In today's world, science, technology and innovation activities continue to transcend geographic, organizational and technological boundaries and evolve into competition for innovation systems, with innovation strategies increasingly important in the context of integrated national competition. The 18th congress of the party has made a major deployment to implement innovative-driven development strategies, offering innovative theoretical researchers a great opportunity to serve their country. Looking at the key issues in the implementation of our innovative nation-building and innovation-driven development strategy, proposing policy responses in the areas of national innovation systems, innovative enterprise development and innovation policy refinement, is an honourable duty and an age mission for researchers of innovation theory。
Historical context of the theory of innovation
Theoretical research on innovation has a hundred-year history. From the “innovation theory” of pumpett to the “open innovation” of henry chesabriv, researchers try to understand the internal patterns and processes of innovation management from different perspectives. The status of innovation theory research has been rapidly elevated as innovation strategies are increasingly valued by countries, and is now at the forefront of social science, a major theoretical proposition for international management, public management and economics concerns. As theories such as the economics of innovation, innovation management and innovation policy have evolved and matured, research on related theories and realities has become an important academic frontier in economics, management, sociology, education and even engineering。
For almost 20 years, the representative view of foreign scholars has been mainly that christopher freeman of the university of sussex, united kingdom, has opened up a new area of research on national innovation systems, drawing on the philosophy of the economics of technological innovation that incorporates bear peter, noting the impact of the institutional environment on technological innovation and the economy. The main function of the national innovation system (nis) is to optimize the allocation of innovative resources and coordinate national innovation activities by governments, enterprises, universities, research institutes and intermediaries in pursuit of a set of common social and economic objectives, and to use innovation as a key engine for change and development. Freeman has further expanded the innovation theory of pumpett, replacing entrepreneurs with large enterprises, noting that the success of innovation ultimately depends on the ability of the state to adapt its socio-economic paradigm to the requirements and possibilities of the technological economy. Prof. Eric von hebell of the massachusetts institute of technology of the united states studied the democratization of innovation and noted that a user-centred innovation system was developing rapidly and forward-lookingly proposing an open and user-centred innovation model adapted to the knowledge society. He tried to show us the scenario that, with the advent of an era of knowledge-based economies and the emergence of advanced technologies, innovation by users would be further developed, and that enterprises should not seek out exactly what kind of products they needed, but should give users the tools to design and develop their own products, from minor changes to major innovations. Open innovation by professor henry chesabriv of the university of california at berkeley provides a new mindset for innovative research. Open innovation refers to the ability of enterprises to innovate in the process of technological innovation, while leveraging internal and external complementary sources of innovation. It emphasizes the importance of multi-subject participation and external knowledge resources for innovation, promotes collaborative innovation with clients, suppliers, competitors, universities, institutes, science and technology intermediaries, venture capital institutions, etc., and leverages open external forces to accelerate innovation, improve its efficiency and ultimately develop its own competitive advantages and core competitiveness。
Since the mid-1980s, our country has initiated research on innovation theory, which has developed a chinese-specific system of innovation theory and methodology, such as technological innovation, autonomous innovation, comprehensive innovation management and synergistic innovation. It is one of the social science disciplines with the lowest or even greater international gaps, with significant international implications。
Theoretical issues of innovation in our country
China's socialist character has flourished, and our country has accelerated the era of transformation of its economic development and industrialization, informatization, urbanization and rapid agricultural modernization, providing fertile ground for our innovative theoretical research, as well as excellent conditions and environment for our social science theory to catch up and leapfrog. The deepening and expansion of the theory of innovation, which is a typical frontier of cross-cutting disciplines, will certainly contribute greatly to the development of the country's management disciplines, economic disciplines, etc. In the area of discipline-building, there is a need for greater visibility, continuous cross-cutting research in innovation economics, management and policy, and the creation and refinement of innovative paradigms characterized by an informed and knowledge-based economy. The accumulation and strength of long-term research based on innovative theoretical disciplines and the integration of leading research forces in this field at the national and global levels must produce a number of groundbreaking theoretical and applied results with international implications, further raise the international standing and level of our social sciences and provide important theoretical underpinnings for our innovative nation-building。
In promoting innovative nation-building in our country, the theoretical study of innovation should focus on three issues:
How to give new impetus to sti through deeper reforms. Continued attention should be paid to the practices and experiences of developed countries in developing sound sti institutional mechanisms, analysing the reforms and reasons for their recent reforms in the sti institutional area, further studying the current state of sti institutional mechanisms and the size and structure of our strategic and emerging industries, analysing the country's main institutional bottlenecks and practical constraints in implementing innovation-driven development strategies, leading to the design of macro-investment systems for innovation, industrial organization systems and modern science and technology management systems。
How to enhance the leadership of innovative strategies. The key to building innovative countries and achieving technological catch-up and leapfrogging is the strategic transformation of innovation. Innovative strategies should be proactive, leading, with greater emphasis on original innovation in policy and strategic design, and furthering synergistic and open innovation. First, the relationship between autonomous development and open innovation is properly addressed. Actively respond to the demand for open innovation, accelerate the introduction of international science and technology results, integrate global innovation resources, develop corresponding regulations, advance platforms and build demand-driven technology markets. At the same time, investment in basic research and the scientific and technological frontier has been greatly enhanced, and the capacity for autonomous research and development and technology absorption has been effectively enhanced and the quality of scientific research improved. Secondly, in the spirit of the 18th plenum, an in-depth study of the strategic priorities and milestones of the “13th fiveth” period, as well as of the mechanisms and strategies that need to be put in place to achieve the goal of building an innovative state. The basic thinking and major initiatives to optimize the innovation-driven institutional environment from a government perspective include the enhancement of the capacity of the governance mechanisms of the national innovation system to design and govern, as well as innovation-driven development strategies, autonomous innovation strategies, content and relevance of science-based national strategies, and refinement of the top-level design of innovation-driven development strategies。
How to improve national innovation systems. Emphasis should be placed on policy recommendations for the establishment of sound national innovation systems, the promotion of science, technology and innovation and the significant upgrading of enterprise innovation capabilities, in terms of deepening sti institutional reform, optimizing public innovation resource allocation, adjusting strategic and emerging industry support models, optimizing the market environment for the development of new and emerging industries, and improving innovation-oriented systems of investment finance. In a sound national innovation system, the relationship between organizational and self-organizing innovation should be addressed. On the one hand, emphasis should be placed on organizational innovation, i. E. The rational use of state institutions under market economy conditions. In the areas of infrastructure development, urbanization, ecological environment and health care, major bases and specializations have been actively deployed, focusing on integrated science, technology, engineering and industrialization, and harnessing the great advantages of the socialist system in terms of strategic direction, mobilization of national resources, pooling of innovative talent and integration of scientific and technological results. On the other hand, high priority should be given to self-organizing innovation, optimizing entrepreneurship policies and environments, stimulating the innovation dynamism of smes, harnessing entrepreneurial creativity and encouraging the growth of high-tech smes. In particular, emphasis is placed on increasing the participation of the people in innovation and on taking full advantage of their ownership in innovation。
(by the director, centre for research on technological innovation, university of tsinghua)
