Schumpeterian games and innovation systems: Combining pioneers, adaptionists, imitators, complementors and mixers

This paper describes simple ‘Schumpeterian games’ that help to explore the microfoundations of (national) innovation systems and the related policy issues. Thus it tries to marry the Schumpeterian approach to innovation and imitation with the simpler but very powerful results of evolutionary game theory. The paper identifies several roles and subgames in an innovation system, based on the players named pioneering innovators, adaptionist innovators, imitators, complementors, and mixed strategists. Normally, the emphasis is on improving the fate of the Schumpeterian pioneers in games against imitators. However, the conventions underlying innovation systems are to a large extent concerned with pioneers versus pioneers, pioneers versus complementors and, not least, complementors versus complementors. These distinctions provides a framework for analysing the concept of innovation systems, the transformation towards more complex innovation systems, and several policy issues.