Pushes and Pulls

Much has been written about the linear model of innovation. While it may have been the dominant model used to explain technological innovation for decades, alternatives did exist. One such alternative—generally discussed as being the exact opposite of the linear model—is the demand-pull model. Beginning in the 1960s, people from different disciplines started looking at technological innovation from a demand rather than a supply perspective. The theory was that technological innovation is stimulated by market demand rather than by scientific discoveries. However, few traces of the demand-pull model remain in the literature today. This article looks at what happened to the demand-pull model from a historical perspective, at three points in time: birth, crystallization, and death. It suggests that the idea of demand as a factor explaining technological innovation emerged in the 1960s, was formalized into models in the 1970-1980s, then got integrated into “multidimensional” models. From then on, the demand-pull model disappeared from the literature, existing only as an object of the past, like the linear model of innovation.