Seminar series
Date:
Wednesday 6 June
Speaker:
Maria Savona (University of Sussex)
Title:
Public R&D strategic interactions across EU-15 countries: A spatial
econometric analysis.
Abstract:
The aim of this paper is to test the existence of strategic interactions in
the government Research and Development (R&D) spending among
EU-15 countries. We add to the literature on public choice strategic
interactions in general and specifically to the one on R&D spending.
We take into account both traditional and overlooked factors affecting
countries' public R&D spending, among which (i) the international
context – i.e. Lisbon strategy – (ii) the country characteristics - the
National System of Innovation; countries' closeness in terms of (iii)
trade and economic size; (iv) sectoral specialisation. This latter is likely
to affect government spending depending on mechanisms of
complementarity or substitution between public and private R&D. Using
a spatial dynamic panel model in which spatial matrices are specified
both in terms of traditional Euclidean distance and in terms of sectoral
specialisation proximity, we confirm the existence of strategic
interactions in terms of R&D spending between European countries
that are close from an economic, international trade and sectoral
structure perspective. Unlike in most of the literature on public choice
strategic interaction, geographical proximity does not seem to affect
public spending interactions in R&D.
Bios:
Dr. Maria Savona is Senior Lecturer at SPRU, Science and Technology
Policy Research at the University of Sussex, UK. She is also Honorary
Research Fellow at the Judge Business School, University of
Cambridge, UK, and has been Associate Professor in Economics at the
University of Lille 1, France. She is an economist and holds a PhD in
Science and Technology Studies from SPRU. Her main areas of
research are economics of innovation in services, theory and micro-
econometrics of innovation in services; regional distribution of
innovation activities; structural change and economic growth. She has
published in these areas on top innovation journals (Research Policy,
Cambridge Journal of Economics, Journal of Evolutionary Economics,
Journal of Economic Survey, The Service Industries Journal). She has
also produced reports on 'Hidden Innovation in Services' (NESTA,
2008). She has been involved in several European Research Projects
(ServPPin, The Contribution of Public and Private Services to
European Growth and Welfare, and the Role of Public-Private
Innovation Networks, within EU FP7; AITEG, Assessing the Economic
Impact of Technological Change and Globalisation, within FP5 and
SIEPI, The Structure of European Innovation and Economic Indicators,
within FP6).