncertainties can lead to delays in licensing misaligned incentives among parties and obstacles to the flow of scientific information and the materials necessary for scientific progress the institutional arrangements within which tlos are embedded have encouraged some of them to become revenue maximizers rather than facilitators of technology dissemination for the good of the entire society we suggest two alternative invention commercialization models as superior alternatives the first alternative is to vest ownership with the inventor who could choose the commercialization path for the invention for this privilege the inventor would provide the university an ownership stake in any returns to the invention the inventor would be free to contract with the university tlo or any other entity that might assist in commercialization the second alternative is to make all inventions immediately publicly available through a public domain strategy or through a requirement that all inventions be licensed non exclusively both alternatives would address the current dysfunctional arrangements in university technology commercialization

a technology gap interpretation of growth paths in asia and latin america abstract this paper presents a north south technology gap model which combines the schumpeterian approach to technical and structural change with the keynesian perspective on effective demand and the balance of payments bop constraint as drivers of growth three are the contributions of the paper first it develops a model in which the technology gap relative productivity and relative wages co evolve and may generate different paths of convergence or divergence between south and north depending on the parameters of the model second the parameters of the model are associated with different types of policies which allows for discussing how these policies may change the growth path finally the model is used to discuss the contrasting experiences of asia and latin america since 1970 convergence in asia and divergence in latin america have been extensively debated topics in the literature on comparative economic development which highlights the crucial role of industrial policy it is argued that the results of the technology gap model are consistent with the findings of this literature and helps understand the forces behind convergence and divergence

a critical realist interpretation of evolutionary growth theorising the article discusses a critical realist interpretation of evolutionary growth theorising by focusing on some of its basic characteristics the evolutionary ontology is complex differentiated structured systemic open ever changing and radically uncertain its methodology tends to be increasingly based on appreciative theorising retroductive explanations and interdisciplinary analysis after discussing these features the article suggests that critical realism may indeed constitute an important philosophical and methodological foundation for the future development of evolutionary theories of economic growth

industrial ecology and the rediscovery of inter firm recycling linkages historical evidence and policy implications industrial ecology is one of the most influential perspectives to have emerged in recent years in the wider discourse on sustainable development the vast majority of industrial ecologists believe that past economic development was characterized by a linear system of extraction use and disposal one of their main goals is therefore to find ways to make modern industrial economies mimic ecosystems by transforming the waste of one firm into the valuable input of another historical evidence presented in this article however demonstrates that inter firm recycling linkages were a dominant characteristic of past economic development if this was the case why do most writers on sustainability believe otherwise i suggest two broad categories of explanation a lack of research into the spontaneous formation of inter firm recycling linkages and the progressive and cumulative implementation of market distortions and regulatory barriers to resource recovery over the last century one implication of these findings is that the most important task facing industrial ecologists is probably not the technical challenge of planning resource recovery between firms but the development of an institutional framework that forces firms to internalize their externalities while leaving them the necessary freedom to develop new and profitable uses for by products copyright 2002 oxford university press

evolutionary policies for sustainable development adaptive flexibility and risk minimising abstract an evolutionary perspective on policies to foster sustainable development is presented it is argued that policies suggested by the traditional economic theory of environmental policy can stimulate unsustainable socio economic structures and patterns in addition they are unable to remove undesired locked in systems and technologies drawing on evolutionary thinking characterised by diversity selection innovation path dependence and bounded rationality an alternative partly complementary theory of environmental policy is suggested specific attention is given to the role of strategies that are aimed at increasing diversity and adaptive flexibility and at reducing risk

national innovation systems and the intermediary role of industry associations in building institutional capacities for innovation in developing countries a critical review of the literature abstract developed over the past three decades the national innovation system concept nis has been widely used by both scholars and policy makers to explain how interactions between a set of distinct nationally bounded institutions supports and facilitates technological change and the emergence and diffusion of new innovations this concept provides a framework by which developing countries can adopt for purposes of catching up initially conceived on structures and interactions identified in economically advanced countries the application of the nis concept to developing countries has been gradual and has coincided in the nis literature with a move away from overly macro interpretations to an emphasis on micro level interactions and processes with much of this work questioning the nation state as the most appropriate level of analysis as well as the emergence of certain intermediary actors thought to facilitate knowledge exchange between actors and institutions this paper reviews the nis literature chronologically showing how this shift in emphasis has diminished somewhat the importance of both institutions particularly governments and the political processes of institutional capacity building in doing so the paper suggests that more recent literature on intermediaries such as industry associations may offer valuable insights to how institutional capacity building occurs and how it might be directed particularly in the context of developing countries where governance capacities are often lacking contributing to less effective innovation systems stagnant economies and unequal development

a coevolutionary understanding of agroenvironmental change a case study of a rural community in brazil abstract this paper studies the coevolutionary ecological economic dynamics of agro environmental change the case study is santa rosa brazil and the modernization of subsistence agriculture followed by the more recent emergence of organic farming we use coevolution as an integrative framework for explaining how and why economic production changed over time in santa rosa in interdependence with the ecosystem resulting in a mosaic of diverse farm practices a coevolutionary framework expands the explanatory breadth of prevailing accounts of agro environmental change that rely on a notion of shifts from one singular homogeneous production economy to the next it unveils the complex processes driving agro environmental change instead of focusing on the structures resulting from it

the national system of innovation in historical perspective contrary to some recent work on so called globalisation this paper argues that national and regional systems of innovation remain an essential domain of economic analysis their importance derives from the networks of relationships which are necessary for any firm to innovate whilst external international connections are certainly of growing importance the influence of the national education system industrial relations technical and scientific institutions government policies cul tural traditions and many other national institutions is fundamental the historical examples of germany japan and the former ussr illustrate this point as well as the more recent contrast between east asian and latin american countries introduction the national system of friedrich list according to this author s recollections the first person to use the expression national system of innovation was bengt ake lundvall and he is also the editor of a highly original and thought provoking book 1992 on this subject however as he and his colleagues would be the first to agree and as lundvall himself points out the idea actually goes back at least to friedrich list s conception of the national system of political economy 1841 which might just as well have been called the national system of innovation the main concern of list was with the problem of germany overtaking england and for underdeveloped countries as germany then was in relation to england he advocated not only protection of infant industries but a broad range of policies designed to accelerate or to make possible industrialisation and economic growth most of these policies were concerned with learning about new technology and applying it the racialist and colonialist overtones of the book were in strong contrast to the inter nationalist cosmopolitan approach of the classical free trade economists and list s belief that holland and denmark should join the german bund and acquire german nationality because of their descent and whole character reads somewhat strangely in the european community of today nevertheless despite these unattractive features of his outlook he clearly anticipated many contemporary theories after reviewing the changing ideas of economists about development in the years since the second world war the world bank 1991 concludes that it is intangible investment in knowledge accumulation which is decisive rather than physical capital investment as was at one time believed pages 33 35 the report cites the new growth theory

technology and innovation an introduction the fields of trade growth and innovation have all increased in importance within the economics literature over the 1980s and 1990s with one of the key developments being the renewed attempts to integrate the role of technical change into the analysis of trade and economic growth for too long technology received scant attention from economists although several works studied its impact on variables such as growth productivity employment and competitiveness much less attention was devoted to understanding the sources and determinants of technological change itself hence joan robinson s remark that economists still treated technology as if it were provided by god and the engineers this special issue of the cambridge economics contains fresh contributions on the economics of trade growth and innovation and in particular on the investigation of technology as a driving force for economic growth and international competitiveness c 1995 academic press inc copyright 1995 by oxford university press

developments in non expected utility theory the hunt for a descriptive theory of choice under risk this article reviews recent developments in the economic theory of individual decision making under risk since the 1950s it has been known that individual choices violate the standard model of expected utility in predictable ways considerable research effort has now been devoted to the project of developing a superior descriptive model following an overview of non expected utility theories which distinguishes between conventional and non conventional approaches the paper seeks to assess these alternative models in terms of empirical success using laboratory and field data and theoretical usefulness the closing sections reflect on some new directions emerging in this literature

the evolution of new industries and the determinants of market structure several empirical regularities concerning firm growth rates and industry firm size distributions have been developed by studying primarily mature industries the primary purpose of this article is to bring together and extend empirical regularities on the evolution of new industries and to use these regularities to gain further insight into the forces governing industry evolution to explain these regularities a model is constructed which emphasizes how factors governing the early evolution of industries may shape their market structure at maturity it stresses how chance events and exogenous factors that influence the number of potential entrants to the industry the growth rate of incumbents and the ease of imitation of industry leaders will influence the ultimate number and size distribution of firms in the industry

selection and variation in organizational evolution many organizational populations display increasing variation over time in characteristics thought to be central to survival as we show here for hard disk drive producers we develop a simple model that might account for this pattern in it technological advance follows a trajectory consistent with a proportionate random process akin to a gibrat process that favors technology leaders but only stochastically we demonstrate through computer simulations that evolution in an organizational population with selection favoring a characteristic evolving as a proportionate random process can under plausible conditions generate increased variation over time copyright 2012 the author 2011 published by oxford university press on behalf of associazione icc all rights reserved oxford university press

efficiency gains within firms under voluntary environmental initiatives this paper focuses on efficiency gains that voluntary environmental initiatives may achieve within the firm current debate concerning the extent and significance of inefficiencies within firms is critically important to the progress of energy and environmental policies several recent lines of inquiry in microeconomics help explain the persistence of inefficiencies within firms in addition two of the most prominent new approaches in the field of business strategy resource based strategy and the capabilities perspective focus on the heterogeneity among firms and the resulting pockets of inefficiency within firms they suggest at least three generic strategies for voluntary environmental initiatives challenging outdated organizational routines creating opportunities for differentiation or complementing firms resource investment trajectories these generic approaches suggest that there is considerable scope for further experimentation with voluntary environmental initiatives

recent evolutionary theorizing about economic change this famous passage from marshall s principles of economics it first appeared in the fifth edition which came out in 1907 nicely brings out two issues which are as germane to economics today as they were when marshall wrote the first is the heavy reliance by economists in their formal theorizing on the notion of equilibrium the other is the appeal that biological conceptions3x201d have for many economists particularly when their focus is on economic change

evolution in the finitely repeated prisoner s dilemma abstract this paper examines some aspects of evolutionary dynamic behavior in the finitely repeated prisoner s dilemma the fitness of cooperation found in the best known simulation of this type that by robert axelrod stems from strategy set restrictions the game used for the simulation has a continuum of pure cooperation equilibria and no pure defection equilibrium some new simulations are presented here for the finitely repeated game although cooperation is ultimately exploited and extinguished dynamic paths can pseudo converge in ways that allow partial cooperation to flourish for extended periods of time

sectoral systems of innovation and production the concept sectoral system of innovation and production provides a multidimensional integrated and dynamic view of sectors it is proposed that a sectoral system is a set of products and the set of agents carrying out market and non market interactions for the creation production and sale of those products a sectoral systems has a specific knowledge base technologies inputs and demand agents are individuals and organizations at various levels of aggregation they interact through processes of communication exchange co operation competition and command and these interactions are shaped by institutions a sectoral system undergoes change and transformation through the co evolution of its various elements 2002 elsevier science b v all rights reserved

public policies and changing boundaries of firms in a history friendly model of the co evolution of the computer and semiconductor industries in this paper we explore the effects of alternative policies ranging from antitrust to public procurement open standards information diffusion and basic research support on the dynamics of two vertically related industries in changing and uncertain technological and market environments the two industries are a system industry and a component industry and the evolution of these industries is characterized by periods of technological revolutions punctuating periods of relative technological stability and smooth technical progress we have been inspired by the co evolution of the computer and component industries from their inceptions to the 1980s on the basis of that evolution we have developed a history friendly model this co evolution in sum this paper has stressed that various types of policies may sometimes have contrasting effects on the industry mainly on concentration and technical change and innovation it has also shown that the consequences of policies may spillover from one industry to another and from one type of firms to another policies that aim at a specific industry may provoke major changes in a related industry through the product market the changing boundaries of firms or knowledge and technological interdependencies the policy maker has to be aware of that finally a major point of the paper regards the unintended consequences of policies

knowledge and competitive advantage the coevolution of firms technology and national institutions this issue of jibs offers reviews of two books that analyse the dynamic interaction between the business environments and business strategies in very different ways the institutional underpinnings for business strategies are a major research topic for comparative management aiming to explain why in different contexts firms pursue different strategies and with different implications for performance j peter murman in knowledge and competitive advantage takes a historical perspective focusing on the co evolutionary processes between national innovation systems business strategies and performance this books thus adds to the industry level longitudinal research reviewed in jibs no 4 2003 tom murtha et al s managing new industry creation and david mckendrick et al s from silicon valley to singapore

changes and trends in the world trade in high technology products high technology industries make special contributions to a nation s long term economic performance and competition among the most advanced countries for high technology production has increased strongly over the past two decades the present paper using an original data base and taxonomy for trade flows in high technology products demonstrates that in the period from 1970 to 1990 there were significant changes in the competitive positions of the united states japan and the former ec now eu countries japan undoubtedly achieved the highest gains whereas us competitiveness has experienced a process of relative decline and eu industry has suffered sharp losses in domestic and international markets particu larly in electronics this general evolution however has been sharply differentiated with respect to the various product groups included in the high technology category the evidence of the paper seems to suggest that these changes constitute long term competitive trends and may be attributed to structural factors as well as to macroeconomic and exchange rate fluctuations

schumpeterian dynamics part ii technological progress firm growth and economic selection abstract business firms strive for survival and growth they innovate in order to grow they imitate in order to survive the purpose of this paper the second in the series on schumpeterian dynamics is to construct a simple mathematical model which is capable of studying the evolution of an industry s state of technology as a dynamic outcome of the interactions among innovation imitation and capacity growth at the micro level of firms the doctrine of economic selection insists by means of the analogy to the biological theory of natural selection that only the most efficient firms will survive the long run competitive struggle for capacity growth indeed if neither innovation nor imitation is possible for the firm a firm or a group of firms which is lucky enough to start with the most efficient technology will outgrow all the other firms in the long run once however the possibility of technological imitation is allowed for the firms the industry will settle down to a static equilibrium of perfect technological knowledge not by the success of the most efficient firms in their striving for the higher growth rate but by the success of the less efficient in their effort to imitate the others the blind force of economic selection is thus outwitted by the human force of imitative activities finally when firms are allowed to innovate in their technology the selective force of market competition is no longer capable of weeding out the less fit even in the long run indeed it is shown in the present paper that the dynamic interplay of the processes of innovation imitation and growth will keep the industry s state of technology from settling down to the static equilibrium but reproduce in the long run a relative dispersion of efficiencies across firms in a statistically balanced form

structural reforms technological gaps and economic development a latin american perspective this paper explores the impact that recent structural reforms have had upon macro to micro linkages as well as upon the pattern of production specialization the entry and exit of firms during the adjustment process and the sources of technical change in the present more open and deregulated latin american macroeconomic scenarios from this exploration a major question emerges is the new market oriented development paradigm sustainable in the long run the interpretation presented in this paper suggests that the present pattern of production specialization strongly biased in favour of industries featuring low domestic knowledge generation and value added content and the inhibition of local r d and engineering activities resulting from the rapid expansion of internationally integrated production systems are pushing latin american economies into a low development trap from which it might prove extremely difficult to escape on the basis exclusively of free market principles copyright 2003 oxford university press

cross sectoral variation in the volatility of plant level idiosyncratic shocks the volatility of plant level idiosyncratic shocks we estimate the volatility of plant level idiosyncratic shocks in u s manufacturing we measure the variation in revenue total factor productivity not explained by either industry or economy wide factors or by establishments characteristics we find that idiosyncratic shocks are much larger than aggregate shocks accounting for about 80 of the overall uncertainty faced by plants plants in the most volatile sector are subject to about six times as much idiosyncratic uncertainty as plants in the least volatile we provide evidence suggesting that idiosyncratic risk is higher in industries where the extent of creative destruction is likely to be greater

systems competition and network effects this paper discusses firm behavior market performance and the public and private institutions that arise in systems markets i e markets where consumers use compatible components together to generate benefits in such markets which include communications networks and hardware software networks popular products are inherently more valuable these network effects can drive corporate strategies and are critical in understanding innovation in many high technology markets the discussion here emphasizes the dynamics of consumer adoption decisions in the presence of network effects competition between incompatible systems and how suppliers choose which components are compatible and which are not

vested interests energy efficiency and renewables in japan this paper sets out to analyze japanese renewable energy policy a default expectation is that countries with unsolved energy problems will have more ambitious renewable energy policies including energy efficiency the japanese case only partially conforms the theoretical proposition made here is that it is essential to analyze a country s vested interest structure before we can make any inferences about its renewable energy policies the vested interest perspective derived from a combination of joseph schumpeter and mancur olson and focusing on structural economic change both complements and rivals the default expectation structural economic change like the rise of renewables typically leads to resistance from the existing vested interest structure which feels that it stands to lose from the rise of new industries the position of a new industry vis a vis the existing vested interest structure is thus crucial in the japanese case the solar industry has been far more on the inside of this structure than wind this has made it far harder for the wind industry to rise than for solar energy efficiency is however the ultimate insider approach to energy policy not challenging any vested interest structures and has been the favored approach for over three decades

wasted waste an evolutionary perspective on industrial by products abstract every production process gives rise to unintended outputs we argue that whether an output is desired or undesired is not given per se but depends on the economic circumstances which change over time as a result by products of one industry first perceived as non marketable wastes may become desired inputs into other production processes by adopting an evolutionary perspective on economic dynamics in particular by exploiting the concept of niche exclusion we identify favorable circumstances for undesired outputs to become marketable to cope with the pace and unpredictability of economic evolution we argue for a flexible policy system which favors outcome over process oriented waste management policies and balances the responsibility between consumers and producers on the one side and the society as a whole on the other side

introduction to the special issue on agent based computational economics abstract a brief overview of agent based computational economics ace is given followed by a synopsis of the articles included in this special issue on ace and in a companion special issue on ace scheduled to appear in computational economics