ABSTRACT
Recent developments in economic theory, and in particular the evolutionary approach, lend weight to investigations suggesting that diversity offers positive economical consequences (Dosi et al., 1988;Metcalfe, 1992; Saviotti, 1988). These consequences have been investigated for conditions in which national systems of innovation are concerned (Cohendet et al., 1991,1992). It has been suggested that Europe especially could benefit from exploiting the potential economic value of diversity. However unambiguous, results about the effective impact of diversity and about the nature of the policy required to ‘valorize’ 1 it are extremely difficult to obtain. In fact several problems are intertwined and contribute to the complexity of the investigation: to determine an appropriate policy in terms of diversity, one should clearly define what diversity is, how diversity is generated, and how selection mechanisms operate.
