Towards an Innovation Policy in the Post Catch-Up Era

Abstract

As the catch-up innovation system was exposed to a new competition environment in which second-tier catch-up countries reduced the gap with Korea and advanced Korean firms entered into the frontier product market, it is experiencing system delay in terms of organizational and policy change. Therefore, innovation policy needs to be reorganized from a dynamic perspective to analyze the problems in the transition period and enable the system to overcome organizational and institutional delays. This article investigates the characteristics of transition periods in terms of external environment changes and internal socio-economic pressures. Based on the analysis of environment changes and catch-up system characteristics, it suggests the framework for policy intervention, direction, and practical principles for post catch-up innovation policy. In particular, it suggests the network-based developmental state and policy implementation in order to overcome the limitation of centralized developmental state of catch-up periods.