Over the past twenty years, the Globelics network has become one of the world’s leading communities dedicated to understanding the relationship between innovation and development. In New Directions in Innovation and Development: Twenty Years of Globelics, Erika Kraemer-Mbula, Susan Cozzens, Alison Cummings, Michiko Iizuka, Rasmus Lema, and Mariana Szapiro reflect on the network’s evolution and its growing contribution to both academic research and public policy.
The article highlights how Globelics has built an international community that brings together researchers, policymakers, and practitioners from the Global South and the Global North. Rather than treating innovation as a purely technological process, the network has consistently promoted a systemic perspective that recognizes the importance of institutions, learning, capabilities, and local contexts in achieving sustainable development.
A central message of the paper is that development pathways are becoming increasingly complex. Challenges such as climate change, digital transformation, global health crises, and geopolitical fragmentation require innovation policies that are more inclusive, resilient, and responsive to local realities. The authors argue that innovation research must continue expanding beyond traditional measures of scientific and technological performance to better capture social, institutional, and environmental dimensions of development.
The paper also celebrates Globelics’ role in nurturing generations of scholars through its international conferences, PhD Academies, regional networks, and collaborative research initiatives. These activities have strengthened research capacity across Africa, Asia, Latin America, and other developing regions while encouraging long-term international partnerships and knowledge exchange. The network’s emphasis on mentorship and collaboration has helped create an inclusive research community where diverse perspectives contribute to advancing innovation studies.
Looking ahead, the authors emphasize that the next phase of innovation and development research should focus on addressing grand societal challenges through interdisciplinary collaboration and stronger links between research and policy. By fostering dialogue across regions and disciplines, Globelics is well positioned to continue shaping new research agendas that promote equitable, sustainable, and innovation-driven development. Overall, the article serves both as a reflection on two decades of achievements and as a roadmap for the future of innovation studies in an increasingly interconnected and uncertain world.
