ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book examines the challenge for many regions and industries as to which factors affect the creation and sustainability of clusters. It stresses the importance of the heterogeneity of resources and opportunities in clusters as strategic for firms and entrepreneurship and as an ingredient for future studies. The book focuses on clusters that were created inside spontaneous clusters and that were officially recognized by the French government to sustain R&D projects among cluster firms. It explains how various institutional entrepreneurs embedded in the institution exerted their influence to realize an institutional change and demonstrates a dynamic process for institutional change in an industrial cluster. The book discusses two cases: the paradox of embedded agency caused by a declination of brazier wholesale business, and the business transformation to the tableware wholesale business for the prevention of the paradox.
