Mapping cultural networks to detect a localized/urban 'entrepreneurial discovery project'. Some methodological issues

With the objective of rendering the policy paradigm and policy prescriptions more useful, recent smart specialization policy is aimed at the localized 'entrepreneurial discovery process' (Trajtenberg 2015; Foray 2006, 2015). Entrepreneurial discovery precedes the innovation stage and comprises exploration and establishment of a new domain of technological and market opportunities and the potential for innovation (Foray 2015). This process has been examined at the macro analytical level, i.e. from existing productive structures to new domains of potential competitive advantage, as structural change or related variety (Frenken et al. 2007). In these works, policy usefulness depends on how the localized entrepreneurial project (i.e. the capacity of the periphery to re-invent itself) is discovered and analyzed. As a result, diagnostic analytic is a crucial component of the smart specialization policy framework. This paper considers the case of a cultural industry (Tagliacarne/Unioncamere 2009) to explore the usefulness of a network approach to reveal a localized entrepreneurial project. We are interested in how to recognize smart specialization in some emergent and consolidated cultural networks. We provide a literature review and discuss some case studies. The literature in the field of art and communication science highlights the hidden (but persistent) entrepreneurial character of the urban peripheral master artisan (Napolitano 2015) while organizational theories have been applied mainly to an institutional framework that includes industrial district (plus the additional concept's developments, until those of the 'advanced cultural district') (see Sacco, Ferilli 2006) and macro analytical dimension. In contrast, our cases explore the network dynamics in terms of changes to the structure and strength of ties throughout a cycle of entrepreneurial discovery (learning by communication and collaboration, creativity and experiential learning) (Teece 2000) and changing network focus (Nooteboom 2000).