Do social factors matter for innovation, and do they influence innovation in Aeronautics Industry?

Based on the report for the course on “Social Factors of Innovation” of the PhD Program on Technology Assessment, supervised by Prof. António Brandão Moniz, Monte de Caparica, University NOVA Lisbon, Faculty of Sciences and Technology, July 2013

As innovation plays an important role in economic growth and development, it is necessary to understand the factors, especially the social factors, which determine the differences in innovation intensity across countries and regions. However, since they are out of scope, the R&D investments and human capital will not be covered in detail in this paper. The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships between social factors and innovation generally and the case of Aeronautics Industry (AI). This paper analysed the influence of social factors on innovation activity and tried to understand the effect in AI. First, the theoretical background concerning innovation, and the social factors were introduced. Then, with an overview of the AIs in Europe and Turkey, the influence of different dimensions of social factors on determinants of innovation in AI was discussed. I have used secondary data sources published by academics and international organizations.

António Brandão Moniz (FCT-UNL) and Michael Decker (ITAS-KIT)