Multiple Paths to Firm Innovation in Sub-Saharan Africa: How informal institutions matter
研究了撒哈拉以南非洲企业中，资源与正式、非正式制度如何组合导致创新，发现非正式制度既能替代也能补充正式制度，为企业提供了多条适合自身制度环境的创新路径。
Although innovation studies in developing countries acknowledge the importance of resources for firm innovation, their emphasis tends to be on bottlenecks created by resource constraints and institutional weaknesses. We address this shortcoming by exploring the relationship among firm resources and formal and informal institutions leading to innovation in these settings. By adopting a crisp-set qualitative comparative analysis of firms in sub-Saharan Africa, we confirm the thesis that informal institutions substitute underdeveloped formal institutions and in combination with firm-level resources afford firm innovation. More importantly, we find that informal institutions also complement more developed formal institutions in the presence or absence of high levels of firm resources or accommodate them in the presence of high levels of firm resources to support firm innovation. Our findings point to multiple paths that firms can take to be innovative that best fit their existing institutional context.