Internet penetration as national innovation capacity: worldwide evidence on the impact of ICTs on innovation development

Feng Xiong, Leizhen Zang, Yanyan Gao

Corresponding authors: Leizhen Zang, e-mail: zangleizhen@cau.edu.cn

Information Technology for Development, Published online

Abstract: Information and communication technologies (ICTs) and innovations haveprofoundly reshaped global development. Although there are manyworks that have examined the direct effects of ICTs on nationaldevelopment in fields of economics, society and politics, the importantrole played by ICTs in national innovation capacity has been less widelyexplored from an empirical standpoint. This paper investigates theinfluence of Internet penetration on national innovation development,using cross-national panel data of 156 countries from 1995 to 2014. Wefind that Internet penetration has a significant but decreasinginnovation-promotion effect, and this finding stood the test of variousmodels and variable measures. Further study shows that there is a oneperiod lagged effect of Internet penetration on innovation, and politicalregimes moderate the innovation promotion effect of ICTs.

Keywords: Internet penetration; innovation; panel data; machine learning; development

View full article(PDF)

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/02681102.2021.1891853