Includes bibliographical references and index.

Pt. 1. Introduction -- Ch. 1. The economic complexity of technological change: knowledge interaction and path dependence / Cristiano Antonelli -- Pt. 2. The economic complexity of innovation -- Ch. 2. Complexity and innovation dynamics / David A. Lane -- Ch. 3. Complexity in the theory of the developing firm / Harry Bloch and Stan Metcalfe -- Ch. 4. The persistence of innovation and path dependence / Alessadra Colombelli and Nick von Tunzelmann -- Ch. 5. The symbiotic theory of innovation: knowledge creation and the evolution of the capitalist system / Martin Fransman -- Pt. 3 The economic complexity of knowledge / Ch. 6. Knowledge, complexity and networks / Pier Paolo Saviotti -- Ch. 7. The dynamics of technological knowledge : from linearity to recombination / Jackie Krafft and Francesco Quatraro -- Ch. 8. Complexity and the coordination of techological knowledge : the case of innovation platforms / Davide Consoli and Pier Paolo Patrucco -- Ch. 9. Causes, consequences and dynamics of complez distributions of technological activities : the case of prolific inventors / William Latham and Christian Le Bas. Ch. 10. The biomedical workforce in the US : the example of positive feedbacks / Paula E. Stephan -- Ch. 11. University-industry interactions : the unresolved puzzle / Isabel Maria Bodas Freitas, Aldo Geuna and Federica Rossi -- Ch. 12. A functional theory of technology and technological change / Andrea Bonaccorsi -- Pt. 4. The economic complexity of structural change and development -- Ch. 13. Mesoeconomics : a unified approach to systems complexity and evolution / Kurt Dopfer -- Ch. 14. Notes on a complexity theory of economic development / Koen Frenken and Ron Boschma -- Ch. 15. Innovation networks : formation, performance and dynamics / Uwe Cantner and Holger Graf -- Ch. 16. The complex interaction between global production networks, digital information systems and international knowledge transfers / Jarle Hildrum, Dieter Erns and Jan Fagerberg -- Ch. 17. The complex dynamics of economic development / Veronica Robert and Gabriel Yoguel -- Pt. 5. Lesson and implications for economic policy -- Ch. 18. Coevolution, emergence and economic development : some lesson from the Israeli and Mexican experience / Gabriela Dutrenit and Morris Teubal -- Ch. 19. Network models of innovation process and policy implications / Paul Ormerod, Bridget Rosewell and Greg Wiltshire -- Ch. 20. Government as entrepreneur : examples from US technology policy / Albert N. Link and Jamie R. Link.

Applies the tools of the economics of complexity to analyse the causes and effects of technological and structural change. It grafts the intuitions of the economics of complexity into the tradition of analysis based upon the Schumpeterian and Marshallian legacies. The Handbook elaborates the notion of innovation as an emerging property of the organized complexity of an economic system, and provides the basic tools to understand the recursive dynamics between the emergence of innovation and the unfolding of organized complexity. In so doing, it highlights the role of organizational thinking in explaining the introduction of innovations and the dynamics of structural change.