Professional Documents
Culture Documents
467–484
doi:10.1093/icc/dtn012
1. Introduction
This special edition of Industrial and Corporate Change explores the continuing
importance of Giovanni Dosi’s concept of technological paradigms as laid out in his
classic 1982 article (Dosi, 1982). It is now over 26 years since it was written, and
20 years since the ideas it contains were developed into the foundational statement of
the evolutionary economics perspective in Dosi (1988a) and Dosi (1988b). This
introduction and the papers that follow place these ideas in their historical context
and assess their past, present, and future impact on academic understanding,
managerial practice, and government policy as it relates to science, technology, and
innovation.
The academic impact of the original paper is considerable, as can be seen from the
over 670 ISI citations the paper has now received. This makes it one of the most
highly cited papers in the economics of technical change and in economics more
generally. Yet the breadth of its impact goes beyond economics and many citations
can be found in the literatures of management, history, and sociology.
As the co-citation data for the top 50 co-cited papers in Figure 1 shows, the 1982
paper is closely linked to a wide body of literature across the social sciences.1 Going
1
The figure shows the 50 articles most often co-cited with Dosi (1982), arranged in a network
according to their similarity in co-citation patterns. The size of each node represents the number
of times a paper is co-cited with Dosi, 1982 (e.g. Nelson and Winter, 1982 is also cited in 302 of the
ß The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Associazione ICC. All rights reserved.
Downloaded from http://icc.oxfordjournals.org/ at Brown University on December 30, 2012
Figure 1 Bibliometric analysis of citations to Dosi (1982).
N. v. Tunzelmann et al.
468
Technological paradigms 469
around the figure clockwise, it is co-cited with papers on path dependency, the
history and philosophy of science and technology, the management of technology,
the strategic management of innovation, strategic management more generally, the
theory of the firm, in particular the resource-based view, transaction cost economics,
and the work of Schumpeter. As might be expected, it is very closely connected to the
core papers within the evolutionary economics tradition, particularly, the two classic
Nelson and Winter (1977, 1982) contributions and is central to the SPRU tradition
of research associated with Freeman and Pavitt. Finally, it is closely connected with
the classic contributions to the National Systems of Innovation literature and the
more recent literature on sectoral systems of innovation and production (Malerba,
2. Historical context
Dosi’s (1982) paper was one of a cohort of related papers that now form the
foundation of the evolutionary economics tradition. The period between 1977 and
1984 saw the publication of Nelson and Winter’s (1977) paper on evolutionary
theory in Research Policy, Rothwell et al.’ s (1974) summary of the SAPPHO project
on innovation management, Mowery and Rosenberg’s (1979) critique of “demand-
pull” models of innovation, Freeman’s (1982) book on the economics of technical
change, Dosi’s (1982) paper itself, Nelson and Winter’s (1982) seminal book, and
Pavitt’s (1984) taxonomy paper. These, together with many others, came to form the
basis for what is now the shared evolutionary basis for much theorising in
management, economics, and policy.
The theoretical context of the paper arose out of a perceived lacuna—Thomas
Kuhn’s very influential book of 1962 and a series of critiques by Imre Lakatos from
655 times that Dosi, 1982 is cited). The linkages between nodes represent the number of times
that two papers have been co-cited together with Dosi (1982) (e.g. when one paper citing Dosi,
1982 cites Nelson 1993, in 54% of the cases it also cites Lundvall, 1993). This measure is used as a
proxy for cognitive similarity. The linkages are then represented in 2D. This introduces a number
of distortions, for example, the Williamson and Schumpeter co-citations in the bottom of the
diagram overlap in 2D space even though their overlap in the multi-dimensional space of the
co-citation matrix is much more limited. The bibliometric analysis for this paper was generated
by Ismael Rafols (SPRU) and the authors of the paper are extremely grateful to him for his
generous contribution of time and expertise.
470 N. v. Tunzelmann et al.
the late 1960s had set the stage for a modern philosophical basis for interpreting
radical change in science, but the counterpart of an equally deserved basis for
understanding radical changes in technology was conspicuously lacking. Undeterred
by the edginess of that post-Kuhn debate in the philosophy of science, into which
Kuhn waded again with the revised 1970 version of his book, Dosi brought his
philosophy training to bear by audaciously sweeping together in his 1982 paper the
Kuhnian position (regarding paradigms) and the Lakatosian one (regarding
heuristics in scientific research programmes) to which Dosi added a touch of
Nelson and Winter with the notion of “technological trajectories.” While a few of
Dosi’s critics found the lifting of concepts from the philosophy of science into the
These debates were ongoing as the oil shocks of the 1970s hit. After the rapid
increase in the price of oil, and the recession that followed, the policy situation
changed radically. It was in this new environment that Dosi’s work emerged. While
working at the University of Sussex in the late 1970s, Dosi would have seen the
beginnings of a fundamental shift in the political economy of the UK that was to
have global ramifications in the 1980s. The big change in political economy involved
a move from a post-war “consensus” model where economies of scale and efficiencies
in production were supposedly achieved by a small number of large firms protected
within national boundaries, to an economic model where it was hoped more
efficiencies could be derived from a large number of entrepreneurial small firms
analytical clarity. By taking Kuhn’s ideas about paradigms in science, and applying
them to technical change, Dosi highlighted how the process of innovation generated
its own knowledge, which was broadly understood in terms of practical and
theoretical understanding and know-how, as well as artefacts and practices. Since this
knowledge was bounded, innovation required trial-and-error experimentation,
which generated cumulative improvements in understanding. These improvements
were technology-specific, and created strong structural differences in the rates at
which different parts of the technological frontier could be developed. As a result,
patterns of innovation follow cumulative paths in which the articulation of demand
and the direction of research are strongly influenced by perceptions of the most
The impact of these ideas can be seen in the changing language of the policy
literature and the shifting emphasis in technology policy towards supporting the
development of firm-specific capabilities. In the EU at least, current innovation
policy draws very heavily on the evolutionary concepts that Dosi and his colleagues
helped to develop. In part, this shift reflects the large numbers of graduate students
trained in institutions such as SPRU, Manchester, MERIT, Pisa, and Bocconi who
have gone on to work in policy and have now, 26 years after the initial publication of
the paper, reached positions of political power. However, it also reflects the way that
technological paradigms, and the evolutionary perspective more generally, provide
alternatives to both pork-barrel support for politically connected national champions
2
Talk of paradigms here is particularly appropriate because many proponents of the earlier 1980s
view of the economy find the change in outlook incommensurate with their own thinking, and can
be literally blind to any alternatives.
476 N. v. Tunzelmann et al.
properly addressed by macro-economics. Instead, their concern was with the capacity
of society to absorb technology. By the 1990s, these concerns had a new language,
with a distinctly “evolutionary flavour.” The OECD, for example, was giving much
more recognition to the organisational dynamics of technical change and its
dependence on capabilities at the firm and nation levels. By the turn of the century,
policy was looking beyond the hype of the New Economy with an explicit focus
on building capabilities and nurturing technology to address policy problems. This
is clear within current EU policy on the competitiveness of the EU economies and
their productivity differences (both positive and negative) with both the US
and Japan.
in the ideas themselves. Dosi’s ideas, for example, provide a bridge of appreciative
theory linking formal modelling and history. Within other disciplines in the social
sciences the dominance of modelling often leads to the neglect of history. Similarly,
within history, the focus on detail has led in many instances to a rather inward
looking, antiquarian turn. As Figure 1 shows, technological paradigms provide a way
for formal modellers and historians to meet and talk a common language.
The second bridging role the ideas have played has been in linking the US
tradition that developed out of the Carnegie School and the work of Herbert Simon,
with a European tradition, most clearly associated with Chris Freeman and his
students. Technological paradigms link Freeman’s concerns with uncertainty and
scientific paths are more fruitful than others—why, for example, have we been so
much more successful in developing vaccines for smallpox than we have for HIV and
malaria? Nelson argues that researchers must now turn their attention to these
questions, that often come down to very detailed issues of technology of the sort
famously analysed by Rosenberg and David. Nelson argues that the ability to tightly
control, clearly specify, and accurately replicate practices so that knowledge can be
successfully accumulated is vital for the growth of effective “know-how.” Such ideas
imply a radical shift in how we think about science and technology policy, and
potentially firm-based innovation. Nelson’s contribution clearly shows that Dosi’s
ideas, and the related ideas that Nelson himself has been so successful in developing,
in turn influence theoretical understanding of what firms are. The paper uses these
ideas to suggest that the current literature on the theory of the firm in both
economics and management, that might initially seem disconnected, is actually
highly structured. Moreover, the paper makes a potentially much more radical claim,
that the changes in the theory of the firm are part of a much wider and deeper change
in the very foundations of the social sciences. As with all the papers, the ideas about
changes in meta-paradigm suggest that Dosi’s concept of technological paradigms
has great future potential for helping us understand theory change in both science
and technology.
Difficult, or in the language of modern policy “wicked,” social problems can often
be clearly articulated, but finding and supporting a suitable paradigm to address
them has been far from easy. This is not always due to lack of money, or political will,
or demand, nor always because of a lack of scientific understanding, although in
many cases more money, political support and scientific understanding would be
useful. The issue seems to be a lack of a paradigm that can be successfully and
cumulatively followed. Finding paradigms after they have become established seems
to be reasonably easy. But how to catch them as they form, and manage the
formation and establishment of new ones, remain very poorly understood and under
researched. We hope that all the papers in this special issue provide some insightful
Acknowledgements
The authors of this article are extremely grateful to Josef Chytry for the enormous
help he has provided in co-ordinating this special issue. Ismael Rafols provided
expert guidance on bibliometric interpretation. The authors acknowledge the long-
term funding provided by the ESRC to both the CoPS (Sussex) and CRIC
(Manchester) Innovation Centres, as well as the STEPS centre, which together
provided the homes in which the ideas in this introduction were developed. The
long-term support of CESPRI is gratefully acknowledged.
References
ACARD (1986), Exploitable Areas of Science. HMSO: London.
Arrow, K. J. (1962), ‘Economic Welfare and the Allocation of Resources for Invention,’ in The
Rate and Direction of Inventive Activity. Princeton University Press: Princeton, pp. 609–625.
Bush, V. (1945), Science the Endless Frontier. National Science Foundation: Washington DC.
Technological paradigms 483
Chandler, A. D. (1977), The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business.
Belknap Press: Cambridge.
Dannreuther, C (2006), ‘Regulation theory and the EU,’ Competition and Change, 10(2),
180–199.
David, P. (1975), Technical Choice, Innovation and Economic Growth. Cambridge University
Press: Cambridge.
Dosi, G. (1982), ‘Technological paradigms and technological trajectories: as suggested
interpretation of the determinants and directions of technical change,’ Research Policy,
11(3), 147–162.
Dosi, G. (1988a), ‘Sources, procedures and microeconomic effects of innovation,’ Journal of
Nightingale, P. (2008), ‘Meta-paradigm change and the theory of the firm,’ Industrial and
Corporate Change, 17, 533–583.
Nightingale, P. (2004), ‘Technological capabilities, invisible infrastructure and the un-social
construction of predictability: the overlooked fixed costs of useful research,’ Research Policy,
33, 1259–1284.
OECD (1972), Science, Growth and Society. OECD: Paris.
OECD (1963), Rationalising Science Policy. OECD: Paris.
OECD (1980), Technical Change and Economic Policy. OECD: Paris.
Pavitt, K. (1984), ‘Sectoral patterns of technological change: towards a taxonomy and a