International Knowledge Networks Research Articles

International research networks: Determinants of country embeddedness

Research activities are increasingly global so that embeddedness in international knowledge networks is decisive for inventive and innovative performance. We analyze determinants of countries’ embeddedness in the global photovoltaics knowledge network for the period 1980–2015 and argue that positions in this network are determined by the structure and functionality of national research systems and by instruments within the policy-mix for renewable energies. We show that cohesion and connectedness of the national research system positively affect international embeddedness, whereas centralized systems are detrimental to embeddedness. This indicates that a diffusion oriented research system allows better access to international knowledge flows. Policy instruments, especially demand side instruments, show a positive effect on embeddedness.

German Missionaries and Australian Anthropology

ABSTRACTIn their primary task of converting Indigenous Australians to Christianity, German missions active in various parts of Australia through the nineteenth and into the twentieth century recorded relatively few successes. On the other hand, their endeavours in observing and recording Aboriginal languages and cultures have left a rich – and yet frequently overlooked – anthropological legacy. A common element in that legacy is their work in the area of linguistics, which they understood to be a necessary foundation for their evangelical work. Nonetheless, caution must be exercised in evaluating the German missionary contribution to Australian anthropology according to either national or religious paradigms. German anthropology, as practised within the community of missionaries and outside, evinces a variety of theoretical and methodological approaches. Moreover German anthropologists, including missionaries, were by the late nineteenth century connected into international knowledge networks.

La Universidad de Buenos Aires y la interdisciplina

En este trabajo se repasan las distintas formas institucionales que adquirieron las iniciativas interdisciplinarias en la Universidad de Buenos Aires desde la vuelta al estado de derecho en Argentina en 1983. Entre tales iniciativas se destaca en primera instancia la experiencia interdisciplinaria desplegada por el Centro de Estudios Avanzados (cea). Se caracterizan las adecuaciones que con llevó en las universidades la orientación neoliberal del gobierno nacional en la década de 1990, donde la opción por la interdisciplina se articuló con la conformación de alianzas y redes de cooperación con sectores extrauniversitarios, tanto de la esfera empresarial privada como de instancias gubernamentales más amplias. Aún cuando el cea dejó de funcionar en 2003 como tal, se muestra que la promoción de la interacción interdisciplinaria ya no dejaría de figurar en la agenda de la uba, primero con la creación de los Programas Intersdisciplinarios de la ubay luego con su incorporación como variante específica de la programación regular del sistema de investigación científica de la Secretaría de Ciencia y Técnica de la universidad.

Coordinating Complex Work: Knowledge Networks, Partner Departures, and Client Relationship Performance in a Law Firm

The mobility of individual managers has long presented a problem for firms in knowledge-intensive industries. Shifting to more complex work often reduces the importance of a single individual’s knowledge for the firm’s exchange relationships because complex work requires inputs from a broader set of the firm’s members. Although complex work decreases the likelihood that a single individual can shift the exchange relationship to another firm, we propose that it increases the vulnerability of the firm’s performance to departures of those individual managers who act as coordinators of knowledge. This leads us to focus on how the internal knowledge network formed to maintain each relationship can compound or mitigate the loss of a coordinating manager. Using original data on client relationships from a law firm, we examine the effect of internal knowledge networks and lead partner departures on the performance of the relationships. Supporting our argument, we find that the negative performance effect of a lead partner departure is greater when the network has high knowledge heterogeneity and involves more experts and lower when the network has high cohesion. This paper was accepted by Jesper Sørensen, organizations.

Towards a location sensitive R&D policy. Local buzz, spatial concentration and specialisation as a challenge for urban planning – Empirical findings from the life sciences and ICT clusters in Vienna

Against the background of the increasing relevance of international co-operation and knowledge networks, the relevance of local buzz for R&D activities is being called into doubt. This has implications for urban R&D policies, as local milieus, face-to-face contacts and proximity are key factors of an urban economy. Based on the case of Vienna, it is the intention of this paper to explore the extent of spatial proximity and the role of urban R&D policy. When examining the spatial structure of 1363 R&D units, two relevant clusters (life sciences and ICT) can be identified by a quantitative GIS analysis. Furthermore, a qualitative survey gives insights into the relevance of R&D policies and their spatial implications. The findings clearly show that urban stakeholders have to consider the location sensitivity of R&D actors as well as the need for specialisation in academic niches.

Organizing for knowledge generation: internal knowledge networks and the contingent effect of external knowledge sourcing

Research summary: When faced with a new technological paradigm, incumbent firms can opt for internal development and/or external sourcing to obtain the necessary new knowledge. We explain how the effectiveness of external knowledge sourcing depends on the properties of internal knowledge production. We apply a social network lens to delineate interpersonal, intra‐firm knowledge networks and capture the emergence of two important firm‐level properties: the incumbent's internal potential for knowledge recombination and the level of knowledge coordination costs. We rely on firm‐level internal knowledge networks to dynamically track the emergence of these properties across 106 global pharmaceutical companies over a 25‐year time period. We find that a firm's success in developing knowledge in a new technological paradigm using external knowledge sourcing is contingent on these internal knowledge properties.Managerial summary: Incumbent firms in high‐tech industries often face competence‐destroying technological change. In their effort to adapt and develop new knowledge in a novel paradigm, incumbent firms have several corporate strategy options available to them: internal knowledge development and a wide array of external knowledge sourcing strategies, including alliances and acquisitions. In this study, we make an effort to address a critical question: How effective is external knowledge sourcing under different internal knowledge generation regimes? We find that external sourcing strategies are less effective when firms can already internally generate new knowledge or if they have high internal coordination costs. Therefore, when considering external sourcing, managers must carefully weigh the benefits of it vis‐à‐vis its commensurate costs as the benefits of external sourcing may be overstated. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

What Determines Enterprises’ Perceptions of Future Development in Higher Education – Strange Bedfellows?

In the last few decades, global changes such as an ever more integrated world economy, new technologies or the emergence of an international knowledge network have increasingly determined developments in European higher education. Policymakers have addressed these challenges using processes that support the practical orientation of higher education, including university‐business cooperation. Because employers are becoming important stakeholders and partners in the creation of higher education policy, the future developers of higher education need to know what employers expect of future development and whether they will meet or resist those expectations when it comes to their input. In this article, we identify the areas that need to be improved upon and examine the ways in which employers’ experiences with higher education determine their perceptions of it. Building on the EMCOSU (Emerging Modes of Cooperation between Private Sector Organisations and Universities) survey, we analysed the responses of professionals of 397 companies based in five European countries. The analysis indicated that the level at which companies participated in university‐business cooperation strongly influenced their perception of the way higher education institutions should develop. To be precise, those with greater experience in university‐business cooperation pressed for more strategic cooperation between universities and business, more support for the international orientation of academic institutions, and less attention to the immediate valorisation of applied research, practical orientation and short‐term skill development.

Demonstration projects in transition processes to sustainable energy and transport

In this paper, an analysis was made of the role of public support schemes funding demonstration, test and trial activities for sustainable development in energy and road transport. This paper presents the analysis of the effects of demonstration projects in transition processes to sustainable energy and transport in the Scandinavian countries on the development of knowledge networks and on interaction with users. The main purpose of this paper is: (1) to analyse the role of publically funded demonstration projects concerning changes in knowledge networks of project participants over time; (2) analysing policy priorities in collaboration by the public funding programmes. The paper addresses following research questions: (1) How successful are Scandinavian demonstration projects in contributing to the development of knowledge networks for sustainable energy and transport transitions? (2) Do Scandinavian demonstration programmes prioritise learning in international knowledge networks and user involvement? (3) How have demonstration projects contributed to transition processes?

Innovation, development, and financing of institutions of Higher Education in health.

The article analyzes the configuration and trends in institutions of Higher Education and their relationship as components of the Health Economic-Industrial Complex (HEIC). The expansion of higher education is part of the transition from elite to mass systems, with tensions between quantitative and qualitative aspects. Such changes reflect different cultures and are related to international phenomena such as globalization, economic transformations, the development of new information and communication technologies, and the emergence of an international knowledge network. The scale and content of these changes vary according to the expansion and institutional reconfiguration of educational systems, as well as the link between state and society. Market expansion for private higher education stirs competition, shapes business clusters, modifies training processes, and raises new public policy challenges. Resumo: Este artigo analisa a configuração e as tendências das instituições de Ensino Superior de saúde no seu relacionamento enquanto componentes do Complexo Econômico Industrial da Saúde (CEIS). A expansão do Ensino Superior é parte da transição de sistemas de elite para sistemas de massa, com tensionamentos entre aspectos quantitativos e qualitativos. Essas mudanças refletem diferentes culturas e se relacionam com fenômenos de escopo mundial como globalização, transformações econômicas, desenvolvimento de novas tecnologias de comunicação e informação, e emergência de uma rede internacional de conhecimento. A escala e o conteúdo dessas mudanças variam com a ampliação dos sistemas de ensino e na reconfiguração institucional, bem como na articulação entre Estado e sociedade. A ampliação do mercado privado no ensino acirra a competitividade, conformando conglomerados empresariais, alterando processos de formação e forjando novos desafios para as políticas públicas.

Internationalising Smart Specialisation: Assessment and Issues in the Case of EU New Member States

Smart specialisation is currently probably the largest innovation policy experiment in the world. Its aim is to move the EU less developed countries and regions on path of R&D-based growth. This transformation requires not only endogenous knowledge and technology accumulation building but also coupling with international knowledge and production networks. Yet, internationalisation does not seem to be a crucial component in the design and development of Research and Innovation Strategies for Smart Specialisation (RIS3), which are at odds with the strong dependence of the EU New Member States (EU-13) on FDI and global value chains. Our analysis is grounded in the key ‘stylised facts’ related to EU-13 R&D&I activities, and the complex link between innovation and internationalisation. Innovation systems in the EU-13 are fragmented and based on largely public R&D systems and on predominantly production-oriented foreign direct investment (FDI). This structural weakness calls for stronger support for innovation-oriented activities and for the integration of global value chains (GVCs) and FDI into local innovation systems. We explore the main obstacles to the internationalisation of smart specialisation and discuss ways to overcome them. We highlight the policy action areas related to providing support for technology upgrading in relation to the internationalisation of smart specialisation.

Science Policy for an increasingly diverging Europe

This paper argues about the need for a revisited public policy framework giving priority to knowledge and technological change across the entire Europe, by discussing new cumulative data on R&D expenditure and the qualification of human resources across Europe. It takes a wide international comparison after a decade hit by recession and economic and budgetary problems, which shows an increasing internal divergence on knowledge investments across Europe, beyond the increasing gap between Europe as a whole and North America. As a result, the paper argues that new paradigms and conditions for responsible science and innovation policy across EU require the collective action of R&D institutions and a system approach to higher education, together with new initiatives towards international cooperation across an enlarged Europe. Analysis shows that chronic backwardness in science and technology in many European peripheries, including in EU southern and eastern regions, have been significantly overcome over the last decade. Nevertheless, their growing scientific and technological capacity is now associated with an increasing vulnerability as a result of the growing international competition for qualified human resources. Additionally, the comparative analysis of levels of economic diversification and sophistication across Europe, suggests the need to insist on qualification and institutional strengthening. This should consider active public policies to attract and retain qualified human resources all over Europe, as well as considering public actions towards promoting new markets. The way in which the economic fabric may gain competitiveness and access to external markets may require enhancing the degree of internationalization of the scientific community and encouraging international knowledge and innovation networks.

The Future of South African Research Universities

In recent decades a widely discussed aspect of higher education policy has been the relationship between universities at the center and those at the periphery—that is, between universities of the highly developed countries and those of developing countries. The debate has focused on the universities in developing countries and their disadvantage in the highly sophisticated, rapidly changing international or global knowledge network. The case of South Africa’s research universities illustrates the dilemmas.

Sumatran Rice and ‘Miracle’ Herbs: Local and International Natural Knowledge in Late-Colonial Guatemala

This paper concerns the local and global knowledge networks in which residents of colonial Central America participated. In the last few decades of Spanish rule (c. 1796–1821), members of the Sociedad Económica de Amigos del País dedicated themselves to bringing ‘Enlightenment’ and ‘improvement’ to the region through natural history and other ‘useful arts’. Articles published in the Economic Society’s newspaper, the Gazeta de Guatemala, show that a socially and geographically wider network of people than might be expected, and a more varied range of sources, were used to obtain scientific knowledge considered useful to the colony. The Economic Society supported the circulation of natural-historical writings within Central America, but also tapped into surprisingly international networks. The transmission and evaluation of information from these different sources reveal a sometimes uneasy coexistence of local, regional and international knowledge networks within the pursuit of ‘enlightened’ scholarship and reform.

The use of knowledge assets: modelling the potential effect of adding innovators to low-innovation and high-innovation SMEs

SMEs rarely possess formal intellectual property (IP) in the sense of patents, etc. Broadly speaking, SMEs reap relatively short-term Schumpeterian profits by means of incremental innovation, where managing internal knowledge networks for ‘mutual inspiration’ can give rise to significant competitive advantages. Unfortunately estimates as to the best timing, how much benefit could be reaped and considerations of the organisations knowledge framework for future development are, at best, vague. To address this issue, a 3D quantitative fold is presented that pertains to a novel knowledge-based theory of the growth of SMEs via their knowledge assets and that contributes to a model that case studies can test. The fold allows quantitative estimations of the potential value of knowledge using Monte Carlo modelling (i.e., shooting virtual balls down the fold and analysing their final scatter distribution). Results indicate that adding middle-management innovators to low-innovation SMEs can contribute markedly to potential financial performance but adding innovators to high-innovation SMEs does not provoke an absolute increase in returns, but performance levels are reached earlier. In all cases potential financial performance was dramatically improved by laying down an innovative stratum early in SME development rather than on top of an already-established less-innovative middle management layer.

Knowledge valley theory

The service sector is characterised by being over-proportionally based on SMEs where these SMEs rarely possess formal intellectual property (IPR) in the sense of patents, etc. Organisations compete intensively and reap relatively short-term Schumpeterian profits by means of incremental innovation. In this high-churn environment, managing internal knowledge networks for ‘mutual inspiration’ can give rise to significant competitive advantages; however estimates as to how to lever and encourage knowledge assets, and how large benefits are, are very vague. A 3D quantitative fold is presented called Knowledge Valley that allows for a novel knowledge-based theory of the evolution of SMEs and the growth of their knowledge assets. By using concrete values of employee number and annual turnover the model allows largely quantitative estimations of potential knowledge value in organisations and is furthermore amenable to Monte Carlo modelling, which explains from a knowledge assets viewpoint why the management crises in growing SMEs occur.

Sympathetic advocates: male parliamentarians sharing responsibility for gender equality

Gender mainstreaming, as a strategy that aims to achieve gender equality across institutions, does not work without the assistance of men. There has been a strategic shift in emphasis over the past decade from women's issues to those concerning gender equality. Underpinning this shift is a change in focus from women exclusively, to one on both men and women in working towards mutually beneficial social and economic development. The institution of parliament is no exception. Changing social values and the increasing gender sensitivity of younger men have resulted in stronger partnerships between men and women parliamentarians on gender equality. Using qualitative data from the Inter-Parliamentary Union and the International Knowledge Network of Women in Politics (iKNOW Politics), this paper presents some of the strategies that have encouraged men to come on board the gender equality project. Strategies uncovered include men's support for the legislative initiatives of women as well as men's co-sponsorship of gender equality legislation; the appointment of men as chairs or members of gender equality bodies of the parliament (that is, bodies designed to mainstream gender equality concerns in the work of the parliament); and inviting men to participate in public activities and outreach, such as public consultations and celebratory activities for International Women's Day.

Technological complexity and the evolving structure of MNC subsidiary knowledge accumulation

The paper analyses the implications of increasing technological complexity and organizational restructuring for the knowledge accumulation activities of the subsidiaries of multinational corporations (MNCs). An analysis of foreign-owned subsidiaries in the German pharmaceutical industry in 1975-1995 indicates that the restructuring and intensification of knowledge exchange mechanisms in MNCs are an essential factor to enable subsidiaries to play a more creative role in knowledge generation. Although subsidiaries might use internal and external knowledge networks in their knowledge accumulation process in a complementary way, the purposes differ. In particular, the international internal knowledge networks of subsidiaries have been used increasingly for incremental knowledge building within the same field, whereas local external knowledge networks have been used far more for transferring more technologically complex knowledge.

Higher education in a global society

Globalization, a key reality in the twenty-firsy century, has already influenced higher education profoundly. Globalization is considered as the reality shaped by an increasingly integrated world economy, new information and communications technology (ICT), the emergence of an international knowledge network, the role of the English language, and other forces beyond the control of academic institutions. Internationalization of higher education is the variety of policies and programs that universities and governments implement in responses to globalization. These responses typically include sending students to study abroad, setting up a branch campus overseas, or engaging in some type of inter-institutional partnership. Higher Education in a Global Society is splendid volume of essays that examines emerging issues for advancing higher education across borders. It discusses the compelling challenges and opportunities facing higher education in cultivating world citizens. The several common themes that are further explored throughout this book are ‘‘(1) Students need to have an international experience to be effective citizens while facing the global society, which colleges and university have multiple means to provide. (2) Challenges facing the world call for international research collaborations, which need to be entered into with due diligence by institutions and then be led by the academics. (3) U.S. institutions, who set the standard of higher education in the world, present genuine opportunities to better fulfill their missions and to do so on a global scale. (4) It is necessary and imperative for higher education to clearly articulate to domestic constituencies the benefit for students and society at large of investments in global initiatives.’’ This book is successful in exploring these themes, and it provides new and actionable information to enhance decision making and informs strategic planning. Moreover, it offers a contemporary examination of the business of higher education and areas of potential new research. This book falls naturally into four parts. In Part I, addressing the leadership imperative on campus, the chapter author discusses ‘‘(1) the concept of globalization as it applies to higher education, the positive and negative implications for higher education and whether

Reflections on internationalisation of higher education in Taiwan: perspectives and prospects

This paper aims to investigate the possible framework for encouraging the presence of local dimensions in an internationalised and globally competitive system by using Taiwan’s higher education system as a case. It begins by discussing the notion of internationalisation and its implications for higher education. It then turns to look at Taiwan’s responses to these global developments. It also reviews different opinions on the position and importance of local dimensions in the world of globalised higher education. Based on these perspectives, the paper advocates promoting the concept of state-building in Taiwan’s as well as in other higher education systems for preserving or even strengthening the local dimensions of individual academic systems operating in the international knowledge network.

Resource allocations, knowledge network characteristics and entrepreneurial orientation of multinational corporations

This paper analyses entrepreneurial orientation (EO) in multinational corporations (MNCs) and develops a new typology of MNC EO based on combining R&D and asset growth investment intensities as orthogonal resource allocations. A cluster analysis of US MNCs on these two dimensions reveals three types of entrepreneurial stance: conservative, aggressive-asset growth and balanced. Internal knowledge network characteristics are shown to vary by stance, with more aggressive stances linked to knowledge governance supportive of the entrepreneurship process. In linking entrepreneurial orientation to the knowledge network of the MNC, this paper identifies factors important to the strategic management and on-going renewal of MNCs. In addition, the vector of R&D investment vs. asset growth investment is an indicator of entrepreneurial aggression and presents a new method of understanding the international strategies of MNCs.