Entrepreneurship and innovation are arguably the main drivers of economic development today. This book explores the two in depth, at both the national and regional levels, using a variety of methodologies. The expert contributors discuss the subject from a policy perspective, with case studies from a host of countries including new member states of the EU as well as established EU member states. Split into three parts, the book focuses on: innovation, entrepreneurial activity and regional development, and entrepreneurship and SME policy.

The past is an increasingly unreliable guide to the future. European workplaces and the regions in which they are located face unprecedented pressures and challenges. Whereas in recent decades incremental adaptation has largely been sufficient to cope with external change, it is no longer clear that this remains the case. Globalisation, technological development and dissemination, political volatility, patterns of consumption, and employee expectations are occurring at a rate which is hard to measure. The rate of change in these spheres is far outstripping the rate of organisational innovation in both European enterprises and public governance, leading to a serious mismatch between the challenges of the 21st Century and the organisational competence available to deal with them. In this context, there is no clear roadmap. The contributors to this volume address these issues and demonstrate that building the knowledge base required by actors in this volatile environment requires continuous dialogue and learning – a context in which social partners, regional policy makers and other participants share diverse knowledge and reflect on experience rather than seeking and imitating any notion of 'best practice'. Action Research has a crucial role to play, embedding shared learning within the process of innovation.

Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Regional Development is unique in that it addresses the central factors in economic development – entrepreneurship, innovation and organizational learning – as regional phenomena. This definitive text focuses on different types of organizations to illustrate the value of entrepreneurship and innovation both for businesses and for regional development. Establishing a firm link between entrepreneurship, innovation and economic regeneration, the book also examines the factors contributing to their success. Replete with international case studies, empirical evidence of concepts and practical examples, this is an ideal text to support postgraduate teaching and research related to entrepreneurship, innovation management and regional economic development.

Turbulence characterises the current global scene. This book uses complementary theoretical approaches to understand and help prescribe policies to ‘re-frame’ the regional development problem in turbulent times. These approaches are: evolutionary complexity; evolutionary economic geography; emergence theory; and resilience theory. From below, they address the four major crises creating a ‘perfect storm’ for societies and economics involving: the climate change crisis; the energy crisis; the banking and financial crisis; and the global economic crisis. This book analyses and proposes ways in which regional economies, in particular, are having to be ‘reframed’ to address these crises. First, many must evolve in new ways, possibly moving back from the ‘service economy’ towards a new, greener form of manufacturing of goods as well as services. Accordingly, regional economies are innovating in new ways. Amongst these are the quest for ‘relatedness’ within their own regional orbits, and promoting ‘modularity’ as a mode of analysis and a policy stance to stimulate innovation across industry and geographical borders. Finally, regional economies and societies are discovering that, from a ‘resilience’ perspective, they must find answers to the higher levels of governance with which they increasingly struggle. In this respect regional economies are in ‘transition’ and regional processes are ‘emergent’. The transition seeks to address the four crises, involving re-balancing, re-directing and re-framing future policy and practice. This book describes many of the novel ‘framings’ involved in understanding the new ways in which this major task is being addressed in theory, policy and everyday practice.

Although China is now the ‘factory of the world’, there is no reason to expect that it will always be content with manufacturing labor-intensive goods for foreign corporations. Scholars must now ask: What is the current level of innovation in China? And how can we face this challenge and renovate industrial production and innovation capacities in developed countries? This edited volume investigates the unique characteristics of Chinese innovation and regional development, China’s policy framework, and the role that transnational corporations play in China’s increasing innovation activities. This book contributes to the heated debate regarding pathways for technology progress and regional development in developing countries, and identifies the ways in which local production networks respond to different configurations of external linkages. Linking patterns of global and local production networks with the trajectories of technology development and regional development allows the authors to theorize and test whether, and how, particular configurations of production networks generate divergent long-term local productivity growth and technological development outcomes. Innovation and Regional Development in China will be of interest to geographers, economists, China specialists, development specialists, and scholars working on innovation and regional development in developing areas and transition countries.

The capacity to adapt to external shocks, to resist negative impacts and to evolve to new socio-technical regimes has been increasingly studied in recent years by regional scientists in order to understand the dynamic conditions that create a “resilient territory”. Resilience is a notion imported from the study of ecological systems and other fields of science to the understanding of geographically embedded socio-economic systems. It is a characteristic often connected to a threshold of the socio-economic variety and specialization that facilitates the smooth adaptation to challenges in particular territories. As a result of recent crises, a number of regions are now further investigating this concept, trying to guarantee by planning the adequate conditions for resilience. Resilient Territories: Innovation and Creativity for New Modes of Regional Development contributes to the definition and advancement of the scientific agenda in the topics of regional resilience, innovation and creativity. The stabilization of this research agenda and an informed discussion of different definitions of resilience are crucial for the alignment and engagement of the scientific community in the study of these essential topics. This volume also focuses on informing policy and decision-makers, in various different levels of action, about the advancements of conceptualization in these domains.

This book investigates the EU’s regional growth dynamics and, in particular, the reasons why peripheral and socio-economically disadvantaged areas have persistently failed to catch up with the rest of the Union. It shows that the capability of the knowledge-based growth model to deliver its expected benefits to these areas crucially depends on tackling a specific set of socio-institutional factors which prevents innovation from being effectively translated into economic growth. The book takes an eclectic approach to the territorial genesis of innovation and regional growth by combining different theoretical strands into one model of empirical analysis covering the whole EU-25. An in-depth comparative analysis with the United States is also included, providing significant insights into the distinctive features of the European process of innovation and its territorial determinants. The evidence produced in the book is extensively applied to the analysis of EU development policies.

Today, economic growth is widely understood to be conditioned by productivity increases which are, in turn, profoundly affected by innovation. This volume explores these key relationships between innovation and growth, bringing together experts from both fields to compile a unique Handbook. The Handbook considers innovation from fresh perspectives, encompassing topics such as services innovation, inward investment and innovation, creative industry innovation and green innovation. It is divided into seven sections, dealing with regional innovation and growth theory, dynamics, evolution, agglomeration, innovation 'worlds', innovation system institutions, and innovation governance and policy. This definitive compendium on regional innovation and growth will undoubtedly appeal to teachers, students, researchers and practitioners of innovation and growth dynamics worldwide.

This book gathers the latest advances, innovations, and applications in urban and regional planning processes and science, as presented by international researchers at the 11th International Conference on Innovation in Urban and Regional Planning (INPUT), held in Catania, Italy, on September 8-10, 2021. The overarching theme of the conference INPUT 2021 was “Integrating Nature-Based Solutions in Planning Science and Practice”, with contributes focusing on functionality of urban ecosystems toward more healthier and resilient cities, planning solutions for socio-ecological systems, technologies and hybrid models for spatial planning, geodesign, urban metabolism, computational planning, ecosystems services, green infrastructure, climate change adaptation and mitigation, rural landscapes, cultural heritage, and accessibility for urban planning. The conference brought together international scholars in the field of planning, civil engineering and architecture, ecology and social science, to build and consolidate the knowledge and evidence on NBS in urban and regional planning.

Rethinking Regional Innovation and Change brings together papers from leading international scholars in the field of regional development and policy. The contributors examine the interactions between path-dependent developments, institutions, and governance structures that influence regional innovation capacity. Up-to-date case studies present diverse theoretical perspectives from economics, political science, geography, planning, and public policy.