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Taking the golden 20 years of the Chinese leather industry as an example, this paper adopts a spatial panel model to accurately portray the characteristics of spatial evolution and the trend of development of agglomeration of the leather industry. This paper further systematically identifies the key driving factors of leather industry agglomeration, taking into account the time effect, spatial effect, and spatio-temporal effect at the same time. The results show that China's leather industry shows a shift from coastal areas to diffusion to inland areas. In terms of influencing factors, resource endowment and economic externality are the key force leading the agglomeration of leather industry. In addition, according to the results of group regression, it is found that innovation capacity and environmental regulation have become the main driving forces affecting the development of leather industry. Therefore, the government should carry out global planning according to the spatial pattern and transfer path of leather industry agglomeration. Based on the deep-level driving mechanism of industrial pattern evolution, specific industrial measures should be formulate to realize the development and promotion of leather industry in the new era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of reshoring, defined as the relocation of previously offshored production activities back to the home country or to a neighbouring country, on the productivity of manufacturing firms. It uses data from the European Reshoring Monitor on European firms in the period 2014–18. Reshoring increased total factor productivity of small and medium-sized firms, but did not affect productivity of large firms. The positive effect was stronger for firms that had offshored production to some Asian countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The knowledge economy – defined here as production and services based on knowledge intensive activities – is widely recognized to have accelerated knowledge production and spillovers through a deepening of collaborative networks that can extend over extensive geographical distances. However, limited by data availability, the geography of China's knowledge production and collaborative networks, segmented by different disciplines, has been little studied in economic geography or innovation studies. This paper draws on data on academic publications that were extracted from the China Academic Journal Network Publishing Database (CAJD) in order to construct knowledge production and collaboration networks for different disciplines in China. The results depict a series of maps that show that: (1) the 'hard' sciences (natural sciences and engineering) outperform much more than the 'soft' sciences (humanities and social sciences) both in article number and collaboration strength; and (2) large metropolises have overwhelming advantages in the terms of both paper production and the collaboration strength for all disciplines, despite varying among different disciplines. These uneven geographical patterns can be partially attributed to a high concentration of scientific resources in a few large cities, which was inherited from the Maoist period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses how narratives influence the legitimation of new industries in peripheral regions. We contribute to the literature a discussion of the emergence of green industries in peripheral regions, but particularly to the emerging debate in evolutionary economic geography on the role of legitimation in the emergence of new industries. Based on an empirical investigation of narratives regarding onshore wind in the Finnmark region in northernmost Norway, we caution against the focus in the literature on 'successful' legitimation, arguing that to better comprehend how new green industries emerge in regions there is a need also to understand delegitimation of new industrial activities and to investigate unsuccessful path creation processes, not only paths that have come into being and where legitimation has been 'achieved'. Following from this we argue that our study on how representations (i.e., narratives) of emerging paths are linked to observable outcomes (e.g., delegitimation) teases out the need for further investigation of power relations, a topic that has received very little interest in research on regional industrial path development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Diversity is one of the defining characteristics of complex adaptive systems - systems made up of heterogeneous agents whose interactions form a dynamic network resulting in emergent behaviour. Recent research shows that various types of diversity increase with the scale of the system. This paper uses ideas and methods from community ecology to define business types as functional traits and to calculate functional diversity as a measure of the economic diversification in an urban system. It asks how functional diversity changes with the size of the city within an urban region. Using Keihanshin Metropolitan Area in Japan as an example, the paper concludes that while functional diversity scales with city size, it reaches saturation due to the limitations of the business types classification systems. It argues that regardless of the observed saturation, the method can reveal the structural complexity of the city, showing what types of industries form its economy. It also discovers functions common to all cities in the region, and calls for further development of the method by introducing the multidimensional analysis and additional measures of diversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the radicalness of industry path transformation in different geographical contexts by analysing the introduction of new technological trajectories within established industry paths. We use an analytical framework based on path dependence theory to conduct a comparative case study of the introduction of offshore farming technology in the salmon farming industry in both coastal Norway and Tasmania, Australia. We show that similar points of departure can lead to different path transformation radicalness. In each case, the transformation outcome will depend on the unique interplay between agency and regional structural components during windows of opportunity. The empirical analysis supports the importance of considering agency, regional structural components and global technology trends when investigating path transformation radicalness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper straddles the systems of innovation and the economic geography theories that conceptualize universities as engines of regional development and drivers of growth. However, these approaches overlook the heterogeneity of universities in the process of engagement, assuming their equal capacity to contribute to their region. In the view proposed here, not only does the university influence the surrounding region, but also regional characteristics shape university performance. The paper puts into perspective differences between university profiles in Spain based on their strategies and performance, and the scale and scope of the capabilities to contribute to their regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evolutionary perspectives have been increasingly applied to understanding industry agglomeration. By tracking change over time, evolutionary perspectives shed a light on firm-level and sectoral changes that are contextualized within global industrial shifts. This paper addresses a research gap in evolutionary economic geography and regional science by applying network dynamics of industrial agglomeration though industry- rather than firm-level relations. It uses network analysis techniques to track the evolution of two industry agglomerations between 1993 and 2015. It focuses on the resource agglomerations in Brisbane and Perth, Australia, to evaluate changes that occurred over the period of the most recent commodities-driven economic boom period. By highlighting changes in forward- and backward- linkages within firms in resource economy agglomerations, it unpacks the shifting position of core industries in inter-industry networks. Results indicate that firms either consolidated around competencies or broadened towards greater flexibility, the extent depending on the local environment. Professional services and specific resource-related activities gained centrality, while manufacturing and various intermediary services such as transportation and warehousing lost centrality. This indicates that core competencies were built around key resource sectors (notably oil and gas), while companies 'shed' activities that were beyond their core competencies, particularly those that could be outsourced to outside firms. This paper ultimately proposes a novel way of tracking the evolution of industry agglomeration, and by focusing on the resource industry it provides insight beyond other studies focusing on manufacturing or services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we focus on mapping and analysing the spatial patterns of unemployment in four Central European countries - Austria, Czechia, Germany, and Poland, on municipal level in 2010. Specifically, based on the geo-social differentiation patterns, we are searching for secondary axes stretching from the Blue Banana (the major European economic development axis running from London to Milan) towards Eastern Europe. Unemployment is supposed to approximate economic development, thanks to its close relation to GDP and other economic indicators. To study spatial patterns and development axes on a micro scale, we use the concept of spatial autocorrelation, specifically Moran's I and LISA analysis. While we analyse more than 44,000 units, the resulting maps are very detailed and difficult to interpret on small scales. In this paper, we take advantage of the opportunity to present large-scale maps (1:2,500,000 and 1:6,000,000), which are also more suitable for the analytical conclusions that follow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that the poor conceptualization of the "firm" in economic geography detracts from the analytical strengths and policy relevance of the discipline. Identified as a phenotype, the firm remains ambiguous as an analytical category. This paper reviews nine overlapping conceptualizations of the firm in order to identify their relevance to the economic geography project. It discusses the broad strengths and weaknesses of these approaches and describes the unique perspective each provides on the nature and functioning of the firm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studying the recent relocation of manufacturing industries from the Nordic countries to the Baltic countries, this paper provides an empirical application of the footloose capital model, a framework for spatial analysis. The model is extended to include input-output linkages and FDI spillovers. It is calibrated and applied, industry by industry, to a 3x3 matrix of Baltic countries and Nordic countries and to the pairing of these blocs. Simulation results are compared with 'real world' data and discussed in regard to testability restrictions of the footloose capital model. Incorporation of vertical linkages and spillovers can improve the goodness of fit, but while the predicted direction of industry relocation is often correct, predicted levels are not. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper lays the methodological foundations of an analytical framework that may help shed some new light on the issue of territorial inequalities in the digital economy. It opposes the recent tendency to build up an evolutionary economic geography as an alternative not only to the so-called "New Economic Geography" (namely "geographical mainstream economics") but also to the institutional economic geography. The paper advocates the development of an evolutionary and institutional approach in economic geography, which would be meso-focused. Finally, it presents some insights that highlight the heuristic potential of this approach in reappraising the territorial features of the digital economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper endorses recent pleas for an ‘institutional turn’ within economic geography. In particular, it reveals and connects the coherence and distinctiveness of dissenting institutional economics as a way of thinking for economic geography. Economic geographers have recognized this tradition but its continuity and compass is not fully appreciated. To provide such an appreciation, this paper argues that the paradigmatic distinctiveness of dissenting institutionalism rests especially on its recognition that real world economies are embedded, have histories or evolve, and are different. The discussion is based around these three cornerstone principles of embeddedness, evolution and difference. For the future, greater attention to the region as an institution, albeit a complex one, along with greater attention to the synthesis of multi-dimensional processes that are normally analyzes as separate conceptual categories, is encouraged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the determinants of innovation behavior in European firms that are predominantly small and medium in size. The aim is to assess the absolute as well as the relative impact on innovation behavior of firm-specific (i.e., internal) factors on the one hand and region-specific characteristics on the other. Two hypotheses are advanced and tested. The first is that—contrary in part to some recent literature on regional and national innovation systems—firm-specific determinants of innovation are more important than either region-specific or external factors. The second hypothesis is that in high-tech regions dominated by a small number of very large firms the innovation behavior of the smaller firms is more strongly influenced by regional factors than by factors internal to the firm. Whereas the first hypothesis is confirmed by the empirical results presented here, the second is not. Because firm-level innovation determinants are of great importance in the European regions investigated in this study, we suggest that local innovation policy should focus more on the specific needs of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in particular regions than on improving regional conditions for innovation in general. The analysis is mainly based on data from the European Regional Innovation Survey (ERIS) and includes information from more than 8,000 interviews with manufacturing firms, service firms, and research institutions in 11 European regions. The logit analyses reported in this paper used data from some 1,800 manufacturing firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The co-location and networking of firms and institutions, also known as clustering, positively influences the innovativeness of firms. The cluster literature provides a single-sided understanding of how clusters function due to an overemphasis in the literature on clusters in high-tech and developed economies at the expense of clusters in low-tech industries in less-developed regions. Applying social network analysis (SNA), this paper studies two furniture clusters in the Wielkopolska region of Poland. The findings demonstrate that: (1) the critical factor is the impact of institutionalization on the mechanisms of knowledge flows, Marshall's externalities and, in consequence, innovativeness of firms; and (2) the underlining clusters do not show a tendency to build cluster-external linkages, opposing the dominant premise in the cluster literature. In the absence of national and international relations, managers of small and medium-sized firms and local institutions are the main sources of novelty for the clusters at the sustaining stage of their life cycle. The findings pave the way for initiatives aiming at creating and developing knowledge networks in lagging and catching-up regions in Europe, particularly those specialized in low-tech sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Motivated by ongoing research into the cluster concept that considers dynamic features of economic development and the cluster life cycle, differences between traded clusters and local activity across different spatial scales are examined for Ireland. Using recent cluster definitions for Europe, this paper presents clustering patterns within the Irish economy from 2008 to 2012. We report on data requirements when applying the benchmark cluster definitions to Irish data. Integrating small, open economy features with life-cycle concerns, we focus on specific clusters in Ireland, along with their export performance, noting that appropriate cluster boundaries are neither regional nor national. Analyses indicate that while Ireland hosts a number of internationally competitive clusters, foreign-owned firms remain substantially more productive than indigenous enterprises. We identify the geographical location of these prominent clusters at the NUTS-3 regional level and highlight the role of regional features for differences in adaptive cycles of clusters. We identify a substantial portion (60%) of Irish regional wage variation relates to the different cluster mixes across regions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Economic integration in Europe has been accompanied by concerns about the effect of integration on regional disparities in the European Union. This paper investigates the effects of the most recent EU enlargement on convergence among countries and regions in the EU-27. Departing from a new economic geography framework, we focus on integration effects caused by changes in market access, released by a reduction of trade impediments. Special attention is paid to the catching-up process of the new member states (NMSs) and the development of regional disparities within the East European countries. From 1995 to 2004, the EU integration process was marked by an economic catching-up of the NMSs. At the same time, regional within-country disparities in the NMSs have been increasing. Our simulation analysis shows that trade integration has a strong effect on market potentials in East European regions. Comparatively strong changes in market access are supposed to foster the East European catching-up at the national and regional levels. However, accounting for these integration effects does not significantly alter the findings of our convergence analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although there is a growing body of research into the cultural and creative industries, little work has focused specifically upon on the geography of design and its role in regional economies. The relative neglect of the geography of the UK design industry is surprising given recent assertions about the sector's role in national economic competitiveness; its contribution to product innovation; and its importance as an urban regeneration resource. This paper explicitly considers the extent to which existing conceptualizations of agglomeration and creativity provide insights into the realm of design. Our discussion reflects upon recent surveys of the design sector and analyses current design organization membership data, both of which reveal an overwhelming concentration of design activities in London and the South East. Our analysis of the strategies, organization and practices of agencies in London reveals that a number of the key features associated with cultural industries in general are significantly less discernible within design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper an attempt is made to measure the cultural industries in a cross-national context. The paper starts with a discussion of the definition and delineation of the term the ‘cultural industries’. It is argued that a large range of goods and services may be considered to be cultural industry products and that it is important to place the production and exchange of such products in the context of an industrial systems approach. Following this the concept is operationalised using data on employment and firm activity from Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. Results are presented which suggest that overall growth in both employment and firm numbers has been especially strong in the cultural industries. However, interesting differences between the countries emerged from the data. Thus regional dimensions are then examined resulting in the finding that in all four countries cultural industries have a strong attraction to urban areas but an even stronger propensity to agglomerate. It is suggested that the spatial dynamics observed may be key to the development of the industries' competencies and success. In summary the paper presents results of extensive data analysis that show the cultural industries' important contribution to Scandinavian economies and labour markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the cultural turn in economic geography, the emphasis on economic necessity when explaining participation in alternative consumption spaces (i.e. informal and/or second-hand retail channels) has been contested by an agency-orientated cultural reading that views engagement in such spaces as about the search for fun, sociality, distinction, discernment, the spectacular and so forth, and more recently by a geographically sensitive approach that ascribes agency to affluent populations and economic rationales to deprived populations. Drawing upon evidence collected during 120 face-to-face interviews in the English city of Leicester, however, this paper finds that people's reasons for engaging in such practices cannot be reduced simply to either economic necessity or agency. Instead, it reveals that such either/or thinking obfuscates how both co-exist in people's explanations for engagement and combine in contrasting ways in different neighbourhood types, modes of goods acquisition and according to the type of good sought. The outcome of this paper is thus to transcend and reconcile previous reductive explanations using a both/and approach that recognises the varying ways in which economic necessity and choice are entangled in rationales for participation in alternative consumption spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The role of space and place in shaping the transformation of firms and industries and the impact of such transformations on the wider processes of territorial development at local, regional, national, and global scales are basic research issues in economic geography. Such analyses tend to be compartmentalized, focusing on a specific economic activity or on a specific territory, rather than on the relationships between them. It is difficult simultaneously to conceptualize economic activities (including such phenomena as firms, industries, and other types of systems of networked economic activity), on the one hand, and territorially defined economies, on the other. In this paper, we address the interconnections between economic activities and territories through an exploration of the mutually constitutive relationships between firms and territories: the firm-territory nexus. The focus of our analysis is the nexus of three major dimensions—firms, industrial systems, and territories—embedded in turn in the overall macro dimension of governance systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses data from the Scottish Household Survey to investigate urban–rural variations in life satisfaction in Scotland. It reviews the previous literature on spatial differences in life satisfaction and develops an econometric model that includes a range of factors previously shown to affect life satisfaction. Holding these factors constant, Scottish rural dwellers are found to have a significantly higher life satisfaction than city residents. Possible reasons for higher life satisfaction in rural areas are explored before finally drawing policy conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The New Economic Geography (NEG)'s agglomerative forces strongly determined the location of firms, in spite of policy intervention blatantly activist intended to reverberate the geography of production (during the communist regime). Recent models of geography and trade recognize a bijective interaction between NEG forces and comparative advantages, they fully explain productive specialization. Our interpretation of the Czech manufacturing is in accordance with the NEG and its recent integration with the comparative advantages stream. In the panel data float up some invariant characteristics enhancing the attractiveness of traditional industrialized territories. The estimates embody the population density and gravitational and agglomeration forces. The time-invariant characteristics are present in the most industrial regions, influencing the localization of manufacturing activity in these spots. In spite of the forceful influence of path dependence, the very manufacturing cores underwent a process of restructuration, adapting the old-fashioned specialization pattern toward a more coherent production tailored to local assets, endowments and technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Japanese firms have a firmly established reputation as influential foreign investors, originating from the surge of foreign direct investment into North America and Europe during the 1980s. This paper examines trends in Japanese corporate behaviour in the United Kingdom, a key investment destination for Japanese firms, over the period 1991 to 2010. Our ‘demographic’ analysis of Japanese firms' investments includes both investment and exit strategies. It is found that Japanese firms have reconfigured their UK presence in response to a rapidly changing market environment, with an enduring proclivity to cluster, notwithstanding government incentives intended to channel investment towards specific regions of the country. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This special issue brings together creativity and enterprise through the geographies of the creative industries. In recent years the focus of academic debate has privileged business and corporate economies, and so this issue seeks to contribute both empirically and theoretically to the burgeoning literature of creative industries. Economic geography offers a rich domain through which to engage with these debates, exploring the nuances of creativity and enterprise. Our aim, as well as bringing together a set of interesting papers, is to contribute critically to understanding the organization and spatial structure of creative industries and the broader creative economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on the service industries has changed radically over the past few decades. Not only has work proliferated, but service research has further developed towards a deeper and more nuanced understanding of particular categories of services activities. However, as most research has focused on large and often densely populated economies, and on large multinational corporations, there is a risk that processes and phenomena relevant to more peripheral or smaller economies, perhaps with a more dispersed pattern of settlements and economic activities, are left unaccounted for. Drawing on contributions to the Inaugural Nordic Geographers Meeting held in Lund in 2005, this article introduces a special issue containing a selection of papers that set out to fill some of the gaps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inspired by a stream of cultural economic geographical thought that has sought to deconstruct the view that monetary transactions are everywhere market-like and profit-motivated, this paper seeks to reread the nature of undeclared work. Conventionally, such work has been seen as epitomising unbridled profit-motivated market-like monetised exchange, and depictions of the geographical variations in its character have distinguished only between various types of profit-motivated informal employment in different area types. Drawing upon detailed empirical evidence from eleven deprived and affluent localities in urban and rural England, however, it is here displayed that universally portraying undeclared work as a form of profit-motivated informal employment over-simplifies and obscures its spatially variable nature and heterogeneous meanings. Although undeclared work in affluent locality types and urban areas is more likely to be market-like and conducted for profit-motivated purposes, undeclared work in deprived locality types and rural areas is revealed to be much more a form of mutual aid conducted for kin, neighbours and friends and embedded in non-market motives. The outcome is not only a refiguring of the geographical variations in the nature of undeclared work but also clear evidence of the need to investigate other mainstream economic spaces so as to explore further the heterogeneous and spatially variable nature of monetised transactions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Uneven development in space in sub-Sahara Africa (SSA) has been attributed to inequalities in comparative advantage within the neoclassical framework of free and competitive markets. The role of structural hegemony, centered in primate cities with controls on allocation and mobilization of development resources throughout the postcolonial state in SSA, has been largely ignored in the literature. Policies and plans for development that were based on the assumption of free and competitive markets in Africa have been frustrated because they did not take into account the role of structural hegemony and associated biases in determining the spatial pattern of costs and benefits of production within incorporated state economic systems. This paper develops a framework which would characterize uneven development in SSA as a function of competitive (or neoclassical) forces of spatial inequality and hegemonic (structural) forces of spatial inequity. The increasing dominance of hegemonic forces, which have progressively submerged competitive forces of production and distribution, are blamed for slowing down progress in SSA and are seen as the principal constraint in structural readjustment. A brief illustrative case study of Ethiopia and Zimbabwe is provided to verify the hegemonic process and to demonstrate its two dominant forms of spatial polarity in SSA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article seeks to advance perspectives on powerful incumbent firms in (new) regional industrial path development. Drawing on recent insights from transition studies, it is argued that this actor group - hitherto often portrayed in a rather one-sided manner - plays a crucial role in shaping the pace and direction of regional path development through agency oriented towards both change and maintenance. Building on systemic perspectives at the intersection of evolutionary economic geography and innovation studies, a particular emphasis is placed on incumbent firms' interventions to reconfigure or stabilize their surrounding regional innovation system to support their intentions. To this end, this article examines how incumbents exert their influence through various forms of power as means by which they promote or hinder regional industrial change. Empirically, the role of incumbent firms in three traditional automotive regions in Austria is investigated. It is shown how they leverage their power to propel the industry's digitalization and suppress its decarbonization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taking concepts from economic geography, this study decomposes locational factors as 'first-nature' and 'second-nature' geography, and argues that the second-nature geography, which is the concentration of entrepreneurial activities, helps entrepreneurs to discover entrepreneurial opportunities and gives them an incentive to integrate business with supporting activities in close proximity due to pecuniary and technological externalities. This study has taken the agricultural sector as the context of its research, and finds that the agricultural entrepreneurship literature has neglected the impact of the second-nature geography. Findings from the Netherlands show that the higher the concentration of entrepreneurial diversification in a region, the greater the likelihood that a farmer undertakes entrepreneurship on the farm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an obituary for Norton S. Ginsburg, an economic geography professor at the University of Chicago.

How do sparsely populated regions innovate in green policies? What enables or limits such innovation? The green policy literature often focuses on core regions, while territorial innovation models have long ignored regional state innovation. In this article we examine the drivers of public sector innovation in green policies in peripheral regions, often considered unequipped. The data come from the case study of Finnish Lapland's Smart Specialisation Strategy in relation to promoting a forest-based bioeconomy. In a context where climate change has become a major global challenge, and sustainable development an additional responsibility for local and regional governments, this article contributes to understanding the rationales for innovation in green policies from a regional perspective. Drawing from institutional economic geography, we argue that top-down approaches (Smart Specialisation) combined with scale and place-specificity (personal connections, environmental fragility, political will and natural resources endowments) play an important role in driving the governments of sparsely populated regions to innovate when translating and implementing green policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents a study which aims to explain why modern corporations persist with a decentralized system of plants, which are differentiated by the vintage of capital and the style of management. How and why firms are structured by the inherited configuration of capital; Use of concepts from modern financial theory; Advantages of a spatially differentiated configuration of products for the firm.

The relationship between labor and capital is one of mutual antagonism and interdependence. Conflict occurs between labor and capital over control of the production process and conditions of employment. However, both classes need one another in order to produce and sustain a livelihood. Spatial decentralization of production and the division of labor can be interpreted as an explicit bargaining strategy of the firm designed to control the power of labor and reinforce the authority of capital. Firms prefer to externalize their labor markets although local conditions, skill requirements, and union power may force internalization and consequently higher costs. Small and relatively depressed local labor markets are favored locations for firms producing standardized commodities. Firms that require specific skills and technical expertise are, on the other hand, more dependent upon the locational preferences of labor. Spatial concentration and agglomeration of production involving both skilled and unskilled workers may not be in the best interests of a firm because of their different labor market strategies related to their preferred employment relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The wealth of utility patent data has made this form of intellectual property (IP) protection the primary focus of the economics and geography of innovation. However, in addition to utility patents, the IP expressed in a firm's products or processes may also be protected via design patents, trademarks, copyright, or in non-compete and non-disclosure agreements. Recent research suggests that mixed modes of technological and non-technological innovation are associated with the most rapid firm growth and, thus, mixed-mode IP strategies may provide important insight for understanding the geography of innovation. If non-technological IP is an important complement to technological IP, then analyses focusing solely on the impacts of patents are misspecified. In addition, if the capability for pursuing these various tactics differs across the settlement hierarchy, then our understanding of the geography of IP is similarly distorted by the singular focus on patents. The objectives of this study are to examine how these tactics of protection are combined into IP strategies, how these strategies vary over the settlement hierarchy, how the different strategies are associated with different economic outcomes, and how these different strategic orientations may differentiate entrepreneurial ecosystems across space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Italy's economic development since its unification in 1861 has been characterized by extensive regional inequality. Northern regions were the frontrunners of modern industrialization in the late 19th century, while southern regions never closed the gap. New Economic Geography (NEG) proposes market access as the main driver of regional income differentials. But is its effect homogeneous across regions? The NEG hypothesis is here for the first time considered for the north and the south of Italy separately in the period 1871–1911. Following previous work by the author, both domestic and total market potentials are taken into account as possible drivers of regional gross domestic product (GDP) per capita. The results differ for the two macro-areas: in the south, both market potentials have a strong role in determining the levels of GDP per capita, but they do not affect the growth rates from period to period; and in the north, only domestic market potential is significant in both levels and growth rates. These results point to different dynamics at the sub-national level that should be further qualified by extending the analysis from the NUTS-2 to the NUTS-3 level. The policy implication is that market-oriented measures might not be effective for the most disadvantaged regions before other prerequisites for growth are achieved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comments on the economic concept of land use. Analysis on supply and demand curves; Elaboration on the law of variable proportions; Arguments over the issue of land rent.

This study examines the cross-sectional association of three value orientations (self-direction, achievement and power) and level of gross domestic product (GDP) in 289 NUTS regions. Regional value aggregates, drawn from Schwartz’s Human Value Scale included in the European Social Survey, are taken to indicate value-based human capital. Regression analysis shows that self-direction, indicating independent thought, action and creativity, is a strong predictor for regional GDP after controlling for standard control variables and spatial autocorrelation. Additionally, analysis implements welfare regimes as indicators of larger socio-historic frames and finds significant geographical variations within these frames regarding the relationship between prevailing value climate and level of economic performance. The study contrasts perspectives from economic geography and cultural studies to the literature on alternative definitions and measures for human capital and argues that a synthesis of these perspectives can enrich one’s understanding of the economic geography in Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Evolutionary thinking suggests that past knowledge accumulation influences future growth opportunities. Old industrial regions’ inherited knowledge is often described as obsolete. Particularly, blue-collar workers’ difficulties in redeploying skills have been stressed. This study examines whether the emerging offshore wind-energy industry in Bremerhaven, Germany, can draw on skills from local declining shipyards. Beyond Germany, this new industry has inspired policy-makers to hope for the renewal of shipbuilding centres. Insights from interviews reveal that the blue-collar skill bases of both industries overlap. Declining shipyards provided much-needed experience and skills to the nascent industry. This contribution underscores the fruitfulness of the perspective of related variety with respect to the development of old industrial regions. An overly sharp distinction between ‘old’ and ‘new’ knowledge may obstruct our view of potential growth opportunities. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

We propose an analysis of the socio-economic development processes at work in territories at the scale of Frenchcommunesfrom 1806 to 2010. This is an extremely fine scale for such analysis, given that there are 36,000communesin mainland France. The diachronic dimension, spanning two centuries, makes it possible to consider the temporal depth of territorial development. But the primary interest is not so much demographics as the socio-economic dimension of these variations over two centuries. We have analysed demographic changes as the expression of the socio-economic processes that shaped French territory over two centuries. Dynamic mapping of long-term population shifts reflects the industrial expansion of certain territories, decline due to the end of traditional farming practices, the shock produced by two world wars, the Fordist period and the post-war boom; the subsequent impact of an increasingly globalized, metropolitan economy then becomes apparent. We thus identify, map and analyse several historico-socio-economic phases. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Historically in New Zealand, car travel has replaced walking and cycling among commuters as wage rates have risen. However, time-series data from the Wellington region show the relationship between income and active commuting differs from the historical trend. While higher incomes do allow people to purchase motorized transport, they also allow workers to purchase shorter commutes and to integrate active modes with public transport. As a result, the probability of active commuting rises with income. Raising urban density can help stem some of the negative environmental and health effects of rising affluence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is to stimulate the discussion about the constant influx of new and potentially useful methods for empirical investigations in regional science and policy analysis. Particularly, the focus here lies on a brief presentation of 'quasi'-experimentalist methods as a promising approach to derive causal statements with respect to the effectiveness of regional policy instruments. Outlining potential advantages and pitfalls of this approach by means of an illustrative empirical example, this article finally sets up a research agenda for its future use by regional scientists and economic geographers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

abstract In a seminal article, Chinitz (1961) considered the effects of industry size, structure, and economic diversification on the performance of firms and regional economies. His inquiry suggested a related but conceptually distinct issue: how does the extent to which a regional industry or industrial sector is concentrated in a small number of firms affect the local performance of that industry? The question has not been addressed systematically in empirical research other than case studies, principally because accurately measuring regional concentration requires firm-level information. This exploratory study uses confidential plant-level data to gauge concentration in manufacturing industries at the regional scale across the continental United States, to explore changes over time in geographic patterns of concentration, and to investigate associations between regional industrial structure concentration and changes in employment. The implications for understanding the impacts of regional industrial structure on economic development processes are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The question of how new regional growth paths emerge has been raised by many leading economic geographers. From an evolutionary perspective, there are strong reasons to believe that regions are most likely to branch into industries that are technologically related to the preexisting industries in the regions. Using a new indicator of technological relatedness between manufacturing industries, we analyzed the economic evolution of 70 Swedish regions from 1969 to 2002 with detailed plant-level data. Our analyses show that the long-term evolution of the economic landscape in Sweden is subject to strong path dependencies. Industries that were technologically related to the preexisting industries in a region had a higher probability of entering that region than did industries that were technologically unrelated to the region's preexisting industries. These industries had a higher probability of exiting that region. Moreover, the industrial profiles of Swedish regions showed a high degree of technological cohesion. Despite substantial structural change, this cohesion was persistent over time. Our methodology also proved useful when we focused on the economic evolution of one particular region. Our analysis indicates that the Linköping region increased its industrial cohesion over 30 years because of the entry of industries that were closely related to its regional portfolio and the exit of industries that were technologically peripheral. In summary, we found systematic evidence that the rise and fall of industries is strongly conditioned by industrial relatedness at the regional level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By means of a unique longitudinal database with information on all industrial plants and employees in the Swedish economy, this article analyzes how geographic proximity influences the impact of spillovers and knowledge flows on the growth in productivity of plants. Concerning the effects of spillovers, it shows that the density of economic activities contributes mainly to the performance of plants within a short distance and that the composition of economic activities is more influential farther away. Regarding the influence of the local industrial setup, proximity increases the need to be located near different, but related, industries, whereas increased distance implies a greater effect of intraindustry spillovers. The analyses also demonstrate that knowledge flows via the mobility of skilled labor are primarily a subregional phenomenon. Only inflows of skills that are related to the existing knowledge base of plants and come from fewer than 50 kilometers away have a positive effect on the performance of plants. Concerning outflows of skills, the results indicate that it is less harmful for a dispatching plant if a former employee remains within the local economy rather than leaves it for a job in another part of the national economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the role of labour mobility as a potential cluster advantage. We review the theoretical arguments as for how and why labour mobility could enhance the dynamism and performance of clusters of similar and related firms. A combination of quantitative and qualitative data from two information and communication technology (ICT) clusters is used to answer two research questions: (1) What is the role of mobility enhancing (or restricting) institutions in clusters? and (2) In what ways does labour mobility contribute to knowledge transfer within clusters? The two ICT clusters studied in the article generally seem to have higher levels of mobility, compared to the labour market at large. Although it is regarded as beneficial in theory, most cluster firms try to restrict mobility of workers since they fear the risk and costs of losing staff. Labour mobility is also rarely viewed as a viable way to increase the knowledge bases or contact networks of firms. However, when firms need to recruit the clustered labour markets seem to benefit them by facilitating the use of informal recruitment processes. By way of conclusion it is suggested that cluster firms might be under-investing in mobility and that innovative institutional solutions could help realize clusters' mobility potential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The world's meat market has had tremendous growth in the past decades. Global meat producers, particularly in developed economies, have grown bigger through expansion, mergers and acquisitions. The livestock markets in less developed countries are particularly the prime targets for investments by these producers. This article looks at foreign direct investment in a transitional economy, using Poland's pig industry as the empirical case study. It argues that such investments not only bring significant changes in the method of producing meat in the host country; they also have particular socio-political impacts and have thus been met with some level of resistance by local communities. Our study suggests that the relations of foreign firms to the local community are crucial for their long term presence; and these relations are in turn dependent on a gamut of place specific features and the firms' broader corporate philosophy and strategy. In general, foreign firms need to find ways to replicate the kinds of deep social-economic links between the livestock industry and places that existed in the socialist era. The case studies of American-owned Agri Plus and Danish-owned Poldanor illustrate some of the difficulties involved in the foreign investment in the meat industries while demonstrating the viability and possibility of such companies becoming more accepted and welcomed in the local communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current financial crisis may be deeper and more far reaching than earlier ones except the Great Depression, but it fits into an all-too-common pattern of capitalist development experienced over the past 40 years. What can Marxian theory, with its focus on crisis formation and the internal contradictions of capital accumulation, teach us about the nature of capitalist crises, and what can the actual experience of the crisis teach us about Marxian theory? In what ways has the distinctive geographic unfolding of the crisis-all the way from subprime lending in specific locations to disruptions and spatial fixes in patterns of financial, commodity, capital, and labor flows-contributed either to the deepening of the crisis or to its partial resolution? How, finally, can adequate responses to the crisis tendencies of capitalism and the stresses of endless compound growth be articulated in these times? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]