Comparative policy analysis under innovation-driven change: assessment of the university industry linkage in Japan and the United States

Abstract

This paper is the third in a series addressing Japanese university-industry linkage policy reforms. The first paper analyzed the linkage using bibliometric techniques, demonstrating links to be prevalent and growing. The finding opposes the widespread belief that Japanese industry and universities have little research interaction, a major justification for reforms. The second paper presented empirical support for this finding, demonstrating the linkage to be substantive. The current paper reconciles the finding of a strong university-industry linkage in Japan with the taken-for-granted assumption of weakness in the linkage, by considering the process of comparative innovation system assessment in the context of innovation-driven change.