Institutional Change in Upstream Innovation Governance

Book excerpt: The book takes issue with the changing role of government in devising and applying science, technology and innovation (STI) policies in a late-comer economy. South Korea is presented as a point in case, due to its astonishing ascent from a developing nation in the 1960s, to an emerging market in the 1980s and a high-technology powerhouse of our days. Which incentives have kept the government focused on productivity-enhancing STI policies? And why should Korea's national innovation system be reconfigured to fully prepare for the technological challenges of the 21st century? An institutional economics perspective complemented by expert interviews shows that organizations and institutions concerned with STI policy-making in Korea have co-evolved simultaneously mainly driven by the timing of presidential election cycles. The book contains a summary in Korean.