Economic Geography

The present period – studies of regional 
innovation systems and learning regions
This focus on innovation turned my attention towards mechanisms for upgrad-
ing the innovative capacity of SMEs and industrial districts/regional clusters.
The ideas of regional innovation systems and learning regions starting turning
up around the mid 1990s. Regional innovation systems (RIS) are defined as
‘interacting knowledge generation and exploitation subsystems linked to global,
national and other regional subsystems’ (Cooke 2004: 3). An RIS is not identical
with a cluster since RIS normally supports more than one cluster. Recent work on
innovation systems indicates that the region is a key level at which innovative capac-
ity is shaped and economic processes coordinated and governed. This has among
Economic geography as (regional) contexts
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other things led to governments and agencies at various geographical levels look-
ing at regional innovation systems as key elements of their innovation policy.
My own studies of regional innovation systems were initiated when I (in addi-
tion to being professor in human geography in Oslo [since 1993]) was associated
with the STEP group in Oslo as a senior researcher and scientific advisor.
8
Here
I – together with my first doctoral student (now professor), Arne Isaksen – built
up research on regional innovation systems, clusters and innovation policy
towards SMEs resulting in many large national and international research proj-
ects (e.g. see Asheim and Isaksen 1997; Asheim et al. 2003). This research
continued when moving my chair in human geography in 1999 to a new Centre
for technology, innovation and culture at the University of Oslo, initiated by among
others Jan Fagerberg (Fagerberg et al. 2005), and finally when taking up the chair
in economic geography at Lund University (after Gunnar Törnqvist) in August
2001, where a comprehensive Nordic project on SMEs and RIS was carried out
2002–3 (Asheim and Coenen 2005).
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This research has been further stimulated by the establishment of CIRCLE
(Centre for Innovation, Research and Competence in the Learning Economy), where
my research group undertakes international comparisons of regional innovation
systems with the aim of contributing to theoretical advances and presenting new
empirical findings.
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The research has developed and implemented in concrete
studies a new approach for doing comparative analyses using the following main
dimensions: industrial knowledge bases, distinguishing between industries based
on analytical (e.g. biotech), synthetic (e.g. mechanical engineering), and symbolic
(film industry) knowledge bases, and institutional frameworks applying the vari-
eties of capitalism distinction between coordinated and liberal market economies
(using regions in the Nordic countries and Canada as cases) (Hall and Soskice 2001).
Bringing these analytical dimensions together has renewed the study of RIS, and
has brought about a better understanding of the workings and impacts of RIS. I
believe that innovation processes of firms are strongly shaped by their specific
knowledge base, and, thus, need different competencies as well as supporting
innovation policies (Asheim and Coenen 2005; Asheim and Gertler 2005). After
years of influential research on the importance of territorial agglomerations for
regional economic growth more work is now needed to disclose and reveal the
contingencies, particularities and specificities of the various contexts and envi-
ronments where knowledge creation, innovation and entrepreneurship take place
in order to obtain a better understanding of factors enabling or impeding these
processes. Differentiating between knowledge bases and institutional frameworks
represents a first attempt of such an ‘unpacking strategy’.