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Journal of Economic Geography Advance Access originally published online on September 20, 2007
Journal of Economic Geography 2007 7(6):673-709; doi:10.1093/jeg/lbm030
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© The Author (2007). Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

The territorial dynamics of innovation: a Europe–United States comparative analysis

Riccardo Crescenzi*, Andrés Rodríguez-Pose**,{dagger} and Michael Storper**

*Dipartimento di Economia, Università degli Studi Roma Tre, Via Silvio d'A;mico 77, 00145 - Rome, Italy
**Department of Geography and Environment, London School of Economics, Houghton St, London WC2A 2AE, UK.

{dagger}Corresponding author: Department of Geography and Environment, London School of Economics, Houghton Street, London WC 2AE, UK. email < A.Rodriguez-Pose{at}lse.ac.uk>

JEL classifications:: R11, R12, O32, O33

The United States and European Union differ significantly in terms of their innovative capacity: the former have been able to gain and maintain world leadership in innovation and technology while the latter continues to lag. Notwithstanding the magnitude of this innovation gap and the political emphasis placed upon it on both sides of the Atlantic, very little systematic comparative analysis has been carried out on its causes. The empirical literature has emphasized the structural differences between the two continents in the quantity and quality of the major ‘inputs’ to innovation: R&D investments and human capital. The very different spatial organization of innovative activities in the EU and the US—as suggested by a variety of contributions in the field of economic geography—could also influence innovative output. This article analyses and compares a wide set of territorial processes that influence innovation in Europe and the United States. The higher mobility of capital, population and knowledge in the US not only promotes the agglomeration of research activity in specific areas of the country but also enables a variety of territorial mechanisms to fully exploit local innovative activities and (informational) synergies. In the European Union, in contrast, imperfect market integration and institutional and cultural barriers across the continent prevent innovative agents from maximizing the benefits from external economies and localized interactions, but compensatory forms of geographical process may be emerging in concert with further European integration.

Keywords: innovation, research and development, regions, spillovers, agglomeration, systems of innovation, European Union, United States
Date submitted: 18 April 2007     Date accepted: 19 July 2007


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