About this issue

Two of the papers in this issue, completely by accident of timing, are concerned with the impact of Federal actions on the technological innovation process (or the R&D/innovation process, as we frequently refer to it in our studies in the Program of Research on the Management of Research and Development at Northwestern University, Evanston, IL). This is a subject which is receiving increased high-level attention from policy makers in the governments of both the highly developed countries and the less developed countries (LDC´s). It is also receiving a great deal of polemic attention from scholars and critics of Federal intervention or constraints on the actions of industry and other sectors of the economy. Neither of the two papers in this issue deals directly with either the policy or polemic aspects of the issue. They both report on empirical studies of what is actually going on, in terms of responses by organizations involved in the R&D/innovation process to both positive (facilitating) and negative (barrier) actions by government which impinge on the R&D/innovation. Gerstenfeld focuses on the impacts of regulation, especially performance standards. Kawase and Rubenstein (reporting on the Japanese phase of a four-country study) report on the reactions of managers to a broad range of incentive programs developed by the Japanese Government. Perceptions, attitudes, information, and decisions related to government action are becoming critical in investment and other decisions by industrial firms in the U.S. and many other countries. This is happening not only in the obvious areas of energy and environmental protection, but also in many other areas such as those regarding health, safety, productivity, and international transfer of technology. The degree of understanding of such government actions — both facilitating and constraining — will have profound impacts on the R&D/innovation process in industrial firms, and on - he potential impact of the process on quality of life and other social economic factors.