Was Dependency Theory Just an Underspecified Location Theory of Economic Activity?

Although neoclassical economists and others long ago dismissed Dependency Theory as both empirically incorrect and underspecified, the recent revival of and progress in location theories of economics suggests that many of the core assertions of Dependency Theory are highly plausible. Early location theorists like Schmoller, Christaller, and von Thunen all argued that the market naturally produced an uneven distribution of economic activity and lower incomes in regions at a distance from the center of economic activity (typically seen as an industrial area). Recent work by Krugman and others has confirmed these points. This paper thus asks and answers, positively, that Dependency Theory was just an unspecified version of economic theories of location. It notes that both dependency theorists and especially Wallerstein (World Systems Theory) drew indirectly on location theories, particularly as refracted through Fernand Braudel. It then shows that Dependency Theory was guilty of an unsystematic effort to link a given spatial distribution of economic activity to production regimes, political outcomes and policy prescriptions. Thus while Dependency Theory was guilty of some of the sins ascribed to it, it should not be regarded as a dead end but rather a first essay at linking location theories to more general political outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]