A Research Journey from National Systems of Innovation to National Systems of Entrepreneurship: Introducing the Sextuple Helix

Abstract

National systems of innovation (NSI) have attracted substantial interest from public administrations, the scientific community and international organizations. Innovation is a key factor for countries to be competitive in the today’s global economy. Entrepreneurship is an innovation source that has gained importance in NSI research over the last few decades. This focus on entrepreneurship in the context of NSI has led scholars to propose novel concepts such as entrepreneurial ecosystems and the national system of entrepreneurship (NSE). This paper uses bibliometric methods and the Web of Science Core Collection (WoS CC) database to explore how entrepreneurship fits into NSI research and to study the increasing importance of entrepreneurship within this research field. The NSI conceptual framework is developed according to the most common keywords, and the most influential NSI studies are identified using the total number of citations and the ratio number of citations per year. Two sets of studies are analyzed: (1) older documents on traditional topics such as the origins and evolution of NSIs, the capacity of countries to innovate, and the relationships of institutions, different organizational forms, networking, production and competence building with innovation and (2) newer entrepreneurship research documents. Based on analysis of the most common keywords, the most influential studies and multiple entrepreneurship approaches, we propose a Sextuple Helix model as an analytical framework that brings together innovation and entrepreneurship.

Uncovering the Challenges and Cornerstones for the Governance of an Innovation Ecosystem in Organic and Agroecological Agriculture

“…This governance makes the network more centralized and intermediated. With power asymmetries, a leading organization manages the network and facilitates the activities of actors in their efforts to achieve the network's objectives, which can happen in alignment with their own goals, a possible threat to a non-entrepreneurial ecosystem [34]. What is desirable is that, after the consolidation of the ecosystem, governance gains contours of greater sharing to evolve for the choreography stage [16].…”

“…[35] suggest the Quintuple Helix Model, which adds the helix from the natural environments of society [19]. In this direction, [34] suggests the Sextuple Helix Model with the perspective of the entrepreneurial actors propelling innovation ecosystems.…”

Factors driving national eco‐innovation: New routes to sustainable development

“…Using these membership scores, fsQCA can identify the necessary and sufficient conditions that explain the presence and absence of eco-innovation. Authors have cited different factors as determinants of innovation (e.g., Bossle et al, 2016;L opez-Rubio et al, 2021). It is reasonable to assume that eco-innovation is also influenced by many of these factors because it encompasses the uncertainty and complexity of not only innovation but also sustain- The raw data were calibrated using the direct method (Ragin, 2008).…”

“…The N‐Helix models complement innovation system theory by considering the existence of N elements that interact within the borders of a nation or region. The latest N‐Helix model is the Sextuple Helix (López‐Rubio et al, 2021), based on the Triple Helix (Etzkowitz & Leydesdorff, 2000). These N‐Helix models emerged to cover the limitations of the Triple Helix model because it is crucial to understand the social implications of socio‐technical transitions (Park & Stek, 2022).…”

Innovation facilitators and sustainable development: a country comparative approach

“…Second, all sustainability dimensions can be positively influenced by the outcomes of new technologies (de Queiroz Machado et al, 2021 ). In addition, entrepreneurship in all its forms has become one of the main economic and social drivers of innovation (López-Rubio et al, 2020 , 2021 ). For these reasons, it is important to identify the interactions between economic, institutional, knowledge or human, and environmental systems (Szopik-Depczyńska et al, 2018b ).…”