Law, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship

• In Event: Governance, Markets, and Innovation

Abstract

This article links law to two core elements of economic and social change: innovation (new ideas) and entrepreneurship (new ventures). It first maps the legal environment for innovation and entrepreneurship across multiple bodies of law and multiple modes of impact. It then synthesizes frameworks from sociolegal and organizational theory to examine: (a) how legal fields translate ambiguous rules into institutionalized organizational practices; and (b) how organizational fields evolve through punctuated cycles of innovation and entrepreneurship. The many analogies and linkages between these accounts suggest a broadly generalizable model of techno-legal regimes aligning, drifting, and realigning through loosely coupled cycles of incrementalism, discontinuity, ferment, and consolidation. The discussion closes by exploring coupling/decoupling mechanisms and sketching implications for practice, theory, and method. The thesis throughout is that law operates not as an exogenous constraint, but as an endogenous, coevolving force within overlapping legal and industrial fields.

Author

• Mark C. Suchman, Purdue University