The Evolution of India’s National Innovation System and its Current Challenges: A First Reading from the Latin American School

This paper presents a preliminary historical reading of the evolution of India’s NSI, from its independence to the present day, and its main current challenges. It is a work that is part of an ongoing effort to understand the technological trajectory of India in a historical perspective, in the light of some analytical-conceptual reflections articulated by authors linked to the Latin American school of thought in Science, Technology and Development, and Latin American structuralism. It focuses mainly on four aspects of the Indian socio-productive structure: a) the geopolitical and social needs of the Indian society, b) the country’s institutional development and the type of scientific, technological and innovative policies implemented, c) the evolution of the main sectors of its productive structure, and d) the formation of partnerships around a “national project” of development by the Indian elite. It concludes by emphasizing the need to connect the country’s capacities with the social, material and geopolitical needs of its society in the context of increasing urbanization and economic growth which has flourished in the country in the early 21st century.