Handbook on the Economic Complexity of Technological Change

by Cristiano Antonelli

Overview

This comprehensive and innovative Handbook applies the tools of the economics of complexity to analyze the causes and effects of technological and structural change. It grafts the intuitions of the economics of complexity into the tradition of analysis based upon the Schumpeterian and Marshallian legacies.

The Handbook elaborates the notion of innovation as an emerging property of the organized complexity of an economic system, and provides the basic tools to understand the recursive dynamics between the emergence of innovation and the unfolding of organized complexity. In so doing, it highlights the role of organizational thinking in explaining the introduction of innovations and the dynamics of structural change.

With a new methodological approach to the economics of technological change, this wide-ranging volume will become the standard reference for postgraduates, academics and practitioners in the fields of evolutionary economics, complexity economics and the economics of innovation.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781848442566
Publisher:	Edward Elgar Publishing
Publication date:	08/30/2011
Series:	Elgar Original Reference Series
Pages:	576
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 9.60(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Edited by Cristiano Antonelli, Professor of Economics, Department of Economics and Statistics "Cognetti de Martiis", University of Torino and Fellow, Collegio Carlo Alberto, Italy

Table of Contents

Contents:

PART I: INTRODUCTION
1. The Economic Complexity of Technological Change: Knowledge Interaction and Path Dependence
Cristiano Antonelli

PART II: THE ECONOMIC COMPLEXITY OF INNOVATION
2. Complexity and Innovation Dynamics
David A. Lane

3. Complexity in the Theory of the Developing Firm
Harry Bloch and Stan Metcalfe

4. The Persistence of Innovation and Path Dependence
Alessandra Colombelli and Nick von Tunzelmann

5. The Symbiotic Theory of Innovation: Knowledge Creation and the Evolution of the Capitalist System
Martin Fransman

PART III: THE ECONOMIC COMPLEXITY OF KNOWLEDGE
6. Knowledge, Complexity and Networks
Pier Paolo Saviotti

7. The Dynamics of Technological Knowledge: From Linearity to Recombination
Jackie Krafft and Francesco Quatraro

8. Complexity and the Coordination of Technological Knowledge: The Case of Innovation Platforms
Davide Consoli and Pier Paolo Patrucco

9. Causes, Consequences and Dynamics of ‘Complex’ Distributions of Technological Activities: The Case of Prolific Inventors
William Latham and Christian Le Bas

10. The Biomedical Workforce in the US: An Example of Positive Feedbacks
Paula E. Stephan

11. University–Industry Interactions: The Unresolved Puzzle
Isabel Maria Bodas Freitas, Aldo Geuna and Federica Rossi

12. A Functional Theory of Technology and Technological Change
Andrea Bonaccorsi

PART IV: THE ECONOMIC COMPLEXITY OF STRUCTURAL CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT
13. Mesoeconomics: A Unified Approach to Systems Complexity and Evolution
Kurt Dopfer

14. Notes on a Complexity Theory of Economic Development
Koen Frenken and Ron Boschma

15. Innovation Networks: Formation, Performance and Dynamics
Uwe Cantner and Holger Graf

16. The Complex Interaction between Global Production Networks, Digital Information Systems and International Knowledge Transfers
Jarle Hildrum, Dieter Ernst and Jan Fagerberg

17. The Complex Dynamics of Economic Development
Verónica Robert and Gabriel Yoguel

PART V: LESSONS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR ECONOMIC POLICY
18. Coevolution, Emergence and Economic Development: Some Lessons from the Israeli and Mexican Experience
Gabriela Dutrénit and Morris Teubal

19. Network Models of Innovation Process and Policy Implications
Paul Ormerod, Bridget Rosewell and Greg Wiltshire

20. Government as Entrepreneur: Examples from US Technology Policy
Albert N. Link and Jamie R. Link

Index

Editorial Reviews

’Antonelli's handbook is an impressive compendium of theoretical approaches to complexity in economics that has emerged during the last two decades. . . this handbook is an amazing excursus on the state of the art of complexity thinking in the economics of technological change. Not only did the compendium reinforce the achievements of other theory textbooks in this field; it also paves the way for a “normalisation” of complexity in economics. It strongly defends the advantage of operationalization and applied research in economics and touches upon important policy implications. Therefore, it is a must-read both for the scientist and for the policy researcher in the field of innovation and technological change.’

Manfred Paier

The editor of this Handbook, Cristiano Antonelli, is to commended for the high quality of the group of authors he has assembled for this project. They provide excellent coverage of the various areas within the field, covering complexity of innovation, complexity of knowledge, complexity of structural change and development, and lessons and implications for economic policy. This is an important and evolving topic, and this book captures the cutting edge of research on it, particularly in connection with the broader idea of economic complexity. —J. Barkley Rosser, Jr., James Madison University, US

My overall impression of the handbook is very favourable. It gives a broad overview of the different topics addressed by complexity economics, especially with regard to innovation and knowledge management. Knowledge and innovation are treated as the emergent properties of a system in which heterogeneous actors interact in different ways at different levels: the firm (meso), the individual (micro), and society (macro). Both Antonelli s and Bonaccorsi's chapters are treasure troves of concepts and ideas, although not necessarily for the complexity novice. Lane's chapter, however, provides an excellent introduction. . . For researchers in the field of economics and those that are interested in 'complexity in the real world', this handbook provides ample discussion and research roads ahead. —Andreas Ligtvoet, Science and Public Policy

Antonelli's handbook is an impressive compendium of theoretical approaches to complexity in economics that has emerged during the last two decades. . . this handbook is an amazing excursus on the state of the art of complexity thinking in the economics of technological change. Not only did the compendium reinforce the achievements of other theory textbooks in this field; it also paves the way for a ''normalisation'' of complexity in economics. It strongly defends the advantage of operationalization and applied research in economics and touches upon important policy implications. Therefore, it is a must-read both for the scientist and for the policy researcher in the field of innovation and technological change. —Manfred Paier, Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation

From the Publisher

‘A series of in-depth critical insights on the nature and role of organizational thinking and the dynamics of structural change are discussed in a new methodological approach that provides academics with a scholarly discussion of evolutionary economics. . . The editor. . . provides an international symposium of collected research and knowledge key to any college-level discussion of technology and economics.’

The Midwest Book Review

‘. . . My overall impression of the Handbook is very favourable. It gives a broad overview of the different topics addressed by complexity economics, especially with regard to innovation and knowledge management. Knowledge and innovation are treated as the emergent properties of a system in which heterogeneous actors interact in different ways at different levels: the firm (meso), the individual (micro), and society (macro). Both Antonelli’s and Bonaccorsi’s chapters are treasure troves of concepts and ideas, although not necessarily for the complexity novice. Lane’s chapter, however, provides an excellent introduction. . . For researchers in the field of economics and those that are interested in ‘complexity in the real world’, this Handbook provides ample discussion and research roads ahead.’

Andreas Ligtvoet

‘The editor of this Handbook, Cristiano Antonelli, is to be commended for the high quality of the group of authors he has assembled for this project. They provide excellent coverage of the various areas within the field, covering complexity of innovation, complexity of knowledge, complexity of structural change and development, and lessons and implications for economic policy. This is an important and evolving topic, and this book captures the cutting edge of research on it, particularly in connection with the broader idea of economic complexity.’

J. Barkley Rosser