The paper discusses a number of topics related to innovation support as a component of regional policy. It reviews the evolution of the understanding of innovation and of its role as a growth factor. It discusses the increasing prominence gained by innovation support as part of the regional policy packages of 12 countries, and the main programmes and schemes implemented to foster innovation within these. It summarises the conclusions and recommendations of a selection of evaluations about such programmes and schemes, and the extent to which the recommendations formulated in the evaluations led to concrete policy changes. In particular, through a mixed methodology, resting on a literature review, the examination of evaluation reports and on country research (desk-research and interviews), the paper provides insights on the following themes:
- first, the type of instruments for innovation that are included in the regional development policies of selected European countries and the relative weight of innovation in the regional policy packages;
- second, the evaluation evidence that is available on regional innovation programmes and schemes;
- and lastly, to what extent evaluation evidence has been used to improve policy.