While the nations of Central and Eastern Europe transform their economies from a planning and centralized control towards free market systems, they face the need to formulate their R&D priorities and to change their systems of innovation. The problems of restructuring the R&D and innovation systems of the post-socialist countries have so far been treated as marginal. It is a fact that progress in science, technology, and innovation-related policy-making in the transitional countries has been rather modest and has largely failed to keep pace with other areas of social, political, and economic change. There is relatively little recognition of the growing importance of knowledge. One of the tools that may help the modernization of R&D and innovation-related policy-making is the training and retraining of policy-makers and knowledge and innovative managers. Moreover, it is important to equip them with the tools to take advantage of the various financing possibilities available for innovation. This book attempts to explore the different dimensions of innovation and how it relates to R&D development and financing in a set of eastern and central European countries.
The matter of funding for innovation (especially, but not only EU support) is both sensitive and important, and is considered in this book.