National innovation systems

"To say that Edison discovered electricity . . . satisfies our predilection for stories that are easy to comprehend and involve superhuman heroes." -- Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1990)

There's a bit of debate over at Hugh MacLeod's fantastic blog GapingVoid on the topic of creation and collaboration. It seems that some people are still drawn to the myth of the lone inventor -- the genius. Others recognize that it takes a bunch of people to create anything worthwhile. 
 

When discussing the role of collaboration, I think it's important to make a distinction between the head end of the innovation process (the initiation stages) and the market end (the implementation stages). It's reasonable to expect that there is relatively little collaboration at the head end, however, this does not mean that nobody else has contributed or is involved. Ideas don't just arise from you: they are a product of your education, your family, your experiences, your culture, your diet, the music you listen to, the physical environment in which you live, your religion -- the list is endless. That great idea you had is a product of historical inputs (e.g. a teacher you had when you were eleven or a favorite television show) and horizontal inputs -- the environment in which you live now, including institutions.

What we're talking about here are innovation systems. A national innovation system requires far more than "3 percent of national GDP invested into R&D" and pampered individuals studying at "top schools" (it's the education level of the people at the bottom of the pyramid that signals the strength of a nation). A successful national innovation system also requires an environment that produces a few more Mick "Where's Keith?" Jaggers of the world and individuals willing to break loose from the relative safety of business, law and medical schools. Guys and girls that clean windows during their summer breaks with a quiet confidence that they will not be doing said chore ten years from now: "I'm cleaning this dude's windows because I know in ten years I will be buying the damn place from the guy and building a public library." The next Andrew Carnegie.