Army-university-industry cooperation in economic improvement and a model proposal for Turkey

Social system is an aggregate composed of interconnected fragments, and any change that occurs on a single fragment has an effect on all others. It is therefore essential to clarify real phenomena through a holistic approach in relation to mutual and multiple interactions rather than a unilateral view of causality.One fragment of the social system is the system of economics. Evaluating the improvement of economic system in the logic of quantum thinking, it is seen that cooperation between or among different institutions within the same system contributes to economic improvement. Bearing within this scope, this study basically focuses on how cooperation between the army, universities and industry -Turkey's fundamental institutions- could contribute to economic improvement.The first section of this study discusses various different models, theories, and approaches to economic improvement. The second section starts with a scrutiny of university-industry cooperation in terms of its contributions to economic improvement. It then follows with the contribution of the cooperation between the army and the industry to economic improvement. This section particularly reveals in various dimensions the R&D process of Turkish Military Industry and its contributions to the improvement of Turkish economy.This study has benefited from two basic methods of application. First and foremost, basic and derivative hypotheses towards providing and improving the cooperation between army-university-industry have been established. In this sense, an econometric model has been formed after determining different variables and the hypotheses of studying with panel data method have been tested through the NATO group of countries. Afterwards an on-site research on defense industry companies that operate in Turkey has been made. In the application phase of the study, the contribution of cooperation between the army-university-industry to Turkey's economic improvement has been put forth along with a suggested model. Some suggestions for establishing ways of cooperation between the army-university-industry and how this will lead to economic improvement have been made as a consequence of the analyses made.Keywords: Economic Improvement, Integrated Network Interaction Paradigm, University-Industry Cooperation, Army-University-Industry Cooperation