Why are good comparative studies of networks so rare? Practical lessons from a study on French clusters

Thierry Weil (1) , Anna Glaser (1) , Emilie-Pauline Gallié (2) , Valérie Mérindol (3) , Philippe Lefebvre (4) , Frédérique Pallez (4)

1 CERNA i3 - Centre d'économie industrielle i3
2 IMRI, Université Paris Dauphine - Institut pour le management de la recherche et de l'innovation
3 IMRI
4 CGS i3 - Centre de Gestion Scientifique i3

French “competitiveness clusters” were set up in 2005 to strengthen cooperation between small and large enterprises, and training and research institutions working on similar topics and located in the same geographical area, with the aim of making this area more competitive and attractive through enhanced innovation. Our analysis of this set of about 70 apparently similar networks, on which much data were collected, has given us an opportunity to investigate the factors explaining the differences in their performance.

Mots clés: Clusters; networks; network performance; context; innovation policy

Domaines: Economies et finances

Thierry Weil, Anna Glaser, Emilie-Pauline Gallié, Valérie Mérindol, Philippe Lefebvre, et al.. Why are good comparative studies of networks so rare? Practical lessons from a study on French clusters. 2010. ⟨hal-00488404⟩