{'fraction_non_alphanumeric': 0.0301123595505618, 'fraction_numerical': 0.028764044943820226, 'mean_word_length': 5.849230769230769, 'pattern_counts': {'":': 0, '<': 0, '<?xml version=': 0, '>': 0, 'https://': 0, 'lorem ipsum': 0, 'www.': 0, 'xml': 0}, 'pii_count': 0, 'substrings_counts': 0, 'word_list_counts': {'cursed_substrings.json': 0, 'profanity_word_list.json': 0, 'sexual_word_list.json': 0, 'zh_pornsignals.json': 0}}
Introduction: regional innovation systems and regional innovation policies

During the last two decades interest in regional innovation policies has progressively increased within the field of regional innovation studies. Such growing interest, which has been mostly European, is observed in the pattern of mentions of the term “regional innovation policy” in scientific papers (González-López et al. 2019). Regional innovation policies studies are narrowly linked to the regional innovation system (RIS) approach (Cooke 1992; Cooke et al. 1997; Asheim and Isaksen 1997; Howells 1999; Asheim and Gertler 2005). The RIS approach, which emerged in the 1990s, linked to both the Innovation Systems (IS) literature and contemporary contributions on Economic Geography and Cluster Theory. The IS approach underlines that nations, regions and sectors show distinctive patterns of innovation, due to diverse technological and institutional trajectories (Lundvall 1992; Edquist 1997). Linked to the post-Schumpeterian views of the Evolutionary School (Nelson and Winter 1982; Dosi and Nelson 1994), innovation and economic changes are understood as a dynamic and path-dependent process, which contributes to explaining why each sector or territory follows different innovation trajectories, shaping different systems of innovation. Moreover, the IS literature draws also on the so-called “interactive learning theories” (Lundvall and Johnson 1994), where innovation is understood as a phenomenon that is the result of multiple interactions and continuous learning processes in which multiple agents participate. At the regional or national level, firms, higher education institutions or technological centres (among others) are the relevant agents that interact and give rise to learning processes and innovations. The other basis for the RIS approach concerns several Economic Geography schools that, particularly since the 1980s, have emphasised the importance of innovation for regions’ and territories’ competitiveness. Among others, we can include here the New Industrial Districts school (Becattini 1990), the Flexible Production Systems approach (Scott 1988; Storper and Harrison 1991) and the Learning Region approach (Asheim