Innovation: Exploring the knowledge base

New types of knowledge, and new ways of organising the production of it, may emerge as knowledge producers respond to the challenges posed by a changing society. This paper focuses on the core knowledge of one such emerging field, namely, innovation studies. To explore the knowledge base of the field, a database of references in scholarly surveys of various aspects of innovation, published in “handbooks”, is assembled and a new methodology for analysing the knowledge base of a field with the help of such data is developed. The paper identifies the core contributions to the literature in this area, the most central scholars and important research environments, and analyses – with the help of citations in scholarly journals – how the core literature is used by researchers in different scientific disciplines and cross-disciplinary fields. Based on this information a cluster analysis is used to draw inferences about the structure of the knowledge base on innovation. Finally, the changing character of the field over time is analysed, and possible challenges for its continuing development are discussed.

► Develops a new method for researching inter-disciplinary scientific fields that takes into account books as well as journal articles. ► Identifies the core publications, contributors and research institution in innovation studies. ► Analyses the changing character of the innovation literature and its users over time. ► Shows that most central works on innovation, as identified by experts in the field, are published in books rather than in journals.