The role of collaboration networks within and across cities as drivers of urban creativity and new knowledge creation is increasingly acknowledged in the literature. We propose that the combination of (1) high internal social proximity between co-inventors within a city and (2) local cliques of inventors in which interaction is dense allows a city to achieve greater inventive creativity. Internal social proximity allows knowledge to circulate quickly across a larger pool of sources; dense cliques promote trust, cooperation, and a more effective use of the acquired knowledge. Moreover, social proximity between a city's inventors and inventors outside the city contributes to enriching and renewing a city's knowledge base by facilitating faster access to fresh external knowledge. We find evidence to support these propositions in a study of the inventive productivity of 331 US cities.

This paper proposes the notion of territorial patterns of innovation as a new conceptualization to understand the relationship among knowledge, innovation, and economic growth at the regional level. The territorial patterns of innovation approach reject the simplistic view of an invention‐innovation equivalence and advance alternative patterns, alternative ways in which knowledge and innovation can take place and mix in space. Each of them represents a different way of innovating, one not necessarily more efficient than the other. On the empirical ground, the paper demonstrates this statement for all NUTS2 regions of the 27 European Union states by showing that the efficiency in taking advantage of innovation does not only link to the strength of the local knowledge base; rather, territorial patterns of innovation characterized by relatively low knowledge intensity can be relatively more efficient in grasping and exploiting innovation returns for growing. Interesting policy implications can be drawn from the empirical analysis presented. If the results do not deny the importance of research and development (R&D) activities for regional growth, and therefore the right focus put forward by the Europe 2020 on a “smart growth” based on knowledge and innovation, they call for particular attention when the Europe 2020 goal is translated into a regional setting.

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BRESCHI S. and LENZI C. The role of external linkages and gatekeepers for the renewal and expansion of US cities' knowledge base, 1990-2004, Regional Studies. This paper examines the role of external linkages and gatekeepers for the renewal and expansion of cities' knowledge base in US metropolitan co-invention networks. It is argued that the relative importance of direct external linkages and external relations mediated by gatekeepers varies according to specific local conditions. It is found that direct external relations, on average, contribute to broadening and rejuvenating the local knowledge base and outperform external links mediated by gatekeepers; the latter, however, are especially important in cities with a localized and specialized knowledge base, as they enable the trans-coding and absorption at the local level of externally sourced knowledge. Networks Gatekeepers Knowledge base BRESCHI S. and LENZI C. 外部连结与把关人在美国城市知识基础的更新与扩张中的角色，1990 年至 2004 年，区域研 究。本文检视美国大都会的共同创新网络中，城市知识基础更新与扩张的外部连结与把关人的角色。本文主张，直接 的外部连结和把关人中介的外部关係的相对重要性，随着特定的在地条件而异。本研究发现，平均而言，直接外部关 係导致在地知识基础的扩张与復苏，并胜过由把关人中介的外在连结；但把关人在具有在地化且专殊化的知识基础的 城市中却特别重要，因为他们能将外来知识进行代码转换，并促进地方层级的吸收。 网络 把关人 知识基础 BRESCHI S. et LENZI C. Le rôle des liens externes et des gardiens quant au renouveau et à l'expansion de la base de connaissance des grandes villes aux E-U, de 1990 à 2004, Regional Studies. Cet article cherche à examiner le rôle dans les réseaux de coinvention métropolitains aux E-U des liens externes et des gardiens quant au renouveau et à l'expansion de la base de connaissance des grandes villes. On affirme que l'importance relative des liens externes directs et des relations externes facilités par des gardiens varient selon les conditions locales spécifiques. En moyenne, il s'avère que les relations externes contribuent à l'élargissement et au rajeunissement de la base de connaissance locale et font de meilleure figure que les liens externes facilités par des gardiens. Cependant, ces derniers revêtent une importance particulière dans les grandes villes dont la base de connaissance est localisée et spécialisée, parce qu'ils permettent de convertir et d'assimiler au niveau local la connaissance recherchée à l'extérieur. Réseaux Gardiens Base de connaissance BRESCHI S. und LENZI C. Die Rolle von externen Verknüpfungen und Gatekeepern für die Erneuerung und Erweiterung der Wissensbasis in Städten der USA, 1990-2004, Regional Studies. In diesem Beitrag wird die Rolle von externen Verknüpfungen und Gatekeepern für die Erneuerung und Erweiterung der Wissensbasis von Städten der USA in metropolitanen Netzwerken für gemeinsame Erfindungen untersucht. Wir argumentieren, dass die relative Wichtigkeit von direkten externen Verknüpfungen und von durch Gatekeeper vermittelten Außenbeziehungen je nach den spezifischen lokalen Bedingungen unterschiedlich ausfällt. Es stellt sich heraus, dass direkte Außenbeziehungen im Durchschnitt zur Erweiterung und Verjüngung der lokalen Wissensbasis beitragen und leistungsfähiger sind als durch Gatekeeper vermittelte externe Ver...