Complexity Perspectives in Innovation and Social Change
Edited by Sander van der Leeuw, Geoffrey West, Denise Pumain and David Lane
Innovation is nowadays a question of life and death for many of the economies of the western world. Yet, due to our generally reductionist scientific paradigm, invention and innovation are rarely studied scientifically. Most work prefers to study its context and its consequences. As a result, our society lacks the scientific tools to understand, improve or otherwise make impact on the processes of invention and innovation. This book delves deeply into that topic, taking the position that the complex systems approach, with its emphasis on "emergence," is better suited than our traditional approach to the phenomenon.
In a collection of very coherent papers, which are the result of an EU-funded, four-year international research team’s effort, it addresses various aspects of the topic from different disciplinary angles. One of the main emphases is the need, in the social sciences, to move away from neo-darwinist "population thinking" to "organization thinking" if we want to understand social evolution. Another main emphasis is on developing a generative approach to invention and innovation, looking in detail at the contexts within which invention and innovation occur, and how these contexts impact on the chances for success or failure. Throughout, the book is infused with interesting new insights, but also presents several well-elaborated case studies that connect the ideas with a substantive body of "real world" information.
Bio
Sander van der Leeuw is a professor in the School of Human Evolution and Social Change. He specializes in the long-term impacts of human activity on the landscape, and he is recognized as a pioneer in the application of the complex adaptive systems approach to socio-environmental challenges.
Praise for this book
This important book presents an articulated and original approach to understanding innovation as a collective, systemic and evolutionary process engendered by generative relations that enable agents and social systems to overcome the challenges of the limits to growth ... It provides new foundations to implementing a broader evolutionary approach to economics.
Cristiano Antonelli Regional Studies
