Title: Nations, institutions, and technological development

Authors: J. Zysman

Addresses: Co-Director, Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy, 2234 Piedmont Avenue, University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720-2322, USA

Abstract: Differences in national structures account for technological outcomes. Technology is a tool for comparativists to analyse the differences in national structures. Does technology drive society, and force an economy|s institutions to adapt, or does the character of a society|s community and institutional arrangements shape the character of technology? These are not necessarily competing hypotheses, but deeply intertwined stones that reflect the process by which technology recreates itself as it drives adaptations in the society at large. Embedding technological and economic development within institutions with historical roots in the nation improves upon the purely economical approach to explaining technological growth.

Keywords: technological development; national structures; technology management; economic development.

DOI: 10.1504/IJTM.1996.025531

International Journal of Technology Management, 1996 Vol.12 No.5/6, pp.651 - 678

Published online: 22 May 2009 *

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