Bernal Prize (1987), Schumpeter Prize (1988), Prix International du Futuroscope (1993), World Technology Network Award for Policy (2001), Silver Kondratieff Medal (2007)
Christopher Freeman (11 September 1921 – 16 August 2010)[1] was a Britisheconomist, recognised as one of the founders of the post-war school of Innovation Studies. He played a lead role in the development of the neo-Schumpeterian tradition focusing on the crucial role of innovation for economic development and of scientific and technological activities for well-being.[2][3]
Freeman was the founder and first Director, from 1966 to 1982, of SPRU, the Science Policy Research Unit of the University of Sussex, England, and RM Phillips Professor of Science Policy and later Professor Emeritus of at the University of Sussex.[4] In 1986, on his formal retirement, he became visiting professor at the Aalborg University in Denmark and professorial fellow at the now Maastricht University in the Netherlands.[5]
With various colleagues, Freeman made pioneering contributions to Innovation Studies in a number of respects. As consultant for the OECD, he was responsible for the development of 'The Frascati Manual', the first program designed to collect and standardize the statistics on R&D which resulted in the development of now commonly-used science and technology indicators at OECD.[6] He helped to shape a tradition of research into firm-based innovation during the early 1970s and was a prominent participant in the discussion around the influential Club of Rome's Limits to Growth Report, arguing presciently that the response to environmental degradation required a reformulation of the character of economic growth rather than the elimination of economic growth.[7] With colleagues he played a lead role in recognising the historic significance of the development of microelectronic based technologies. This matured into the development of what has come to be called the Techno-Economic Paradigm theory of long waves, building on Kondratieff long wave theory. In collaboration with Carlota Perez (whom he subsequently married), Luc Soete and Francisco Louçã he made path-breaking contributions to this field.
In the early 1990s, together with B.-Å. Lundvall, Freeman developed the concept of National System of Innovation[3][8] which is widely used to understand the multiple drivers of innovation paths in different countries, regions and sectors. Throughout his career and influenced by John Desmond Bernal, his mentor at the London School of Economics where he studied after demobilisation after World War II, Freeman fused an analysis of the determinants of innovation in contemporary capitalism with an abiding interest in the social shaping and impact of economic growth.[9] As a natural consequence of this, Freeman had a deep commitment to the understanding and promotion of an equitable path of economic growth in the developing world (as seen in the Sussex Manifesto).
Developing science, technology and innovation indicators: What we can learn from the past, Research Policy, 2009, vol. 38, issue 4, pages 583-589 (with Luc L. Soete), doi:10.1016/j.respol.2009.01.018
Systems of Innovation: Selected Essays in Evolutionary Economics, Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd, 2008.
The Economics of Industrial Innovation, 3rd edn. (co-author with Luc Soete), Pinter, London, 1997.
Work for All or Mass Unemployment?: Computerised Technical Change in the Twenty-First Century, (co-author with Luc Soete), Pinter Pub Ltd, 1994.
The Economics of Hope: Essays on Technical Change, Economic Growth, and the Environment, Pinter Pub Ltd, 1992.
Technology Policy and Economic Performance: Lessons from Japan, Pinter Pub Ltd, 1987.
Unemployment and Technical Innovation: A Study of Long Waves and Economic Development, (co-author with John Clark and Luc Soete), Greenwood Press, 1982.
^Directorate for Scientific Affairs (1963). The Measurement of Scientific and Technical Activities - Proposed Standard Practice for Surveys of Research and Development. OECD. p. 6.
