ABSTRACT
Part Three of this book has illustrated the variety of ways in which the national environment, or ‘national system of innovation’ may influence the innovative activities of firms. Differences in national systems can go a long way towards explaining differences in growth rates over the past two centuries. However, Chapters 14 and 15 in particular showed that the international global environment exerts an increasing influence on the behaviour of firms. Even in the largest countries the world economy, world science and technology increasingly affect the innovative activities of all firms, large and small. Public policies too are heavily affected by the international environment. This is obvious in the case of war or the Cold War, but it is also true in the case of policies which are motivated primarily by economic goals or social objectives.
