Technical information services, managed by the All- 

 Union Institute for Scientific and Technical Infor- 

 mation (VINITI) , are among the best in the world. 

 VINITI disseminates Soviet journals, translation 

 journals, and comprehensive abstracts of foreign and 

 domestic publications, and assists in publicizing 

 patents. Most industrial ministries have similar 

 agencies. Academy, university, ministries, and S&T 

 societies host frequent technical conferences which 

 facilitate personal interaction, a potent means of 

 technology transfer. Actual transfer of personnel 

 with the direct or indirect intent of transferring 

 technology tends to occur less frequently, and is 

 particularly rare across ministerial boundaries. 

 Standardization programs, such as those concerning 

 design documentation, facilitate transfer but are a 

 relatively recent development. Finally, a common 

 Soviet technique of technology diffusion which avoids 

 many of the administrative problems described previ- 

 ously is the construction of entirely new facilities 

 which "embody" the new technology. However, the per- 

 formance of the Soviet construction industry is it- 

 self quite poor, especially concerning lead times, 

 and the shift of investment funds away from new con- 

 struction to reconstruction of facilities reduces the 

 scope for this approach. 



In sum, the Soviet innovation and diffusion pro- 

 cesses are rendered similar, if not indistinguishable, 

 by the nature of Soviet economic organization and ad- 

 ministration. The general absence of competitive 

 pressures in particular is a severe deterrent to rap- 

 id diffusion. Special programs designed to encourage 

 internal technology transfer, particularly relating 

 to information and (potentially) standardization, can 

 alleviate some of the problems but are not, in our 

 view, sufficiently effective to overcome barriers to 

 innovation created by fundamental attributes of the 

 Soviet economic mechanism. 



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