Exactly at this time in history, a complexity science perspective seems to me most useful for reflecting on what innovation is and what it means for those complex systems that our economies and societies are. It was with this mindset that I joined IAS for a research fellowship.

I was drawn by how IAS embraces the same approach that I had already got to know many years ago as a PhD student attending the Complexity summer school at the Santa Fe Institute in New Mexico. To me, complexity science meant a way of thinking where interdisciplinarity is seen as a necessity rather than an academic distraction. I felt the same vibe of nourishing interdisciplinary encounters in the rooms and corridors of IAS.

In my IAS lecture, I argued for the need for a broader interpretation of what innovation is and what its consequences are. Such efforts can help to reveal innovation in more places but also highlight implications of innovation beyond the places where innovation is developed.

In my research, I raise critical questions on the innovation narratives embraced by policymakers, and I initiate conversations about how to represent, visualise, and communicate alternative narratives, either with different data or with different visualisation approaches.

During my IAS stay, I found the interactions with the other fellows and IAS connections very valuable. Oleksandra Moskalenko’s efforts to rethink macroeconomic models to explain how her country of origin, Ukraine, demonstrates resilience and develops all kinds of high-tech and low-tech innovation were very inspiring. Albert Faber’s work at the intersection of research and policy on sustainability transitions was a reminder that innovation processes come with governance questions beyond technology solutions and that innovation actors are many and of different kinds. I was also happy to interact with my UVA connection Laura Dupin. She is interested in connecting entrepreneurship and innovation studies to geography, which is now my main discipline as I am based at the Human Geography department of Utrecht University. What I like about geography as a discipline is its openness to other disciplines. In this sense, I am lucky to be in a disciplinary environment which is interdisciplinary at heart.

In my last week at IAS, we could also celebrate the Stevin prize to Claes de Vreese. His work at the intersection of science and technology studies, political science, and sociology is a great example of how complexity science thinking can help to make sense of both the opportunities and challenges of innovation in society. I also cherish the conversations with Huub Dijstelbloem on these very topics.

All in all, I look back at a lovely and rewarding stay at IAS. Luckily, Utrecht is around the corner, and I get to join IAS events easily also in the future.

If you want to know more about my research, these are two papers related to my IAS talk:

Castaldi, C. (2025). Mapping innovation in space. Spatial Economic Analysis, 1-16.

Binz, C., & Castaldi, C. (2024). Toward a normative turn in research on the geography of innovation? Evolving perspectives on innovation, institutions, and human well-being. Progress in Economic Geography, 2(2), 100018.