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Weekly UpdatesINTRODUCTION
In the current context of globalisation and the development of the so-called 'knowledge economy', there has been growing interest in both policy-making and academic circles in two inter-related phenomena: policies on knowledge production and exploitation between universities, business and government; and policies to promote localised innovation systems. The first consists of policy measures which focus on the creation, transfer and commercialisation of knowledge, most notably through the introduction of measures to ensure that there is a flow from centres of knowledge creation, such as universities and public sector research agencies, to centres of economic application largely, though not exclusively, in firms (Bozeman 2000; Laredo & Mustar 2001; Thune 2007). The resulting regime has been claimed to have a new mode of knowledge production, new entrepreneurial actors (the entrepreneurial university), and a novel 'triple helix' form of university-industry-government inter-relationship (Gibbons et al. 1994; Etzkowitz & Leydesdorff 1997). This model proposes a more prominent role for universities in innovation within the economy, higher levels of collaboration among universities, industries and governments, with innovation policy an outcome of interaction among these institutional spheres rather than a government prescription, and that each partner 'takes the role of the other' so for example an entrepreneurial university takes on some of the traditional roles of industry and government (Etzkowitz & Klofsten 2005).
The second phenomenon has been a renewed interest in localised innovation, as exemplified by firm clusters, regional innovation systems and the concept of 'city-regions' (Porter 1998; Cooke 2002; de la Mothe & Mallory 2006). Cluster policies have been adopted by policy-makers at several levels of government in order to foster localised innovation and economic development and most have involved attempts to strengthen the links between industry, universities and other knowledge producing institutions (Gunasekara 2006; Charles 2007).
Particular emphasis has been placed on the idea of the city or city-region as a 'natural' scale for economic interaction, and the recognition that knowledge infrastructure is typically concentrated in cities. With the knowledge economy focusing policymaking attention increasingly on knowledge-based services as well as high tech industry, the city-region (defined as the city and its immediate zone of influence) is seen as the driver of national and regional/state economies. Policy tools available at the city-region scale include provision of new physical spaces to host and encourage activities which translate academic knowledge into commercial activity, and broader efforts to use the cultural renaissance of the 'city' as an 'attractor' for the so-called 'creative classes' (Florida 2002) and other human capital required to 'energise' translational activity.
As a consequence the traditional locus of policy for science and innovation at the national scale has been extended to other levels of government and new governance relationships have emerged to oversee new sub-national, and indeed supranational, policies (Charles et al. 2004). At a subnational scale, regional, metropolitan and State or provincial governments have developed an interest in innovation policies and focused on the stimulation of territorially defined innovation systems as a key element of economic development strategies. Indeed, the growing emphasis on science-based industries has led to a new focus at sub-national levels of policy on investments in science infrastructure, whether it be large scale equipment, such as synchrotrons, or smaller infrastructure in university research centres or even scientific talent-attraction funds, much of this concentrated in cities. At the same time, in Europe, we see the increased engagement of the EU in science and innovation policy, with EU policymakers often working directly with cities and regions to promote innovation strategies and to promote international collaboration among cities and regions in transferring the experiences of innovation policy. These disparate strategies and initiatives also draw upon new models of governance, with public-private partnerships overseeing strategy development, use of universities as policy innovators, and special purpose governance arrangements for specific initiatives.
These two strands of policy thinking on university knowledge commercialisation and localised innovation systems come together around the demarcation of territory for the transfer and transformation of knowledge, as indicated by such terms as 'innovation corridors', 'smart regions', 'science cities', and 'technology precincts'. This development appears to echo earlier policy obsessions with science or technology 'parks', which first became popular during the 1980s and which sought to emulate the success of 'high technology' breeding grounds, such as Silicon Valley and Boston's Route 128 in the USA (Joseph 1992; Massey et al. 1992; Link & Scott 2003). Although the notion of science/technology parks persists, as indicated by such organizations as Technology Parks and Incubators in Australia, the UK Science Park Association, and the International Association of Science Parks, the newer rhetoric is much more focused on marking out somewhat less bounded spaces as places to ensure desired effects and capture benefits locally. This focus also contrasts with earlier concerns with organization--the 'park' as a tract of land enclosing a community of organizations managed by specialised professionals--and a more generalised creation of viable enterprises, the benefits of which were expected to ripple throughout national economies. Moreover, the link of economic development policies to broader cultural and outreach agendas, as part of an overall regenerative project, emphasising their potential for localised social as well as economic benefit, is new.
The central premise of policies for the newer localised innovation spaces is that if the panoply of actors engaged in the creation, application and commercialisation of knowledge, including the entrepreneurial support necessary for this, can be brought into co-location and so 'rub shoulders together', the resulting processes of interaction and exchange will assist a dynamic, innovative and expanding techno-economic network to develop. The material manifestation of the resulting virtuous circle will be new venture start-ups and in-flows of investment and firms, leading to job creation and knock-on effects throughout the local economy.
At the current juncture, however, these spaces exist more in rhetoric and representation than they do in the tangible form of material facilities, physical areas and identifiable activities. They are usually projects whose possibilities, features and potential outcomes exist in the imaginations of those engaged with the policy and strategy making process, typically emergent and nascent collaborative networks of public and private sector actors engaged in policymaking across established organisational and other boundaries. Within these emergent networks, actors of various sorts seek to enrol a variety of interests to realise their intent. However, the act of enrolment requires a translation of the nature of what the actors do to fit in with the new network as well as a translation and reformulation of the intent. In other words these new networks are not the simple application of idealised models of policies but the negotiation of different interpretations of policy in which the positions of actors are invariably changed by the process of negotiation. Some of the activities that these networks or partnerships seek to foster within the city may well already exist, and so a key task may be to draw these preexisting initiatives into the representational space and better align them with network goals. Such a process may amount to no more than a 'rebranding' of an already existing set of activities, although the rhetoric may promise more fundamental changes in outcomes.
These policy initiatives raise many questions, including the extent to which they differ from earlier science/technology parks and the 'effects' they cause, or articulate with, in university-industry-government relations. Can they just be dismissed as empty rhetoric which addresses particular political agendas (such as the need to be seen to be doing something to address a recognised economic problem)? Alternatively, are there situations where the rhetoric underpins constructive policy developments through physical or organisational transformations through which the desired effects can be realized? In this paper, we address these questions through an exploration of two examples: the Newcastle Science City in the north east of England and the Pacific Innovation Corridor on the Gold Coast of Queensland in Australia.
Newcastle Science City: industrial rejuvenation
Following an initial announcement in his 2004 pre-budget report, the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown, designated six UK cities--Newcastle, Birmingham, Bristol, Manchester, Nottingham and York--as 'Science Cities':
The idea was that these designated innovative spaces would 'lead the development of stronger and more widespread engagement between businesses and the science base' as they would enable the 'science base' to be 'plugged into the enterprise grid'. This initiative was intended as the 'spearhead' of efforts to build a globally competitive 'knowledge economy' in Britain. Based 'on the concept that clusters of knowledge-intensive firms tend to form around large research universities', the Science City initiative recognised the importance of regional innovation systems. Science cities would build on the university research knowledge base by 'joining up local policies and addressing a range of wider policy issues to create an innovation ecosystem that will make the cities attractive locations for business investment' (Sainsbury Review 2007: 139). The experiment with science cities would add to a growing global set of geographically-focused innovation places and spaces.
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