Introduction to the Handbook

Bronwyn Hall and Nathan Rosenberg

Chapter Chapter 1 in Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, 2010, vol. 1, pp 3-9 from Elsevier

Abstract: In the chapters of the book Economics of Innovation, Volume 1, it is clear that this basic understanding of the importance of internally generated economic change for the progress of the economy and the weaknesses of static economic analysis in the face of this phenomenon occupies much of the research in innovation economics. A number of themes common to at least several of the chapters touch on this and related ideas. The first and perhaps the most important theme is the essential dynamism of the innovative process—knowledge, inventions, and innovations created today build on those created in the past, and the benefits of an innovation are often not felt until it undergoes a dynamic, cumulative learning and diffusion process. An understanding of this phenomenon underlies almost all of the chapters and is perhaps most obvious in those by Thompson on learning by doing, Bresnahan on general-purpose technologies, Teece on the innovative firm, and Stoneman and Battista on diffusion.

Date: 2010
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:haechp:v1_3

DOI: 10.1016/S0169-7218(10)01001-4

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