Contribution pour une évaluation des nouvelles formes de « co-construction » réflexives au sein du régime de l’innovation en Wallonie

Abstract :
Poles of competitiveness were launched in Walloon region as a policy for innovation support. This policy aims to reinforce cooperation and partnering between industry and research universities in the region: critical mass, excellence, international size should be reached through the construction of large cooperative projects. Thes new dynamics were in line with the earlier ones which were developed as separate branches of research policy for universities and firms.
The governance of the poles, largely controlled by the firms representatives, promoted the development of new forms of interactions between the institutional segments of the Triple Helix of innovation: state – industry – university. Universities stepped quickly in the poles dynamics and took advantage of the opportunity to reinforce their presence in the regional economic framework. Administration was not associated to the launch of the government-defined process and encountered difficulties stepping in the process and entering into these new modes of governance, more supportive than normative. The innovation model at the basis of the policy initiative sets a strong systemic stance to the dynamics of knowledge production but fails to deliver enough reflexivity to go beyond the narrow instrumental rationality of innovation.