The paper provides a novel, empirically grounded map of innovation ‘clubs’ in the EU, based on a unique analysis of micro-aggregated, country-level data. Using exploratory factor analysis we articulate innovation variables in a taxonomy of four ‘latent’ innovation theories: Network-Innovation-System, Kaldorian, New-Growth-Theory, and Schumpeterian. We then characterise clusters of countries (‘clubs’), based on their performance against this taxonomy, and design a new map of EU innovation clubs. We identify an articulated map of EU innovation hierarchy beyond the rather well-known ‘core-periphery’ structure, and interpret how some of the peripheries are functional to the ‘consolidated core’ of innovative countries, raising an issue of long-term sustainability of such hierarchies. We also find that even the most innovative clusters show concerning weaknesses. The strongest cluster in terms of its innovation system does not seem to exploit its full potential and lags behind with respect to radical product innovations. Instead, the leading cluster in terms of radical product innovations is strongly dependent on external innovative activity, is focused on scale-intensive sectors, and has a fairly weak innovation system. The periphery of small countries that show a healthy network structure, do so because they mainly include supplier-dominated firms, reliant on innovation inputs from the core. We offer some reflections on innovation policy within a broader view of EU cohesion.

该论文基于对微观聚合的国家级数据的独特分析，提供了一个新颖的、以经验为基础的欧盟创新“俱乐部”地图。使用探索性因素分析，我们在四种“潜在”创新理论的分类中阐明了创新变量：网络创新系统、卡尔多利、新增长理论和熊彼特. 然后，我们根据这些国家（“俱乐部”）在该分类法中的表现来描述国家集群（“俱乐部”）的特征，并设计一个新的欧盟创新俱乐部地图。我们确定了超越众所周知的“核心-外围”结构的欧盟创新层次结构的清晰地图，并解释了一些外围如何对创新国家的“统一核心”发挥作用，提出了长期可持续性的问题这样的层次结构。我们还发现，即使是最具创新性的集群也显示出相关弱点。就其创新体系而言最强的集群似乎并未发挥其全部潜力，并且在激进的产品创新方面落后。相反，在激进产品创新方面的领先集群强烈依赖于外部创新活动，专注于规模密集型行业，创新体系比较薄弱。表现出健康网络结构的小国的外围是因为它们主要包括供应商主导的公司，依赖核心的创新投入。我们在更广泛的欧盟凝聚力视角下对创新政策提出了一些思考。