Introduction New Tendencies in Society. The Management of Innovation and Innovation Research

As a point of departure for editing this book, we asked the following question: Why should we not look at the right things and why is it that we might not be looking at the right things? Our answer was that both society and the market have changed, and with them the art of innovation management has changed. In June 2004, we organized a workshop involving researchers from several countries to discuss this question. The book is a result of that workshop. Part I provides an introduction and outlines the societal changes and the resultant changes in the nature of innovation activities and their consequences for innovation management. All of these changes can be characterized in one phrase — increased complexity. This means that the factors (innovation research, basic research in natural sciences and classic entrepreneurship) that classically have been thought to ensure innovation, firm development and economic growth are too limited for the present situation. In the next two chapters of the introduction, Staffan Laestadius and Marius Meeus discuss in greater depth the development of innovation research and the challenges it faces today.