Economic And Legal Foundations Of Innovative Development In The Digital Age

The digital age is a modern stage of the development of society and economy, which started with the wide use of the first digital technologies (Internet, mobile communication) and reached its peak amid the Fourth Industrial Revolution due to the dissemination of smart technologies (the Internet of Things, artificial intelligence). The digital age has the highest rate of technological progress in the entire history of industrial revolutions, which predetermines two specific features of this age. The first specific feature is as follows: unlike the previous industrial revolutions, when, despite certain companies' transition to new technologies, other companies - due to the traditional thinking of society - preserved the previous technological mode for a long time, the society progressed together with economy. Digital technologies transform not only the processes of production but also the processes of distribution and consumption of products. The growing demand for digital innovations is strong pressure on the market, which does not allow companies to remain aside from the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The second specific feature is that digitalization takes place in waves - continuously and over and over again. This is the difference between the Fourth Industrial Revolution and the previous revolutions when the technological transition was momentary and single-step. Due to this specific feature, there emerged a hypothesis that the digital age could have not one but several industrial revolutions. Followers of this hypothesis suggest considering technological progress in the macro-scale, distinguishing the pre-digital age, which was the time of the first three industrial revolutions, and the digital age, which was opened by the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Regardless of the level of the view of the digital age, it is obvious that it requires continuous, step-by-step digital innovations. This book's contribution to the literature on digital innovations is due to offering a new scientific and methodological approach to managing innovative development in the digital age. The main feature of the new approach is active, continuous, and comprehensive interaction between government, society, and entrepreneurship. The advantage of the new approach is the increase of effectiveness of state and corporate management of innovative development, as well as accelerated and well-balanced adaptation of society to the digital age. This book is aimed primarily at scholars studying digital innovations. For them, the book offers fundamental developments, empirical overview, case studies, and scientific and methodological recommendations in the sphere of innovative development of state and law, society, and economy in the digital age. Due to its multidisciplinary character, the book will also be of interest to the representatives of various humanitarian disciplines: legal, social, and economic. The book will be also of interest for practicing experts involved with the practice of corporate management and for bodies of public administration of innovative development in the digital age. For them, the book offers various issues of economic and legal regulation of innovative development in the digital age, due to which it could be a theoretical and methodological guide for improving this management.

Innovation is of critical value in the modern global economy, as it performs several important economic functions. The first is related to supporting the sustainability of socio-economic systems, preventing the emergence of crises and, if they do occur, providing solutions to overcome their consequences. Secondly, innovation allows for the activation of economic growth and social progress through the rationalization of economic activities. Thirdly, innovation supports the global competitiveness of economic systems, allowing for the specialization of production and sales of unique goods that are in high demand in both domestic and global markets. At the same time, innovational development in economic systems is required to mitigate the high levels of risk and requires both effective management and a reliable normative and legal foundation. This book studies the economic and legal foundations of managing the innovational development of economic systems from an interdisciplinary perspective, bringing together the thoughts of international scholars in management, economics and law.

World-renowned economist Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum, explains that we have an opportunity to shape the fourth industrial revolu­tion, which will fundamentally alter how we live and work. Schwab argues that this revolution is different in scale, scope and complexity from any that have come before. Characterized by a range of new technologies that are fusing the physical, digital and biological worlds, the developments are affecting all disciplines, economies, industries and governments, and even challenging ideas about what it means to be human. Artificial intelligence is already all around us, from supercomputers, drones and virtual assistants to 3D printing, DNA sequencing, smart thermostats, wear­able sensors and microchips smaller than a grain of sand. But this is just the beginning: nanomaterials 200 times stronger than steel and a million times thinner than a strand of hair and the first transplant of a 3D printed liver are already in development. Imagine “smart factories” in which global systems of manu­facturing are coordinated virtually, or implantable mobile phones made of biosynthetic materials. The fourth industrial revolution, says Schwab, is more significant, and its ramifications more profound, than in any prior period of human history. He outlines the key technologies driving this revolution and discusses the major impacts expected on government, business, civil society and individu­als. Schwab also offers bold ideas on how to harness these changes and shape a better future—one in which technology empowers people rather than replaces them; progress serves society rather than disrupts it; and in which innovators respect moral and ethical boundaries rather than cross them. We all have the opportunity to contribute to developing new frame­works that advance progress.

This book explores the economic analysis of intellectual property law, with a special emphasis on the Law and Economics of informational goods in light of the past decade’s technological revolution. In recent years there has been massive growth in the Law and Economics literature focusing on intellectual property, on both normative and positive levels of analysis. The economic approach to intellectual property is often described as a monolithic, coherent approach that may differ only as it is applied to a particular case. Yet the growing literature of Law and Economics in intellectual property does not speak in one voice. The economic discourse used in legal scholarship and in policy-making encompasses several strands, each reflecting a fundamentally different approach to the economics of informational works, and each grounded in a different ideology or methodological paradigm. This book delineates the various economic approaches taken and analyzes their tenets. It maps the fundamental concepts and the theoretical foundation of current economic analysis of intellectual property law, in order to fully understand the ramifications of using economic analysis of law in policy making. In so doing, one begins to appreciate the limitations of the current frameworks in confronting the challenges of the information revolution. The book addresses the fundamental adjustments in the methodology and underlying assumptions that must be employed in order for the economic approach to remain a useful analytical framework for addressing IPR in the information age.

The book focuses on a systemic study of the challenges of the modern economy and related problems and areas of sustainable development of countries, regions, and businesses, with particular attention paid to the new prospects offered by the spread of digital technology. The book’s contribution to the literature is that it reveals the specifics and digital perspectives of supporting the SDGs in the economy at every level of the economy: country, regional, and corporate, considering sectoral specificities—this is reflected in six parts of the book. Part 1 identifies contemporary challenges of the modern economy as barriers to sustainable development. Part 2 reflects the future direction of sustainable development of the countries. Part 3 considers the problems and prospects for sustainable development of regions. Part 4 focuses on the problems and prospects for the sustainable development of enterprises and industries. Part 5 sheds light on the economic and legal foundations and cooperative mechanisms of sustainable development. Part 6 offers recommendations for enhancing the use of digital technologies offered by Industry 4.0 to support the SDGs. Scientists whose research interests include sustainable economic development are the primary target audience for this book. For the primary target audience, the book forms a systemic view of the global challenges of sustainable development and offers a set of scientific and methodological recommendations to provide an effective response to these challenges at every level of the economy. An additional audience for the book is practicing experts, who will find international best practices and applied recommendations to support sustainable economic development and implementation of the SDGs in the practice of state (national regulation and public administration of the region) and corporate (in various industries) management.

The digital economy is a new direction in which the modern global economic system is now heading. This book seeks to adapt the digital economy concept to the priorities of humanity, including the implementation of global development goals. The authors develop and substantiate scientific and methodological criteria for assessing the sustainability of the modern digital economy, and offer several concrete recommendations for improving the concept of the digital economy by incorporating global development goals.

The development of the Digital Economy has been a landmark breakthrough for economic systems in the 21st century, as it opens up opportunities for the full-scale implementation of new digital technologies and the optimization of economic activities. While the conceptual essence and specific features of the digital economy are described in detail in the existing literature, the practical foundations of its formation are poorly studied. In this book, the digital economy is studied from the perspective of neo-institutional economic theory. This allows for the tracking of the process of formation (institutionalization) of the digital economy, determining the basic institutions that are necessary for its formation and that exist in modern economic practice, and analyzing scenarios for the future development of the digital economy in the 21st century.

This text provides one of the first book-length studies on the innovative and sustainable development of complex systems in the era of digital transformations, combining quantitative data from several countries with detailed qualitative accounts at the national level. In particular, the book covers the basic concepts, methods, and cutting-edge research on innovation and sustainability in complex systems. Given its scope, the book will be of great interest and value to researchers and practitioners working across the social sciences and in a diverse range of areas in complexity science. Pursuing a multidisciplinary approach, the book is also an ideal resource for advanced undergraduate and graduate level courses in complexity science, sustainability research, economics, and development studies.