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ItemCommunity-Based Innovation Dynamics in the Water Supply and Sanitation (WSS) Sector(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2011-09-16) Catalán, Pablo ; Cozzens, Susan E.The article aims to determine what are the dynamics of innovation in the establishment of rural Water Supply and Sanitation-Community Based systems by focusing on the case of rural communities in Costa Rica. Results show that leadership and sense of ownership do have a greater role in increasing sustainability and learning.
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ItemTechnology Diffusion Dynamics: The case of Chile’s Forestry Industry(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2009-10-07) Catalán, Pablo ; Cozzens, Susan E.Based on Everett Rogers’ diffusion model, the article explores diffusion dynamics in Chile’s Forestry Industry. Technology adoption is defined as depending upon innovation attributes, collaboration, communication channels, research and development (R&D) capacity, and institutional environment. The attributes of innovation are in turn divided into five sub-factors: comparative advantage, compatibility, complexity, observability, and trialability. Our case study analysis is based on 21 interviews with various actors in the Chilean forestry industry and on secondary information sources. Our conclusion is that the attributes of innovation in terms of comparative advantage, observability, and compatibility are technology diffusion drivers, and that the industry needs higher collaboration, better R&D capacity, less bureaucracy, and a more flexible public funding system to achieve a better performance.
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ItemGlobal systems of innovation: Water supply and sanitation(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2008-09) Cozzens, Susan E. ; Catalán, PabloInnovation is a process of problem solving. In its broadest sense, innovation means doing things in new ways. When conditions change and routines no longer work, humans experiment and learn. In a narrower sense, innovation means developing new ideas into new products or processes. Whether the process happens in the public domain or in the market, the sign of successful innovation is something new being used widely to solve a problem. Many problems that face humanity today take on global dimensions, and their solutions are likely to involve cooperation as well as competition across national boundaries. Global climate change is the clearest example: human activity has set changes into motion that affect people in various parts of the world in ways that they did not choose but have to work together to address. Disease is another example, in which growing networks of transportation are spreading pathogens faster and wider than ever. No one country can protect its health without joint information gathering and international public health efforts. To address global challenges, humanity needs to be able to solve problems at global scale. In our research, we aim to deepen understanding of one form of global problem-solving, namely, global systems of innovation. A global system of innovation (GSI) is a learning space (Arocena and Sutz 2000) in which a multi-level network of diverse actors interacts to address a world-level challenge, accumulating knowledge across national borders and developing, testing, and adopting new approaches. This paper helps to develop the GSI concept using information on responses to global challenges in the household water supply and sanitation sector (WSS). In this research, we use a broad concept of innovation that encompasses both new technologies and new approaches, such as community-demand driven systems and privatization. The paper reports preliminary observations based on interviews with nearly 100 people who work in organizations in the sector, at global, national, and local levels, including intensive interviews in Costa Rica, Mozambique, and South Africa. In addition, we have analyzed the published literature in this area and consulted an extensive set of documentary sources. The first section of the paper introduces the concept of a global system of innovation. The second section describes how preliminary data from the WSS sector match or modify the GSI concept. The final section raises further research questions and points to possible policy implications.