從哪來的創新想法？地方政府創新來源與創新政策特質的分析

Where Do Innovative Ideas Come from? The Relationship between Information Source and Quality of Innovation

政府創新的過程大致可區分成創新想法的出現、想法的採用、及創新想法的執行三階段。然而目前針對政府創新所做的研究，幾乎沒有任何研究系統性地深入探討「創新」在剛開始是如何被提出來的、由誰提出來的問題，忽略上述發展過程中的第一階段。多數研究都假定創新想法的出現是一種理所當然，直接將焦點放在創新被採用之後從一個地方擴散到另外一個地方的速度，使得研究成果無法解釋原始創新資訊來源網絡的問題。本文以地方政府過去幾年所推出的43 個創新個案為例，分析這些創新的初始想法來源以及其政策特質，了解地方政府創新的資訊網絡並提出改善建議。研究結果發現，與預期不同，地方政府的創新想法大多產自政府內部，例如行政首長或其他同事，而且多數認為這些內部想法來源對於後續創新的採用與執行有較高的影響能力，相關政策特質也較明顯；在創新想法的傳遞媒介部分，除了學術性的場合外，互動性質較高之媒介所傳遞出來的創新，在各項特質上也是較為明顯，也就是被採用的機會也是較高的。本研究是第一個系統性分析政府創新來源的研究，在理論上，可為創新政策的過程理論注入更多未來研究的命題，導引出未來更多對於創新想法、創新訊息資訊網絡研究的重視，在實務上則提供健全化政府組織創新資訊來源與管道的建議。

When viewed from the perspective of policy development, both the original sources and the quality of the channels through which policy ideas are communicated and proposed are closely related to whether a given policy can be accomplished within a short span of time. This relationship holds particularly true with regard to innovative policies, which are often characterized by their high levels of uncertainty. This study aims to (1) explore the sources of innovative ideas and (2) reveal the most valuable idea sources. The results indicate that the source for most local government innovative ideas originates from within the government itself. Most respondents also believe that internal sources of innovation are more influential on the later phases of adoption and implementation. Analysis of the different channels of innovative idea delivery reveals that innovations resulting from channels with higher levels of interaction generally score higher in all innovation characteristics, with the sole exception of academic meetings. Thus, channels with greater interactivity generate innovations that have a higher chance of being adopted. This research is the first study to systematically examine the source of government innovation. It is hoped that this research may lead to renewed interest in the area of innovation.