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Summary Innovation and International Development

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Course
Innovation and International Development (GEO42009)

Institution
Universiteit Utrecht (UU)

This is a summary with Lecture notes, articles and tutorials. The lectures are: 1)Technology transfer, 2) Platforms, 3) Leapfrogging, 4) Nation-building, 5) Patents, 6) Splintered regimes, 7)BoP and reverse innovation, and 8) Pluriversal technologies.

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Uploaded on January 15, 2024
Number of pages 48
Written in 2023/2024
Type Summary

innovation
international development
technology transfer
platforms
leapfrogging
nation building
patents
splintered regimes
bottom of the pyramid
reverse innovation
pluriversal technologies
decoloniali

Institution
Universiteit Utrecht (UU)
Education
Innovation Sciences
Course
Innovation and International Development (GEO42009)

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Innovation and International development
(GEO4-2009)

2023/2024

,Introduction
Development

 Effort to undo the inequality between supposedly ‘underdeveloped’ places and supposedly
‘developed’ places, where the latter help the former
 “the sum of virtuous huma aspirations”

Conventional understanding

 Western counties are innovative, developing countries are not
 Innovations should be brought from Western countries to developing countries
 The assumption is that underdeveloped countries do not have that knowledge and skills of
developed western countries. Western countries bring innovations to the Global South. When
there comes up an innovation in the Western countries, there is always someone who says, let’s
bring this innovation to poor countries, to the Global South.
 But it is a bit more complicated:
Complication 1: The track record for bringing Northern innovation to the global South is very poor

 Northern innovation usually fail in the South
o For example, 60% of the tractor innovations brake down in the South (because of
lack of skills, high costs etc.). Not only for tractors, also for solar panels, computers
etc. They usually work very well in our Western contexts. Should we developed
innovations that fits more to the contexts of the global South?

Complication 2: Colonial legacies (Koloniale erfenissen)

 Also in colonial times innovations were brought from rich to poor countries
 Science and innovations strengthened the colonial project
 Botany, geology, agriculture, and infrastructure enabled the extraction of resources

 The most common technologies the colonial brought where agricultural and infrastructural
technologies.
 The colonial legacies are very good documented. If you want to understand the role of innovation
you have to know the colonial legacies of the global South.

Complication 3: The Global South itself is (increasingly) innovative

 Global South scores well on innovation input/output performance

Gross expenditure on research 1996 2017
and development
High-income economies 87% 64%
Developing countries 13% 36%
 This says something about out perceptions that we think this countries are not innovative
 China and India are leading countries in innovations
 The developing countries have younger populations (map), that is interesting, the demand for
development and innovation will therefore be more in the global South. There are bigger markets
in 2050, is the expectation.

,The problem

 Conventional understanding that Western innovations should be brought to developing
countries is problematic
 The relation between innovation and international development in more complex

The solution

 There are different ways of understanding the relation between innovation and development
 Hence the course objectives:
o Learn different perspectives
o To be able to critically assess these

Note on terminology

 International development is about different at an international scale
 Every way of describing such differences has its problems (Developed vs. Developing – Rich
vs. Poor - First vs. Third World) Each has a problem and does not explain everything

Preparatory assignment before each tutorial (for 1 article)

 Quote: provide a single-sentence quote that you think clearly captures the authors’ main
point. Include the page number in the quote. The quote cannot be from the abstract.
 Argument: describe the line of argumentation of the article. What is the central argument
and how is that argument made? (max. 100 words)
 Questions: formulate two questions that the articles raises to you.
 Relation: describe how the article relates to at least one other article that you have read in
this course, or to a broader theme or scientific discussion on the course content.
 Critique/Limitations: formulate at least two critiques (strengths or limitations) of the
argument. (max. 100 words)

 The assignments have to be handed in via Microsoft Forms by 16:00 hours the day prior to the
tutorial meeting. URLs to the relevant forms will be made available by the tutor.

, Lecture 1. Technology transfer
Literature:

 Rostow (1959) on stages of growth
 Juma (2011) on biotechnology for preventing hunger
 Hassan (2005) on nanotechnology for the developing world

Rostow, 1959, The stages of economic growth

Rostow, an eminent economic historian, has described the historical process of transition from
underdevelopment to development in terms of a series of five stages of growth though which all
countries must pass to reach the ultimate destination of a developed country.

 This article summarizes a way of generalizing the sweep of modern economic history.
 The form of this generalization is a set of stage of growth:

Stage 1. The traditional society: This stage is characterized by a subsistent, agricultural-based
economy with intensive labor and low levels of trading, and a population that does not have a
scientific perspective on the world an technology.

Stage 2. The preconditions for take-off: Here, a society begins to develop manufacturing and a more
national/international, as opposed to regional, outlook.

Stage 3. The take-off: Rostow described this stage as a short period of intensive growth, in which
industrialization begins to occur, and workers and institutions become concentrated around a new
industry.

Stage 4. The drive to maturity: This stage takes place over a long period of time as standards of living
rise, the use of technology increases, and the national economy grows and diversifies.

Stage 5. The age of high consumption: At the time of writing, Rostow believed that Western
countries, most notable the United States, occupied this last ‘developed’ stage. Here, a country’s
economy flourishes in a capitalist system, characterized by mass production and consumerism.

These categories are rooted in dynamic propositions about supply, demand, and the pattern of
production.

Rostow's Stages of Growth model is one of the most influential development theories of the
twentieth century. It was, however, also grounded in the historical and political context in which he
wrote. Stages of Economic Growth was published in 1960, at the height of the Cold War, and with
the subtitle "A Non-Communist Manifesto," it was overtly political. Rostow was fiercely anti-
communist and right-wing; he modeled his theory after western capitalist countries, which had
industrialized and urbanized. As a staff member in President John F. Kennedy's administration,
Rostow promoted his development model as part of U.S. foreign policy. Rostow's model illustrates a
desire not only to assist lower income countries in the development process but also to assert the
United States' influence over that of communist Russia.

Juma, 2011, Preventing hunger: Biotechnology is key

If African countries can’t plant genetically modified crops to produce more and healthier food,
vulnerable populations will be at risk, argues Calestous Juma.

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