The French system of innovation in the oil industry - Some lessons about the role of public policies and sectoral patterns of technological change in innovation networking

The central issue in this paper is to show the importance of public policies and sectoral patterns of technological change for institutional interaction in National Systems of Innovation (NSI), from the illustrative case study of French oil industry. This case is a relevant example of the French style of public policy, more well known as Colbertism. In the oil industry, Colbertism has demonstrated a greater ability to overcome some of its main challenges related to a weaker diffusion propensity and to a excessive concentration of R&D funds in some strategic sectors. The study of this industry demonstrates that sectoral patterns of technological change are very important to explain institutional interaction. Differences in the degree of appropriability between up and downstream of the oil industry had a great influence in this interaction and in public policies effectiveness. However, the technological diffusion success was not only due to some favorable technological factor but also to the nature of decision making, which was the outcome of a cooperative process.