HISTORY OF INNOVATION

In accordance with the learning objectives of the Degree in Innovation and Marketing, the course intends to provide an overview of most important critical approaches to the history of innovation and entrepreneurship.
During weeks 1 and 2, the teacher will provide students with key theoretical instruments to study innovation and technology borrowed by sociology of technology and economic theory.
In the following weeks, the course will focus on specific technical and organizational innovations and case studies. These will be used by both teacher and students to shed light on and discuss the complexity of innovation processes and their social determinants.

1) Students will develop an understanding of innovation and entrepreneurship as complex phenomena resulting from interactions between groups of people and institutions (entrepreneurs, experts, managers, consumers, firms, governments).
2) Students will obtain a basic understanding of the methods and contents of Science and Technology Studies (STS) and of the Social Construction of Techology (Scot) and their implication for historical analysis
3) Students will become aware of the main historical debates on innovation and entrepreneurship
4) Students will become familiar with the most important trends and innovations in the history of technology and organizations.
5) Students will be able to present in public and defend research outcome

Good- Excellent English skills

Week 1. Course Introduction: what is innovation? How does technology work? Concepts from sociology and history of technology
1. The social construction of facts and artifacts (Pinch and Bijker)
2. The social construction of Bakelite. Towards a theory of invention (Bijker)
3. The consumption junction. A proposal for research strategies in the sociology of technology (Schwartz Cowan)

Week 2. How do economists conceptualize innovation?
4. Problems in the Economist’s Conceptualization of technological innovation (Rosenberg)
5. Schumpeter: the entrepreneur as innovator (Schumpeter)
6. Risks of Technological Determinism (Edgerton)

Week 3. Innovation in history - Economic historians and innovation
4. Imitation and invention (Berg)
5. Industriousness (De Vries)
6. R and D. The industrialization of the invention or from novelty to utility (Hounshell)

Week 3. Innovation in the consumption world
7. Domestication of Everyday Life Technology: Dynamic Views on the Social Histories of Artifacts (Pantzar)
8. Ford Motor Company (Hounshell)
9. The Kitchen debate (Oldenziel)

Week 4. Innovation in business history and management
10. (Chandler)
11. From the U form to the conglomerate (Williamson)
12. The Network enterprise (Powell)

Week 5. Innovation and sustainability
13. Electric car: mobility innovation (Mom)
14. Handloom and sustainability (Bijker and Mamipuhdi
15. Sustainability and business model

Relevant articles and chapters will be made available to students on Moodle platform

Berg M., 2002, From Imitation to Invention: Creating Commodities in 18th-Century Britain, Economic History Review, 55(1): 1-30.
Bijker W, Thomas P. Hughes, Trevor Pinch, The Social Construction of Technological Systems: New Directions in the Sociology and History of Technology, MIT Press, 2012 (new edition)
Chandler A.D., 1973, Decision Making and Modern Institutional Change, Journal of Economic History, 33(1): 1-15.
De Vries J., 1994, The Industrial Revolution and the Industrious Revolution, Journal of Economic History, 54(2): 249-270.
Edgerton, D., From Innovation to Use: Ten Eclectic Theses on the Historiography of Technology, History and Technology 16, 2, (1999), 1-26
Galambos L. & Jane Sewell, "The Virology Network and a New Program at Merck Sharp & Dohme," & "New Networks, New Leadership: The Hepatitis B Vaccines," in Networks of Innovation: Vaccine Development at Merck, Sharp & Dohme, and Mulford, 1895-1995 (1995): 53-78, 181-210.
Hounshell, D. "The American System of Manufactures in the Antebellum Period," From the American System to Mass Production, 1800-1932 (1984): 67-124.
David Hounshell, "The Ford Motor Company and the Rise of Mass Production in America," From the American System to Mass Production, 1800-1932 (1984): 214-262.
Meyer-Thurow, G. "The Industrialization of Invention: A Case Study from the German Chemical Industry" Isis 73:3 (1982): 363-381Pantzar M., 1997, Domestication of Everyday Life Technology: Dynamic Views on the Social Histories of Artifacts, Design Issues, 13(3): 62-95.
Powell W.W., 1990, Neither Market nor Hierarchy: Network Forms of Organization, Research in Organizational Behavior, 12: 295-336.
Rosenberg, N., 1974, Science, Invention and Economic Growth, The Economic Journal, 84(333): 90-108.
Rosenberg, N., 1976, On Technological Expectations, The Economic Journal, 86(843): 523-535.
Williamson O.E., 1981, The Modern Corporation: Origins, Evolution, Attributes, Journal of Economic Literature, 19 (4): 1537-68.
Usselman, S. "Unbundling IBM: Antitrust and the Incentives to Innovation in American Computing," in Sally Clarke, Naomi Lamoreaux, & Steve Usselman, eds., The Challenge of Remaining Innovative (2009): 249-279

Written exam
Onl online; one question\open books; two hours

Dual system\ frontal lessons\ presentations and discussion by the students

Inglese

scritto

Questo insegnamento tratta argomenti connessi alla macroarea "Economia circolare, innovazione, lavoro" e concorre alla realizzazione dei relativi obiettivi ONU dell'Agenda 2030 per lo Sviluppo Sostenibile