Why do some nations prosper while others struggle? Businesspeople, policymakers, and social scientists have sought to answer that question for centuries, starting as early as 1776, when Adam Smith published The Wealth of Nations. A closely related question is, Why are some nations more innovative than others? Innovation is increasingly seen as the key to unlocking competitive advantage, as much for countries as for companies.
Comparing innovation on a nation-by-nation basis, however, is fraught with difficulty, given the diversity of national business practices, economic structures, and financial and economic reporting conventions. Resolving these difficulties is the main objective of the Global Innovation Index (GII), a research project conducted by INSEAD in partnership with Alcatel-Lucent, Booz & Company, the Confederation of Indian Industry, and the World Intellectual Property Organization (a specialized agency of the United Nations). The research measures innovativeness for 125 economies. This year’s GII report (available at www.globalinnovationindex.org) ranked Switzerland as the world’s most innovative nation, followed, in order, by Sweden, Singapore, China, Finland, and Denmark — and the U.S., in seventh place.
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