Science and industry: a theory of networks and paradigms

The recent interest in ‘network’ forms of organization serves as a starting point to understand better the dynamic characteristics of technology development. Network theory allows one to describe the relationship between ‘actors’ involved in the development of new technologies, both cross-sectionaily and longitudinally, and, as a consequence, to model the structural and behavioural developement of a community of actors (regardless of whether this ‘community’ is defined as a set of individuals, e.g. the ‘scientific’ community, or is defined as a collection of organizations, e.g. an industry). In this paper, this network approach is used to develope a theoretical framework to undersiand the knowledge transition from ‘scientific’ paradigm status to a ‘technological’ paradigm status. It is belived that the propositions made in this paper will enable truly empirical studies on the nature of the development of ‘scientific’ and ‘technological’ paradigms.