ABSTRACT
The application of the basic tools of the economics of information, and specifically the analysis of transaction costs, agency theory, asymmetric information, and communication and networking costs to the economics of knowledge makes it possible to implement the notion of localised technological change and operationalise the debate between the Arrovian notion of knowledge as a public good deemed to undersupply (Arrow, 1962a) and knowledge as a quasi-proprietary good that can be exchanged in markets for knowledge (Jones, 1998; Arora et al., 2001) or generate equilibrium levels of free spillovers (Romer, 1990, 1994).
