ABSTRACT
The United States has long been praised for the dynamism and resilience of its “national system of innovation” (NSI). A shifting but distinctive institutional framework has enabled innovators and institutions to produce and commercialize novelty, inventions and research within and across national borders. The resulting open innovation paradigm has helped identify the driving force of the innovation process as the outcome of successful interactions that occur under specific historical, cultural and socioeconomic conditions between entrepreneurs, organizations, universities, the state and markets (Freeman, 1995; Lundvall, 1992; Mowery, 1998; Etzkowitz & Leydesdorff, 2000). The American NSI and its successive adaptations have played a crucial role in the vibrancy of the US political economy model and the primacy of its “liberal-market economy” over other varieties of capitalism (Hall & Soskice, 2001; Amable, 2003).
