Innovation Goes Global

Abstract

By taking a U.S.-national approach to innovative capabilities and comparing the present with the postwar period, W. B. Bonvillian (“Advanced manufacturing policies and paradigms for innovation,” Policy Forum, 6 December 2013, p. [1173][1]) ignores the truly transformational change that has occurred over the past several decades: the growth of the global science system. The critical knowledge needed to innovate into the next generation of production is increasingly distributed across the globe, and it is just as likely to be located in India or China as in Ohio. The Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development reports that the growth in the number of triadic patents demonstrates the worldwide spread of innovative activities ([ 1 ][2]). U.S. researchers are actively tapping this global resource by collaborating with researchers from many other countries. The global network of international links (drawn from coauthorships on publications) has tripled in density over the past 20 years ([ 2 ][3]), with many new members joining the global network from developing countries, particularly China. Chinese addresses now appear more frequently than any other country in publications coauthored with U.S. researchers. Scientific globalization does not threaten an end to U.S. excellence in innovation; quite the opposite. The diffusion and rooting of scientific capacity to new places provides opportunity for greater efficiency in research activities, particularly by removing redundancy. Creative problem-solving can be enhanced by having new entrants grapple with technological challenges, as many U.S. companies are finding as they invest in foreign research. Culturally tied knowledge is often important to market access in foreign countries. These goods require a deliberate policy shift on the part of U.S. agencies from pushing knowledge creation to fomenting knowledge scanning and integration. Scanning the globe for the best new knowledge and ensuring local uptake is the more promising approach to closing the gaps in U.S. know-how than building a U.S.-only R&D effort, as Bonvillian suggests. 1. [↵][4] OECD, OECD Science, Technology and Industry Scoreboard 2013 (OECD Publishing, Paris, 2013). 2. [↵][5] 1. L. Leydesdorff, 2. C. Wagner , J. Informetrics 2, 317 (2008). [OpenUrl][6][CrossRef][7][Web of Science][8] [1]: /lookup/doi/10.1126/science.1242210 [2]: #ref-1 [3]: #ref-2 [4]: #xref-ref-1-1 View reference 1 in text [5]: #xref-ref-2-1 View reference 2 in text [6]: {openurl}?query=rft.jtitle%253DJ.%2BInformetrics%26rft.volume%253D2%26rft.spage%253D317%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Adoi%252F10.1016%252Fj.joi.2008.07.003%26rft.genre%253Darticle%26rft_val_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Ajournal%26ctx_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ctx_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Actx [7]: /lookup/external-ref?access_num=10.1016/j.joi.2008.07.003&link_type=DOI [8]: /lookup/external-ref?access_num=000260903700007&link_type=ISI