Science and Innovation - The Idea of Innovation

Science et innovation

Science and Innovation

BENOÎT GODIN

The Idea of Innovation The Culture of Numbers News

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The Idea of Innovation

A project funded by the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).

Innovation is everywhere. In the world of goods (technology), but also in the world of words: innovation is discussed in the scientific and technical literature, but also in social science like history, sociology, management and economics. Innovation is also a central idea in the popular imaginary, in the media and in public policy. In summary innovation has become the emblem of the modern society, and a panacea for resolving many problems.

This suggests three questions. First, why has innovation acquired such a central place in our society or, put differently, where precisely does the idea of innovation come from? Second, why is innovation spontaneously understood as technological innovation? Third, why is the idea of innovation often restricted to commercialized innovation?

To answer these questions, the project on the idea of innovation looks at innovation as a category and its historical development since Antiquity. It identifies the concepts that have defined novelty through history and that have led to innovation as a central category of modern society. More specifically, the project looks at:

the concepts involved for speaking about innovation: change, novelty, originality, invention, creativity, etc.
the meaning of the concepts developed.
the discourses held in the name of innovation.
the values involved in the debates.
the theories and the conceptual frameworks developed for explaining innovation.
the context out of which the category emerged.
the measurement of innovation.

Publications and Working Papers

B. Godin and P. Lucier(2014), Innovo: On the Vicissitudes and Variations of a Concept, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Paper no. 19, Montreal: INRS. 36p.

B. Godin (2014), « Innovation: un slogan, rien qu'un slogan ! » Paper presented at the Forum du Développement Territorial 2nd edition organized by Le cercle des Développeurs, Lyon, France, October 24, 2013.

B. Godin (2014), Innovation and Creativity: A Slogan, Nothing but a Slogan, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Paper no. 18, Montreal: INRS. Forthcoming in Cristiano Antonelli and Albert N. Link (eds), Routledge Handbook of the Economics of Knowledge, 2014.

B. Godin (2014), Une histoire intellectuelle de l'innovation. De l'interdit politique à la politique publique, in Sophie Boutillier, Joëlle Forest, Delphine Gallaud, Blandine Laperche, Corinne Tanguy, Leïla Temri (dir.), Principes d'économie de l'innovation, Series: Business and Innovation - Volume 8, Peter Lang, International Academic Publishers : Bruxelles, Bern, Berlin, Frankfurt am Main, New York, Oxford, Wien, 2014. 514 p. Available at : http://www.peterlang.com/...

B. Godin (2014), The Linear Model of Innovation: The Historical Construction of an Analytical Framework, reprinted in Recent Developments In The Economics Of Science And Innovation, Albert N. Link and Cristiano Antonelli (eds.), Edward Elgar. Available at : http://www.e-elgar.com/...

B. Godin (2014), Innovation and Science: When Science Had Nothing to Do with Innovation, and Vice-Versa, Project on the Intellectual History of innovation, Working Paper no. 16, Montreal: INRS. 53p. Presented as Basic Research and Innovation: the "New" Semantic Pair, Workshop on "Basic and Applied Research: Historical Semantics of a Key Distinction in 20th Century Science Policy", University of Bonn, Forum Internationale Wissenschaft (FIW), 20-22 February 2014.

B. Godin (2014), The Politics of Innovation: Machiavelli and Political Innovation, or, How to Stabilize a Changing World, Project on the Intellectual History of innovation, Working Paper no. 17, Montreal: INRS. 31p.

L. Perren and J. Sapsed (2013), Innovation as politics: The rise and reshaping of innovation in UK parliamentary discourse 1960-2005, Research Policy, Available online 18 October 2013.

B. Godin (2013), Invention, Diffusion and Linear Models of Innovation, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Working Paper no. 15, Montreal: INRS. 38p. Published in : Innovation: Journal of Innovation & Management, 15, 2014/3: 11-37.

B. Godin (2013), Innovation after the French Revolution, or, Innovation Transformed: From Word to Concept, Working Paper No. 14, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montréal : INRS. 41p. For a version with translation of French texts, see (PDF).

B. Godin and J.P. Lane (2013), Pushes and Pulls": The Hi(story) of the Demand Pull Model of Innovation, Working Paper No. 13, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montréal : INRS. 39 p. Science, Technology and Human Values, 38 (5), 2013: 621-54.

Jean Hebue (2012), Généalogie de l'innovateur, in Gérer et comprendre, 110, décembre.

A. Spanos (2012), Was Innovation unwanted in Byzantium? To be published in: Ingela Nilsson & Paul Stephenson (eds.), Byzantium Wanted: The Desire and Rejection of an Empire, Uppsala 2013 [Studia Byzantina Upsaliensia, vol. 15.

B. Godin and P. Lucier (2012), Innovation and Conceptual innovation in Ancient Greece, Working Paper No. 12, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montréal : INRS. 31 p.

B. Godin (2012), Social Innovation : Utopias of Innovation from c. 1830 to the Present, Working Paper No. 11, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montréal : INRS. 50 p.

B. Godin (2011), Innovation and Politics: The Controversy on Republicanism in Seventeenth-Century England, Working Paper No. 10, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montréal : INRS. 38 p. Published in Redescription (Yearbook of Political Thought, Conceptual History and Feminist Theory), 16, 2012-13: http://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978-951-39-5297-6

B. Godin (2011), Καινoτoµíα: An Old Word for a New World; or, The De-Contestation of a Political and Contested Concept, Working Paper No. 9, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montreal: INRS. A shorter version is available in Karl-Erik Sveiby, Pemilla Gripenberg and Beata Segercrantz (eds.), Challenging the Innovation Paradigm, London: Routledge, 37-60, 2012.

Egil Kallerud (2011) Goals conflict and goal alignment in science, technology and innovation policy discourse, NIFU Nordic Institute for Studies in Innovation, Research and Education. Norway.

A. Spanos (2010), To Every Innovation, Anathema (?) Some Preliminary Thoughts on the Study of Byzantine Innovation, in Mysterion, strategike og kainotomia Et festskrift til ære for Jonny Holbek , Eds. Harald Knudsen, Joyce Falkenberg, Kjell Grønhaug and Åge Garnes, Novus Forlag, Oslo: 51-59.

B. Godin (2010), “Innovation Studies”: The Invention of a Specialty (Part 2). Working Paper No. 8, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montrea l: INRS. 48 p. Paper presented at 1) worshop on 'The Rhetoric of Innovation in Contemporary Society', University of Helsinki, 7-8 February 2010; 2) SPRU, Freeman Center Seminar Series, Brighton, 22 October 2010. Published in Minerva, 50 (4), 2012 : 397-421.

B. Godin (2010), “Innovation Studies”: The Invention of a Specialty (Part I). Working Paper No. 7, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montreal : INRS. 47 p.

B. Godin (2010), “Meddle Not With Them That Are Given to Change”: Innovation as Evil, Working Paper no. 6, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montreal: INRS. 46 p. Paper presented at 1) Workshop on “Rhetoric of Innovation in Contemporary Society”, University of Helsinki, Institute of Behavioral Sciences, 7-8 February 2010; 2) Public Understanding of Science Seminar, London School of Economics, 10 February 2010.

B. Godin (2010), Innovation Without the Word: William F. Ogburn’s Contribution to Technological Innovation Studies, Working Paper no. 5, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montreal : INRS. 56 p. Published in: Minerva, vol. 48 , no 3, 2010.

B. Godin (2009), National Innovation System (II): Industrialists and the Origins of an Idea, Working Paper no. 4, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montreal : INRS.

B. Godin (2010), National Innovation System: A Note on the Origins of a Concept, Working Paper, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montreal : INRS. 8 p.

B. Godin (2009), The Linear Model of Innovation (II): Maurice Holland and the Research Cycle, Working Paper no. 3, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montreal: INRS. Published in Social Science Information, 50th Anniversary Issue, 50 (3-4): 569-81. Paper presented at the Seminar Series at Carnegie Mellon in Strategy, Entrepreneurship, and Technological Change, Pittsburg, 30 October 2008.

B. Godin (2008), In the Shadow of Schumpeter: W. Rupert Maclaurin and the Study of Technological Innovation, Paper no. 2, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation. Published in Minerva, vol. 46 no 3, p. 343-360. Paper presented at : 1) Carnegie Mellon, Seminar Series in Strategy, Entrepreneurship, and Technological Change, Pittsburg, 30 October 2008; 2) Imperial College/Science Museum, 22 May 2008, London, Great Britain.

B. Godin (2008), Innovation: the History of a Category, Working Paper No. 1, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, Montreal: INRS. 62 p. Paper presented at: 1) Polish Academy of Sciences, Committee for the Science, Warsaw, Poland, 2 December 2008; 2) Charles University, Department of Comparative History, Czechoslovakia, Prague, 26 November 2008; 3) « Governance of and Through Science : Notions, Categories, and Tools », EHESS, Paris, France, 26-27 May 2008; 4) Third PRIME/ENID International Conference, Oslo, Norway, 28-30 May 2008; 5) Finnish Society for Science and Technology Studies, Annual Seminar, 5 March 2009.

Position Papers

B. Godin (2013), « What Business Are You In, Mr Barber? A Review of "Oceans of Innovation" » Educational Philosophy and Theory 45 (10) : 989-991. DOI: 10.1080/00131857.2013.837601.

B. Godin (2013), The Unintended Consequences of Innovation Studies, Paper prepared for a communication presented at "Policy Implications due to Unintended Consequences of Innovation", Special Track at EU-SPRI, Madrid, 10-12 April 2013.

J.P. Lane and B. Godin (2012), Is America's Science, Technology, and Innovation Policy Open for Business? in Science Progress, June : scienceprogress.org/.../

B. Godin and J.P. Lane (2012), Innovation and Normal Science, in Robert Frodeman and J. Britt Holbrook, The Promise and Perils of Transformative Research, Report on the workshop 'Transformative Research: Ethical and Societal Implications' held in Arlington (VA), March 8 & 9, 2012, p. 36-38: csid.unt.edu/.../FinalReport.pdf

B. Godin (2011), A User-View of Innovation: Some Critical Thoughts on the Current STI Frameworks and Their Relevance to Developing Countries, Communication presented at Expert Meeting on Innovation Statistics, UNESCO, 8-10 March, 2011.

Forthcoming Papers

B. Godin, Re-imagining Innovation in the Nineteenth Century: A Study in the Rhetoric of Innovation.

B. Godin, Appropriating Innovation in the Twentieth Century: For What Purpose?

B. Godin, What is Innovation? A Lexicon.

B. Godin, Homer G. Barnett and Culture Change: A Student of Innovation among the Anthropologists, Project on the Intellectual History of Innovation, INRS: Montreal.