Diffusion of Innovation, Innovation Studies, and Innovation Policies : Cross-Fertilization to Improve Smart Specialisation Strategies (S3)

The paper reviews the diffusion research approach to the analysis of innovations and its impact on innovation studies. This social approach brought a new understanding of the innovation process by focusing on analysing the factors that influence the spread of innovations instead of focusing on its technical basis. From this research tradition, we pay special attention to the work of Everett Rogers Diffusion of Innovations (1962) analysing the different impact and contributions to innovation studies (i.e. S-shaped curve rate of adoption and his categorisation of adopters) and science policy studies (i.e. agenda setting). We review the reception of diffusion research to recover some insights and to integrate them into current innovation policy debate. We use the innovation policy of Smart Specialisation Strategies (S3) as an example of how this integration could be done. After reviewing the main challenges of S3, we show the importance of improving the implementation phase of innovation policies through different mechanisms. For example, we indicate the need paying more attention to mechanism of policy diffusion, such as, learning and, specially, socialisation as these could lead to more stable and long-term policy changes