Centre for Innovation Research Seminar: Unlocking regional futures – Networks, Institutions, and Governance

Abstract:
In this talk, he depart from the puzzling observation that many models in economic geography seeking to explain innovation and development through structural conditions of the regional economy, have underdelivered even for understanding past development. How, then, can economic geographers effectively look ahead into the future? Innovation changes games in ways that shift power, privilege and profits. Yet, these shifts trigger resistance by the incumbent and often lock innovations into niches. I argue that rather than being determined by regional hardware, regional futures are contingent upon the workings of the ‘orgware’, i.e. the place-specificity of the social process. Building on a relational approach to economic geography, I propose three conceptual takes on this process – networks, institutions, and governance – and I discuss each of these approaches in the context of an empirical case to illustrate how relational and institutional work actually support innovation even in the face of resistance. He close with implications for the generic strategies of how to unlock innovation from controversy and resistance.