Token endeavors: The significance of academic spin-offs in technology transfer and research policy in Germany

Andreas Knie and Martin Lengwiler

Science and Public Policy, 2008, vol. 35, issue 3, 171-182

Abstract: Based on the principal-agent theory, this paper analyses the historical emergence of policies supporting spin-off activities since the end of the Second World War, focusing on Germany as an exemplary case study. It argues that the significance of spin-offs in research policy is not an effect of their hard-and-fast number or their direct economic impacts but rather of their symbolic meaning, providing legitimacy for academic institutions and funding agencies in controversial public debates about science and technological policies. Spin-offs, like technology transfer at large, are important to the rationale and legitimacy of science and research policy. Copyright , Beech Tree Publishing.

Date: 2008
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.3152/030234208X302661 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:scippl:v:35:y:2008:i:3:p:171-182

Access Statistics for this article

Science and Public Policy is currently edited by Nicoletta Corrocher, Jeong-Dong Lee, Mireille Matt and Nicholas Vonortas

More articles in Science and Public Policy from Oxford University Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().