Innovative Strategy in Shrimp Potiguar: Asymmetries Power Generation and Implications for Policy Innovation

Abstract

This paper aims to analyze the technological trajectory and the actors – public and private - political behave in the carciniculture network (cultivate of shrimp) in the federal estate of Rio Grande do Norte. The research was based on both embeddedness and cluster policy approach. The case study was based on bibliographic, archives, and empirical data, whose primary data were collected through semi-structured interviews carried on with 10 members of different organizations from carciniculture sector in the period 2009-2010, as well as interviews already conducted in the area since the year 2005. These data were submitted to content analysis with longitudinal and descriptive approach. Along the technological trajectory of the cluster we highlighted opportunities and limits for innovative strategies generated by asymmetries of power and ability to influence actors in the network. We highlight the relationship between 'power network' and 'links established with public actors' as well as the implications for innovation along the trajectory generated by a more or less state interference.