Governments and regional authorities often express the belief that the key to prosperity and economic expansion is related to the ability of countries to sustain regional clusters of competitiveness and innovation. The book reviews the most important conceptual approaches to the analysis of the
emergence, growth and evolution of clusters of innovation. Drawing from the different experiences of industrial districts and high-tech regions such as Silicon Valley, Boston's biotech region, and Hsinchu-Taipei, the contributions in this book offer a broad interpretative framework and policy
implications for the creation and strengthening of competitive clusters.
Themes include:
* the wide variety of existing clusters and the diversity in their emergence and growth;
* the international mobility of factors and demand linkages;
* the role of different
network types and the social setting;
* the accumulation of capabilities in key large actors and the importance of spinoffs and new firm formation;
* the role of different learning regimes and sectoral specificities;
* the importance of social networks, labour mobility, and
face-to-face contacts as vehicles of knowledge spillovers.
Broad implications are drawn for the design of policies to encourage successful economic clusters in developed and developing clusters.
Stefano Breschi and Franco Malerba: Introduction: Clusters, Networks, and Innovation: Research Results and New Directions
Part I: New Perspectives on Clusters and Networks
1. Robin Cowan: Network Models of Innovation and Knowledge Diffusion
2. Giulio Bottazzi, Giorgio Fagiolo,
and Giovanni Dosi: On Sectoral Specificities in the Geography of Corporate Location
3. Philip Cooke: Regional Knowledge Capabilities and Open Innovation: Regional Innovation Systems and Cluster in the Asymmetric Knowledge Economy
Part II: Emergence of Clusters and
Entrepreneurship
4. Timothy Breshanan, Alfonso Gambardella, and AnnaLee Saxenian: 'Old Economy' Inputs for 'New Economy' Outcomes: Cluster Formation in the New Silicon Valleys
5. Maryann P. Feldman: The Entrepreneurial Event Revisited: Firm Formation in a Regional Context
6. Mark H.
Lazerson and Gianni Lorenzoni: The Firms that Feed Industrial Districts: A Return to the Italian Source
7. Steven Klepper: Employee Startups in High-Tech Industries
Part III: Institutions, Local Communities, National and International Networks
8. AnnaLee Saxenian and Jinn-Yuh Hsu:
The Silicon Vally-Hsinchu Connection: Technical Communities and Industrial Upgrading
9. Kellye Porter, Kjersten Bunker Whittington, and Walter W. Powell: The Institutional Embeddedness of High-Tech Regions: Relational Foundations of the Boston Biotechnology Community
10. Olav Sorenson:
Social Networks and the Persistence of Clusters: Evidence from the Computer Workstation Industry
Part IV: Localization of Knowledge Spillovers
11. Micahel Storper and Anhony J. Venables: Buzz: Face-to-face Contact and the Urban Economy
12. Stefano Breschi, Francesco Lissoni, and
Fabio Montobbio: The Geography of Knowledge Spillovers: Conceptual Issues and Measurement Problems
13. James D. Adams: Comparative Localizattion of Academic and Industrial Spillovers
Part V: Public Policies Towards Clusters
14. Peter Maskell: Towards a Knowledge-Based Theory of
the Geographical Cluster
15. Ron Martin and Peter Sunley: Deconstructing Clusters: Chaotic Concept or Policy Panacea
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Stefano Breschi is an Associate Professor of Applied Economics at Università L.Bocconi and a member of the Board of Directors at Cespri-Bocconi, Milan, Italy. He has published in various international journals. His main research interests concern economics of innovation, industrial economics,
industrial dynamics, regional economics, networks and clusters, industrial and technology policy. Franco Malerba is Full Professor of Industrial Economics at Università L.Bocconi. He is Director of CESPRI (Center for Research on Innovation and Internationalization) at Bocconi University. He has
been president of the International Schumpeter Society and is currently president of EARIE (European Association for Research in Industrial Economics). He is Editor of the journal Industrial and Corporate Change, and Associate Editor of Research Policy and the Journal of Evolutionary Economics. He
has published various books and several papers in various international journals. His main research interests concern economics of innovation, industrial economics, industrial dynamics, international competitiveness, and technology policy.
Making Sense - Margot Northey and Joan McKibbin
