The Working Group on Innovation and Crisis: Asian Technology after the Millennium

Innovation and Crisis: Asian Technology after the Millennium was launched in 1999 by co-principal investigators MIT Japan Program Director Richard Samuels and Research Director William Keller, this study tests the hypothesis that distinctive modes of innovation can be empirically associated with different countries or regions of the world, particularly as applied to the various developed and late developing states in Asia. It also explores the implications of a range of scenarios for further research and for public policy. Our authors consider whether a tsunami of converging practices -- spread by networks of multinationals and international S&T collaboration, and powered by the forces of global trade and finance -- is eradicating nationally-based differences in the organization of innovation, or if national differences will harden and persist.

New imperatives, driven by political, military, and economic instability, may influence the ways in which Asian governments and companies think and behave regarding critical technology assets. The study will: (1) map the international political economy of innovation in Asia for countries that have been affected by the economic and political crises of 1997-1999, specifically including China, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, and other countries as necessary; (2) analyze how local companies and multinational corporations function in national and regional economies, including sub- and cross-national technology/production networks; (3) determine how national policy orientations and institutions influence the organization of innovation, education, intellectual property protection, supplier chains, foreign direct investment, foreign technology acquisition, and industry associations; and (4) assess the effects of the crises on US information technology companies doing substantial business in Asia and with Asian companies.