A new model of technological learning for Russia

Abstract

Today's Russian economy is relatively open to trade and investment but remains largely isolated from any inflows of foreign scientific and technological knowledge. Continued technological isolation undermines the competitiveness of Russian civilian exports and pushes its economy and politics back to its old orientation toward oil and military industries. Helping Russia to integrate with the global knowledge economy can help prevent this undesirable scenario. Depending on the level of indigenous scientific and technological capacity in its particular industries, Russia would be well advised to rely on the ‘creative-cooperative’, ‘autonomous’ or ‘active FDI-dependent’ models of national technological learning practiced by the most advanced and the fast-learning developing countries. We use a new technique of analysis and visualization developed by one of us (TS), building on earlier work by the late Sanjaya Lall (2000) to discuss the choice of strategies that Russia has on its way to economic diversification. Copyright , Beech Tree Publishing.