Industrial policies, patterns of learning, and development: An evolutionary perspective

This work discusses the role of industrial policies within an evolutionary view of innovation and learning as drivers of economic development. Building on the notions of technological paradigms and trajectories, it links the processes of catching up with the dynamics of capability accumulation within and across firms. Technological paradigms provide a structure to the knowledge embodied in individual and, even more importantly, in organizational problem-solving procedures and routines, which collectively define the technological and organizational capabilities of firms and whole countries. The improvement of such capabilities is at the core of the process of development and catching up, well beyond sheer capital accumulation. In turn, such processes are embedded in broader national systems of innovation in which industrial policies play a pivotal role.