South Africa: A rising star? assessing the X-effectiveness of South Africa's national system of innovation

Abstract

This paper assesses the X-effectiveness of South Africa's national system of innovation. It focuses on problems that occur in innovation projects, assuming that those problems are indicators of the effectiveness of flows of different institutions into South African innovators. An analysis of some macro-economic trends shows that the South African economy is a “two-world economy”, a characterization that sets the stage for the performance of the country's innovation system. Our findings on a whole suggest that relatively inefficient functioning institutions hamper South African innovators. As a result, compared to some European countries, some vital ingredients of innovation are not adequately provided.

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the reviewers of this Special Issue for their helpful comments. Moreover, they would like to thank their research assistant Mirjam van Buren for collecting and summarizing data on South Africa. Of course, the usual disclaimer applies.

Notes

1. Unless stated differently, all figures presented in this section are derived from the web pages of the South African Department of Trade and Industry. Available at http://www.dti.gov.za. Last accessed 7/10/05.