Rethinking innovation in business relations and networks : a complex systems perspective

We introduce a complex systems perspective on innovation in networks in which in-novation is conceptualized as a form of creative act associated with the dynamics and evolution of business networks. We show how innovation is a form of creative act that involves the creation of new ideas and their exploitation, in which new ideas come from combining and recombining existing ideas in new ways that have value. We stress the need to move away from traditional linear, comparative static variables based theories and models to more nonlinear, dynamic, evolutionary mechanism and process based theories models of business networks. This calls for different types of methods including systematic case histories and agent-based models.