Course Information

Instructor: Dr. Timur Ergen (iawlehre@uni-bremen.de)
Institution: University of Bremen, Institute Labor and Economy (iaw)
Semester: Spring 2026
Schedule: Fridays 08:00 - 10:00, weekly (from 10/04/26)
Location: UNICOM 3.3380 (SOCIUM - Mary-Somerville-Str. 3)

The class examines innovation as a core governance problem for modern states. After exploring foundational debates on the nature of innovation and the ways in which states have come to problematize it, the class moves into cutting-edge debates on the shape, workings, and discontents of contemporary innovation states with a major focus on Europe and the United States. Themes the course develops in more detail are cross-national institutional differences in the governance of innovation, links between national security, the military, and innovation policy, the interaction between policies meant to stimulate innovation and policies meant to regulate and contain it, and policies structuring the financing of innovation. The last third of the class explores core aspects of the current European innovation state. Thematically, this block centers on problems of organizing innovation policy in a characteristically weak supranational state structure, climate change and green innovation, semiconductor policy, regional innovation clusters, and the compensation of losers and losing regions in knowledge economies.

Course Materials
  • Complete Syllabus — Full course syllabus with detailed information and requirements

Assessment

Discussion of the readings will make up the core of the seminar sessions. Students are expected to read all assigned texts and to participate regularly and actively. To get credit (6 CP), students must (1) do all assigned readings; (2) prepare three reading reports (4,000 characters); (3) and submit final papers (12,000 characters).

The reading reports are intended to prepare the ground for discussions by asking participants to set out their responses to the readings in written form. Memos should not just summarize the readings, but rather take up specific arguments, compare the positions of different authors, raise questions of evidence, usefulness, or plausibility or draw attention to particular strengths and weaknesses in the arguments and descriptions. We will share these memos through email. In order for everyone to have time to read over the comments of others, these will be due by 4 pm on the day before the class meets. For the final paper, original research on literature, data, or archival material is required. Term papers have to be written in English. All texts are made available on the Stud.IP website of the course.

Part 1: Fundamentals - Innovation and the State

Session 1: What is innovation and where does it come from?

April 10, 2026

Required Reading:

  • Fagerberg, J. 2006. “Innovation: A Guide to the Literature.” In The Oxford Handbook of Innovation, edited by J. Fagerberg and D. C. Mowery, 1-26. Oxford University Press.

Further Readings:

  • Atkinson, R., and M. Lind. 2018. “The Myth of the Genius in the Garage: Big Innovation.” In Big Is Beautiful, 95-115. MIT Press.
  • Engerman, S.L. & N. Rosenberg. 2024. Innovation in Historical Perspective. In Handbook of Cliometrics, edited by C. Diebolt & M. Haupert. Springer: 2211-2223.
  • Godin, B. 2017. A conceptual history of innovation. In The Elgar Companion to Innovation and Knowledge Creation, edited by Harald Bathelt et al. Edward Elgar: 25-32.
  • Mowery, D. C., and N. Rosenberg. 1998. “The Institutionalization of Innovation, 1900-90.” In Paths of Innovation: Technological Change in 20th-Century America, 11-46. Cambridge University Press.
  • Lester, R., and M. Piore. 2004. Innovation: The Missing Dimension, 35-73. Harvard University Press.

April 17, 2026 - no class

Session 2: Technological innovation and the modern state

April 24, 2026

Required Reading:

  • Lundvall, B.-A., and S. Borras. 2006. “Science, Technology, and Innovation Policy.” In The Oxford Handbook of Innovation, edited by J. Fagerberg and D. C. Mowery. Oxford University Press.

Further Readings:

  • Acemoglu, D. & J. Robinson. 2006. “Economic Backwardness in Political Perspective.” American Political Science Review 100 (1): 115-131.
  • Berman, E. P. 2012. Creating the Market University: How Academic Science Became an Economic Engine. Princeton University Press. Chapters 3 & 7.
  • Bloom, N., J. Van Reenen & H. Williams 2019. A toolkit of policies to promote innovation. Journal of Economic Perspectives 33: 163-184.
  • Fagerberg, J. 2017. “Innovation Policy: Rationales, Lessons and Challenges.” Journal of Economic Surveys 31(2): 497-512.
  • Gerschenkron, A. 1962. Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspective. A Book of Essays. Harvard University Press, Chapters 1, 2, 3 & ‘The Approach to European Industrialization: A Postscript’.

May 01, 2026 - no class

Part 2: Untangling the Innovation State: Arenas and Domains

Session 3: National innovation systems

May 8, 2026

Required Reading:

  • Nelson, R. R. 2013. “National innovation systems”. In Regional innovation, knowledge and global change, edited by Z. Acs. Routledge: 11-26.

Further Readings:

  • Mowery, D. C., and B. N. Sampat. 2006. “Universities in National Innovation Systems.” In The Oxford Handbook of Innovation, edited by J. Fagerberg and D. C. Mowery. Oxford University Press.
  • Mustar, P & P. Laredo. 2002. Innovation and research policy in France (1980-2000) or the disappearance of the Colbertist state. Research Policy 31(1): 55-72.
  • Soskice, D. 1997. “German Technology Policy, Innovation, and National Institutional Frameworks.” Industry and Innovation, 4(1), 75-96.
  • Trumbull, G. 2004. Silicon and the State: French Innovation Policy in the Internet Age. Brookings Institution Press, Chapters 1, 2 & 6.
  • Ziegler, J. N. 1995. “Institutions, Elites, and Technological Change in France and Germany.” World Politics 47(3): 341-72.

Session 4: Innovation and the military

May 8, 2026 (additional virtual session - 14:00-15:30)

Required Reading:

  • Hooks, G. 1990. “The Rise of the Pentagon and U.S. State Building: The Defense Program as Industrial Policy.” American Journal of Sociology 96(2): 358-404.

Further Readings:

  • Bonvillian, W. B. 2018. “DARPA and its ARPA-E and IARPA clones: A unique innovation organization model”. Industrial and Corporate Change 27 (5): 897-914.
  • Block, F. 2008. “Swimming Against the Current: The Rise of a Hidden Developmental State in the United States.” Politics & Society 36(2): 169-206.
  • Mowery, D. C. 2009. “National Security and National Innovation Systems.” Journal of Technology Transfer 34: 455-473.
  • Weiss, L. 2014. America Inc.?: Innovation and Enterprise in the National Security State. Cornell University Press, Chapters 1, 2 & 4.

Session 5: The regulatory politics of innovation

May 15, 2026

Required Reading:

  • Evans, P. 1995. “Promotion and Policing.” In Embedded Autonomy: States and Industrial Transformation, 99-127. Princeton University Press.

Further Readings:

  • Collier, R., V. B. Dubal, and C. Carter. 2018. “Disrupting Regulation, Regulating Disruption: The Politics of Uber in the United States.” Perspectives on Politics 16(4): 919-937.
  • Gifford, D. J. & R. T. Kudrle. 2011. “Antitrust Approaches to Dynamically Competitive Industries in the United States and the European Union.” Journal of Competition Law & Economics, 7 (3): 695-731.
  • Jasanoff, S. & SH. Kim. 2009. “Containing the Atom: Sociotechnical Imaginaries and Nuclear Power in the United States and South Korea.” Minerva 47: 119-146.
  • Loeppky, R. 2005. History, technology, and the capitalist state: the comparative political economy of biotechnology and genomics. Review of International Political Economy 12 (2): 264-286.
  • Mugge, D. 2024. “EU AI sovereignty: for whom, to what end, and to whose benefit?” Journal of European Public Policy 31(8), 2200-2225.

May 22, 2026 - no class

Session 6: Financing Innovation

May 29, 2026

Required Reading:

  • Auerswald, P., and L. Branscomb. 2003. “Valleys of Death and Darwinian Seas: Financing the Invention to Innovation Transition in the United States.” Journal of Technology Transfer 28 (3-4): 227-239.

Further Readings:

  • Cooiman, F. 2024. Imprinting the economy: The structural power of venture capital. Environment and Planning A, 56 (2), 586-602.
  • Griffith-Jones, S. & N. Naqvi. 2021. “Leveraging Policy Steer? Industrial Policy, Risk-Sharing, and the European Investment Bank”. In The Reinvention of Development Banking in the European Union: Industrial Policy in the Single Market and the Emergence of a Field, edited by D. Mertens, M. Thiemann & P. Volberding. Oxford University Press: 90-114.
  • Mazzucato, M, & Semieniuk, G. 2018. “Financing renewable energy: Who is financing what and why it matters”. Technological Forecasting and Social Change 127: 8-22.
  • Thurbon, E. 2016. Developmental mindset: The revival of financial activism in South Korea. Cornell University Press, Chapters 6, 7, 8 & 9.
  • Zysman, J. 1983. “Finance and the Politics of Industry.” In Governments, Markets and Growth. Cornell University Press: 55-95.

Session 7: Innovation and intellectual property

June 5, 2026

Required Readings:

  • Schwartz, H. 2021. “Mo’ Patents, Mo’ Problems: Corporate Strategy, Structure, and Profitability in America’s Political Economy.” In The American Political Economy: Politics, Markets, and Power, edited by J. S. Hacker, A. Hertel-Fernandez, P. Pierson, and K. Thelen. Cambridge University Press: 247-269.

Further Readings:

  • Breznitz, D. 2021. “Our Anti-Intellectual Property Rights System.” In Innovation in Real Places: Strategies for Prosperity in an Unforgiving World. Oxford University Press.
  • Jessop, B. 2005. “Cultural political economy, the knowledge-based economy, and the state”. In The Technological Economy, edited by D. Slater & A. Barry. Routledge: 144-166.
  • Muzaka, V. 2012. “Intellectual property protection and European ‘competitiveness’”. Review of International Political Economy 20 (4): 819-847.
  • Scherer, F. 2009. “The Political Economy of Patent Policy Reform in the United States”. Journal on Telecommunications & High Technology Law 7: 167-216.
  • Shadlen, K. C., A. Schrank, M. J. Kurtz, 2005. “The Political Economy of Intellectual Property Protection: The Case of Software”. International Studies Quarterly 49(1): 45-71.

Part 3: The 21st Century European Innovation State

Session 8: European innovation policy

June 12, 2026

Required Reading:

  • Mazzucato, M., and C. Perez. 2015. “Innovation as Growth Policy: The Challenge for Europe.” In The Triple Challenge for Europe, edited by J. Fagerberg et al., 229-264. Oxford University Press.

Further Readings:

  • Grande, E. 2001. “The Erosion of State Capacity and the European Innovation Policy Dilemma: A Comparison of German and EU Information Technology Policies.” Research Policy 30(6): 905-921.
  • Mocanu, D., and M. Thiemann. 2024. “Breeding ‘Unicorns’: Tracing the Rise of the European Investor State in the European Venture Capital Market.” Competition & Change 28(3-4): 433-453.
  • O Riain, S. 2000. “The Flexible Developmental State: Globalization, Information Technology, and the ‘Celtic Tiger.’” Politics and Society 28(2): 157-193.
  • Ruck, J. 2024. “A Geoeconomic Fix? European Industrial Policy on Semiconductors Amidst Global Competition.” Journal of Common Market Studies 64: 742-761.

Session 9: Green energy innovation policy

June 19, 2026

Required Reading:

  • Gabor, D. 2023. “The (European) Derisking State.” Stato e mercato 2023-1: 53-84.

Further Readings:

  • Cigna, L., D. Di Carlo and N. Durazzi. 2025. “The Comparative Political Economy of the Green Transition: Economic Specializations and Skills Regimes in Europe.” Regulation & Governance Online First: 1-16.
  • Gabor, D., and B. Braun. 2023. “Green Macrofinancial Regimes.” Review of International Political Economy, 32(3): 542-568.
  • Meckling, J., and J. Nahm. 2022. “Strategic State Capacity: How States Counter Opposition to Climate Policy.” Comparative Political Studies 55(3): 493-523.
  • Mowery, D. C., R. Nelson & B. Martin. 2010. “Technology policy and global warming: why new policy models are needed (or why putting new wine in old bottles won’t work)”. Research Policy 39: 1011-1023.

Session 10: Regional innovation clusters

June 26, 2026

Required Reading:

  • Birch, K., and A. Cumbers. 2010. “Knowledge, Space, and Economic Governance: The Implications of Knowledge-Based Commodity Chains for Less-Favoured Regions.” Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space 42(11): 2581-2601.

Further Readings:

  • Karo, E. & R. Kattel. 2015. “Economic development and evolving state capacities in Central and Eastern Europe: can ‘smart specialization’ make a difference?”. Journal of Economic Policy Reform 18 (2): 172-187.
  • Mccann, P. & R. Ortega-Argiles. 2015. “Smart Specialization, Regional Growth and Applications to European Union Cohesion Policy”. Regional Studies 49 (8): 1291-1302.
  • Mitsch, F., A. Hassel, and D. Soskice. 2024. “Southern Germany’s Innovation Clusters: Regional Growth Coalitions in the Knowledge Economy.” III Working Paper. London: London School of Economics and Political Science.
  • Huggins, R., A. Johnston, M. Munday, and C. Xu. 2023. “Competition, Open Innovation, and Growth Challenges in the Semiconductor Industry: The Case of Europe’s Clusters.” Science and Public Policy 50(3): 531-547.

July 3, 2026 - no class

Session 11: Innovation policy and the compensation of losers

July 10, 2026

Required Reading:

  • Rodriguez-Pose, A. 2017. “The Revenge of the Places That Don’t Matter (and What to Do About It).” Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society 11(1): 189-209.

Further Readings:

  • Iversen, T. & D. Soskice. 2015. “Democratic Limits to Redistribution: Inclusionary versus Exclusionary Coalitions in the Knowledge Economy.” World Politics 67 (2): 185-225.
  • Iversen, T. 2024. “Unleashing a Monster? Causes and Consequences of the Knowledge Economy in Advanced Capitalist Democracies.” World Politics 77: 39-50.
  • Ornston, D. 2014. “From Social Protection to Skill Formation: Diversified High-Tech Production in Denmark.” In When Small States Make Big Leaps, 92-125. Cornell University Press.
  • Seidl, T. 2023. Investing in the knowledge economy: the comparative political economy of public investments in knowledge-based capital. European Journal of Political Research 62: 924-944.
  • Trebilcock, M. 2014. “Climate Change Policy: Managing More Heat in the World’s Kitchens.” In Dealing with Losers: The Political Economy of Policy Transitions, 119-137. Oxford University Press.