kopfmaennchen

My dear collegue and and friend Daniel Buhr recently published his dissertation titeled “Chaos oder Kosmos? Die Koordination der Innovationspolitik des Bundes – Probleme und Lösungsansätze”. Within this book he analyses innovation policies in the German Innovation System. This case study illustrates the complex interdependences in one of the most important policy fields that derive not only from the embeddedness in the european multi-level system but also from the more or less fragmented field in the German federal system. The findings of the study imply that the future of innovation policies lies in a systemic approach, that is apt to integrate the diverse facettes of the policiy field and to enable a productive coordination. Within the given coordinated market economy in Germany, two potentially successful institutional solutions to the coordination problem are offered: 1) the concentration of competences within a newly established “Innovation Ministry”; or 2) the integration of competences through the creation of special cabinet commissions or  interministerial 2working groups coordinated by the “Kanzleramt”, i.e. a “Innovation Cabinet”.