From exclusion to inclusion in public innovation support?

Innovative practices in bottom-up networks

Authors

  • Malin Lindberg Luleå University of Technology

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.58235/sjpa.v18i4.15658

Keywords:

Innovation policy, Innovation network, Bottom-up, Top-down, Gender

Abstract

This article examines whether hitherto marginalized actors, industries and innovations – such as women, services industries and service innovations – could be acknowledged by the use of a bottom-up approach in innovation research in a way that helps make public innovation support more inclusive. It is scrutinized whether the relation between context, organization and outcomes in publically financed innovation networks such as clusters and innovation systems serves to highlight how more inclusive innovation support could be designed. Four regional innovation networks promoting women’s entrepreneurship and innovation in Sweden are analyzed by a bottom-up approach, since while emphasizing decentralization and inclusion in theory, most innovation theories and policies are in practice characterized by a top-down approach, ascribing superiority to certain actors, industries and innovations while marginalizing others in a distinct – often gendered – pattern. The bottom-up approach makes it possible to expose that being a marginalized actor in public innovation support is related to the organization of entrepreneurial types of innovation systems, based on contacts established ad hoc and resources gathered from scratch, making a wider range of actors, industries and innovations relevant than in institutional types of innovation systems favored in prevalent public innovation support. By acknowledging both types of innovation systems, more inclusive innovation policies could be designed and more nuanced innovation theories could be developed.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Author Biography

Malin Lindberg, Luleå University of Technology

Malin Lindberg is associate professor in gender and technology at Luleå University of Technology, Sweden. She conducts research on social innovation, gender patterns in innovation policies and processes, gender-sensitive business counselling and women's entrepreneurship and innovation. With starting point in political science, she uses theories of bottom up and top down as political- administrative instruments, doing gender in policy and research, and classification/organization of different types of innovation networks, such as innovation systems, clusters and triple helix constellations. She specializes in participatory research, where new knowledge is developed jointly between academia and society.

Downloads

Published

2014-12-15

How to Cite

Lindberg, M. (2014). From exclusion to inclusion in public innovation support? Innovative practices in bottom-up networks. Scandinavian Journal of Public Administration, 18(4), 91–107. https://doi.org/10.58235/sjpa.v18i4.15658

Most read articles by the same author(s)

Similar Articles

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 > >> 

You may also start an advanced similarity search for this article.