This book examines regional responses to marginality by highlighting social innovation, local capacity and new path formations in what are often seen as economically weak regions where policy and institutional considerations play a key role. Divided into three parts, it covers a wide range of topics related to geographical marginality from various angles, on both regional and local scales. The first part focuses on the role of social innovation and illustrates the themes of social innovation and new localism, local revitalization and social entrepreneurship. The second part then addresses the issues of economic responses, valorization, resource use and local action in response to marginalization. Lastly, the third part explores various policies and measures taken to respond to marginality and intensify regional development in marginal areas.

This book investigates the less-explored dimensions of how industries in different Indian subnational spaces or states have responded to the growing phenomenon of internationalization. What factors have influenced firms participating in global business? Have state (both central and provincial) policies acted as catalyst for local firms? Not only does this study delve into these issues; it also painstakingly develops a comprehensive database that remains unique in the absence of reliable official statistics on this subject to date. Efforts have been made to establish a reasonably consistent dataset for the period 1990-2008 derived from the CMIE-PROWESS database. Care has been taken to condense the data and classify it by sector, location, size and ownership. The study delineates export patterns by firm and state and explores factors influencing export decisions according to sector, size and location. A further interesting aspect is the book's critical examination of industrial and trade promotion policies at the state/regional level that might have contributed to or hindered exporting by firms. The states considered for detailed policy discussions are highly diverse and include Gujarat, Odisha and Karnataka. To address the glaring absence of literature on the role of subnational factors in enterprises' export performance, a preliminary state-by-state analysis of the spatial determinants of firms' export activities is also provided.

The book presents the lectures delivered during a short course held at Urbino University in summer 2015 on qualitative theory of dynamical systems, included in the activities of the COST Action IS1104 "The EU in the new economic complex geography: models, tools and policy evaluation". It provides a basic introduction to dynamical systems and optimal control both in continuous and discrete time, as well as some numerical methods and applications in economic modelling. Economic and social systems are intrinsically dynamic, characterized by interdependence, nonlinearity and complexity, and these features can only be approached using a qualitative analysis based on the study of invariant sets (equilibrium points, limit cycles and more complex attractors, together with the boundaries of their basins of attraction), which requires a trade-off between analytical, geometrical and numerical methods. Even though the early steps of the qualitative theory of dynamical systems have been in continuous time models, in economic and social modelling discrete time is often used to describe event-driven (often decision-driven) evolving systems. The book is written for Ph.D. and master's students, post-doctoral fellows, and researchers in economics or sociology, and it only assumes a basic knowledge of calculus. However it also suggests some more advanced topics.

This book discusses the latest theoretical advances in regional innovation research, presents empirical cases involving the development of regional innovation systems (RISs), and explores regional innovation policy approaches. Grounded in the extensive literature on RISs, it addresses state-of-the-art developments in light of recent theoretical advances in economic geography and related disciplines. Written in honor of Bjorn Asheim's seventieth birthday, the book includes novel and carefully selected chapters prepared by collaborators, colleagues and former PhD-students of one of the founding fathers of RIS research. Further, it makes a significant contribution to the academic debate on regional innovation and growth and offers valuable insights for scholars and policymakers alike.

Governments in some democracies target economic policies, like industrial subsidies, to small groups at the expense of many. Why do some governments redistribute more narrowly than others? Their willingness to selectively target economic benefits, like subsidies to businesses, depends on the way politicians are elected and the geographic distribution of economic activities. Based on interviews with government ministers and bureaucrats, as well as parliamentary records, industry publications, local media coverage, and new quantitative data, Spending to Win: Political Institutions, Economic Geography, and Government Subsidies demonstrates that government policy-making can be explained by the combination of electoral institutions and economic geography. Specifically, it shows how institutions interact with economic geography to influence countries' economic policies and international economic relations. Identical institutions have wide-ranging effects depending on the context in which they operate. No single institution is a panacea for issues, such as income inequality, international economic conflict, or minority representation.

This is the first study to draw on international research carried out across four EU member states to add to the neglected area of the creative economy of peripheral regions. Economies are dynamic entities and subject to constant flux. Driven by changing tastes, new ways to make and disruptive innovations, new routes of economic development present themselves at ever increasing rates. This study is concerned with the rise of the creative economy. UNCTAD has marked the emergence of the creative economy across the globe and noted its resilience in the face of recent economic turmoil. Here, the authors intend to bring the level of analysis down to the regional and firm level by uncovering the extent of the creative economy in some of Europe's most peripheral regions. This is the first study to draw on international research carried out across four EU member states to add to the neglected area of the creative economy of peripheral regions. The work contributes to expanding theory in the areas of economic geography, business studies and regional development.

Taking eleven countries in Europe, Canada, South Africa, America, Latin America and Australia, this book discusses recurring barriers to cluster development in the renewable energy sector. The authors look at the real-world dynamics and tensions between stakeholders on the ground, with a particular focus on the relationships between SMEs and other actors. This trans-regional study is unique in its scale and scope, drawing on a decade of field research to show how by learning from the successes and failures of other clusters, costs and risk can be reduced. The book fills a significant gap in the literature for policymakers, managers and economic developers in a key market.

This book highlights the difficult policy choice that must ultimately be made during China's structural reform according to the theory of the Impossible Trinity, between exchange rate and monetary policy autonomy.

Cooperation and clusters have become the guiding paradigms for explaining and promoting regional competitiveness, but the cooperation process between firms and universities and the transfer of knowledge in guiding and nurturing regional competitiveness has received relatively little attention. This book strives to fill this gap in highlighting the connection between inter-firm cooperation in regional clusters, innovation and regional networks, and the role of universities in them . It goes beyond the traditional economic approach of clusters and includes 'soft factors' in the explanation of regional competitiveness, and connects the literature on clusters to the literature of learning and knowledge creation as sources of regional competitiveness. It aims to foster an international and interdisciplinary exchange of perspectives by presenting current developments, case studies, best practices as well as new integrated theoretical approaches and applications.

Fewer than 100 people own and control more wealth than 50 per cent of the world's population. The Handbook on Wealth and the Super-Rich is a landmark multidisciplinary evaluation of both the lives and lifestyles of the super-rich, as well as the processes that underpin super-wealth generation and its unequal distribution. Drawing on international case studies, leading experts from across the social sciences offer 22 accessible and coherently organized chapters, which critically analyse a range of topics including: the legitimacy of extreme wealth from a moral economic perspective biographies of illicit super-wealth London's housing markets how the very wealthy fly the environmental consequences of super-rich lives crafting immigration policies to attract the rich. Students and scholars studying a host of topics such as development studies, economics, geography, history, political science and sociology will find this book eminently engaging. It will also be of great interest to public commentators, charitable organizations and NGOs concerned with wealth and income distributions. Contributors: R. Atkinson, J.V. Beaverstock, L. Budd, R. Burrows, L. Crewe, A. Davison, A.D. Dixon, R. Forrest, D.R. Green, S. Hall, T. Hall, I. Hay, I. Kapoor, S.Y. Koh, G. Mangraviti, A. Martin, I.A. Osuoka, A. Owens, R. Palan, C. Paris, D. Rhodes, A. Sayer, P.G. Schervish, S. Schulz, J.R. Short, E. Spence, A. Watson, B. Wissink, M. Woods, A. Zalik

This book examines the evolution and major elements of China's Belt-and-Road Initiative (BRI), a trillion-dollar project for the revival and refinement of ancient terrestrial and maritime trade routes. The author analyses the foreign policy and economic strategy behind the initiative as well as the geoeconomic and geopolitical impact on the region. Furthermore, he assesses whether the BRI has to be considered as a challenge to the US-led order, leading to a Sinocentric order in the 21st century. Offering two case studies on the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road (MSR), the book reveals the drivers motivating China and its partners in executing BRI projects, such as security of commodity-shipments, energy supplies, and explores trade volumes as well as the anxiety these trigger among critics. The book juxtaposes these to non-Chinese, specifically multilateral institutional and Western corporate, inputs into Beijing's developmental planning-processes. It also identifies the role of combined Chinese-foreign stimuli in generating the policy priorities precipitating the BRI vision, and the geoeconomic essence of BRI's implementation.

What happens when previously autonomous firms from different countries, each with their own identities, routines and capabilities, come together inside a single multinational corporation? Can a cooperative strategy be established that advances the development of the multinational as a whole, or do mutual misunderstandings and the unintended consequences of strategic interaction among the players' lead instead to endemic conflict and disintegration?
This book tackles these novel and important questions through an empirical study of the strategic constitution of an 'actually existing' multinational. It does so by tracing the historical construction of the multinational corporation from the confluence of multiple formerly independent firms and analyzing the interacting web of strategies pursued by different actors within it. The analysis reveals how workers, unionists, subsidiary managers, and corporate executives pursue separate strategic games rooted in their local contexts, whose global outcome contrasts sharply with idealized views of the multinational as an integrated and coordinated organization.
By comparing these findings to those of the broader literature, the book proceeds to a theoretical examination of the challenges of managing the multinational, and the difficulties of resolving them through conventional organizational means. The authors propose new procedural solutions aimed at fostering mutual recognition and knowledge exchange within the multinational corporation, and explore how a multinational public may be created to press for the necessary reforms in corporate governance. As the success of such reforms is far from preordained, the book concludes with a seriesof alternative scenarios that illustrate the many obstacles to a smooth continuation of the globalization process.
This is an important and original study of significance for researchers, academics, and advanced students of international business, business strategy, comparative management and organizational studies.

This book explores different approaches to defining the concept of region depending on the specific question that needs to be answered. While the typical administrative spatial data division fits certain research questions well, in many cases, defining regions in a different way is fundamental in order to obtain significant empirical evidence. The book is divided into three parts: The first part is dedicated to a methodological discussion of the concept of region and the different potential approaches from different perspectives. The problem of having sufficient information to define different regional units is always present. This justifies the second part of the book, which focuses on the techniques of ecological inference applied to estimating disaggregated data from observable aggregates. Finally, the book closes by presenting several applications that are in line with the functional areas definition in regional analysis.

The book aims to present "traditional features" of regional science (as geographical concepts and institutions), as well as relatively new topics such as innovation and agglomeration economies. In particular it demonstrates that, contrary to what has been argued by recent economics literature, both geography and institutions (or culture) are relevant for local development. In fact, these phenomena, along with the movement of goods and workers, are among the main reasons for persisting development differentials. These intriguing relationships are at the heart of the analysis presented in this book and form the conceptual basis for a promising institutional approach to economic geography.

In an increasingly globalised world, place and provenance matter like never before. The law relating to Geographical Indications (GIs) regulates designations which signal this provenance. While Champagne, Prosciutto di Parma, Cafe de Colombia and Darjeeling are familiar designations, the relevant legal regimes have existed at the margins for over a century. In recent years, a critical mass of scholarship has emerged and this book celebrates its coming of age. Its objective is to facilitate an interdisciplinary conversation, by providing sure-footed guidance across contested terrain as well as enabling future avenues of enquiry to emerge.The distinctive feature of this volume is that it reflects a multi-disciplinary conversation between legal scholars, policy makers, legal practitioners, historians, geographers, sociologists, economists and anthropologists. Experienced contributors from across these domains have thematically explored: (1) the history and conceptual underpinnings of the GI as a legal category; (2) the effectiveness of international protection regimes; (3) the practical operation of domestic protection systems; and (4) long-unresolved as well as emerging critical issues. Specific topics include a detailed interrogation of the history and functions of terroir; the present state as well as future potential of international GI protection, including the Lisbon Agreement, 2015; conflicts between trade marks and GIs; the potential for GIs to contribute to rural or territorial development as well as sustain traditional or Indigenous knowledge; and the vexed question of generic use. This book is therefore intended for all those with an interest in GIs across a range of disciplinary backgrounds. Students, scholars, policy makers and practitioners will find this Handbook to be an invaluable resource. Contributors include: E. Barham, D. Barjolle, L. Berard, D.S. Gangjee, D. Gervais, M. Geuze, B. Goebel, M. Groeschl, M. Handler, C. Heath, D. Marie-Vivien, J.M.C. Martin, P. Mukhopadhyay, D. Rangnekar, B. Sherman, A. Stanziani, S. Stern, A. Taubman, L. Wiseman, H. Zheng

Inequality is becoming an urgent issue of world politics at the end of the twentieth century. Globalization is not only exacerbating the gap between rich and poor in the world but is also further dividing those states and peoples that have political power and influence from those without. While the powerful shape more `global' rules and norms about investment, military security, environmental and social policy and the like, the less powerful are becoming `rule-takers', often of rules or norms they cannot or will not enforce. The consequences for world politics are profound. The evidence presented in Inequality, Globalization, and World Politics suggests that globalization is creating sharper, more urgent problems for states and international institutions to deal with. Yet at the same time, investigations into eight core areas of world politics suggest that growing inequality is reducing the capacity of governments and existing international organizations to manage these problems effectively. The eight areas surveyed include: international order, international law, welfare and social policy, global justice, regionalism and multilateralism, environmental protection, gender equality, military power, and security.

This book introduces the reader to local development economics and policy, with a special focus on the place-based paradigm that covers its justification, its difficulties and the types of public intervention that it suggests. The starting point for the analysis is that economic development in lagging places is not to be expected as the result of a mechanism of automatic convergence between backward and advanced regions and that, therefore, the most appropriate development policy is not to maximize competition among all agents in all sectors and places. The failure of the Washington Consensus is examined, and the two competing positions to have emerged from this failure - spatially blind interventions and place-based policies - are contrasted. The main shortcoming of spatially blind policies, namely that immobile resources that could trigger or support a development process often remain untapped or "trapped", is emphasized. The limitations of the "big push" state intervention and wage flexibility solutions to this trap are analyzed and the merits of place-based policies that support intervention and can deal with uncertainty, risk and conflict are discussed.

This book introduces a radically spatialised approach to knowledge creation and innovation. Reflecting on an array of European urban and regional developments, it offers an updated notion of milieu as the conceptual and material space of knowledge and innovation in line with the interpretative turn in social sciences and humanities. In view of the unwillingness of mainstream economics to accommodate such a trend, the authors pursue a broadly understood hermeneutic approach that expands on the triad of knowledge-space-innovation. The book's main findings are that space is an essential intermediary in the connection between knowledge and innovation, and that a renewed notion of milieu provides the knowledge-space-innovation triad with both an analytical basis and operational power. It also offers fresh insights into the significance and potential of the knowledge economy. A number of empirical European case studies on various scales (organisations, cities and territories) support the findings and suggest new policy directions.

This volume enables readers to understand the complexity associated with climate change policy and the science behind it. For example, the author describes the criticism and defense of the widely known hockey stick temperature graph derived from combining instrumental data and proxy temperature indications using tree ring, ice core and other paleoclimatic data.

Readers will also learn that global warming cannot easily be avoided by reducing CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions in rich countries. Not only is emissions reduction extremely difficult in rich countries, but demands such as the UN mandate to improve the lives of the poorest global citizens cannot be satisfied without significantly increasing global energy use, and CO2 emissions. Therefore, the author asserts that climate engineering and adaptation are preferable to mitigation, particularly since the science is less than adequate for making firm statements about the Earth s future climate.Readers will also learn that global warming cannot easily be avoided by reducing CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions in rich countries. Not only is emissions reduction extremely difficult in rich countries, but demands such as the UN mandate to improve the lives of the poorest global citizens cannot be satisfied without significantly increasing global energy use, and CO2 emissions. Therefore, the author asserts that climate engineering and adaptation are preferable to mitigation, particularly since the science is less than adequate for making firm statements about the Earth s future climate."

Through the 1990s and early 2000s the strength of the United States economy has been linked to its ability to foster large numbers of small innovative technology companies, a few of which have grown to dominate new industries, such as Microsoft, Genentech, or Google. US technology clusters such as Silicon Valley have become tremendous engines of innovation and wealth creation, and the envy of governments around the world. Creating Silicon Valley in Europe examines trajectories by which new technology industries emerge and become sustainable across different types of economies. Governments around the world have poured vast sums of money into policies designed to foster clusters of similar start-up firms in their economies. This book employs careful empirical studies of the biotechnology and software industries in the United States and several European economies, to examine the relative success of policies aimed at cultivating the 'Silicon Valley model' of organizing and financing companies in Europe. Influential research associated with the 'varieties of capitalism' literature has argued that countries with liberal market orientations, such as the United States and the United Kingdom, can more easily design policies to cultivate success in new technology industries compared to countries associated with organized economies, such as Germany and Sweden. The book's empirical findings support the view that national institutional factors strongly condition the success of new technology policies. However, the study also identifies important cases in which radically innovative new technology firms have thrived within organized economies. Through examining case of both success and failure Creating Silicon Valley in Europe helps identify constellations of market and governmental activities that can lead to the emergence of sustainable clusters of new technology firms across both organized and liberal market economies.

Governments have conferred ownership titles to many citizens throughout the world in an effort to turn things into property. Almost all elements of nature have become the target of property laws, from the classic preoccupation with land to more ephemeral material, such as air and genetic resources. When Things Become Property interrogates the mixed outcomes of conferring ownership by examining postsocialist land and forest reforms in Albania, Romania and Vietnam, and finds that property reforms are no longer, if they ever were, miracle tools available to governments for refashioning economies, politics or environments.

The Russian Federation has a history of more than twenty years of transformation to a market economy, but as well to a knowledge society, to look back on. This study takes a look at the knowledge generation, knowledge transmission and knowledge use inside the Federation since the early 1990s. Furthermore, in light of the high dependence of the Russian economy on the oil and gas sectors this study analyzes the impact knowledge related factors have on regional income generation following thereby in the direction of Schumpeterian growth theory. The study combines descriptive with empirical analyses to paint a picture as detailed as possible of the Russian knowledge society and its innovative potential.

For those in developed nations, suddenly being without electricity is a disaster: power cuts have us fretting over the food stored in the freezer, and even a few hours without lights, televisions, or air conditioning is an ordeal. However, for an estimated 1.6 billion people worldwide, the absence of electricity is their daily experience. An untold number of others live with electricity that is erratic and of poor quality. How can electric power be brought into their lives when the centralized utility models that have evolved in developed nations are not an economically viable option? Poor, rural communities in developing nations cannot simply be plugged in to a grid.

Small-scale Distributed Generation (DG), ranging from individual solar home systems to village level grids run off diesel generators, could provide the answer, and this book compares around 20 DG enterprises and projects in Brazil, Cambodia and China, each of which is considered to be a "business model" for distributed rural electrification. While large, centralized power projects often rely on big subsidies, this study shows that privately run and localized solutions can be both self-sustaining and replicable. Its three sections provide a general introduction to the issue of electrification and rural development, set out the details of the case studies and compare the models involved, and discuss the important thematic issues of equity, access to capital and cost-recovery.

Hisham Zerriffi shows that in each case, it is not simply a matter of matching a particular technology to a particular need. Numerous institutional factors come into play including the regulatory regime, access to financial services, and government/utility support or opposition to the DG alternative. Despite this, in many countries, the question is not whether DG has a role to play. Rather it is a question of how it will play a role.

Islands face one of the most pressing issues of our time: how to balance ecological integrity with economic development and collective quality of life, including the need for social and conservation space. Islands are sites of rich and varied human and ecological diversity, but they are also often characterized by narrow resource bases and dependency on links to the outside world, and by their limited ability to determine the actual character of those links. This volume reviews the challenges of island development and conservation in the Asia-Pacific region. With emphasis on nature reserves and UNESCO World Heritage sites, chapters describe the benefits, barriers, and potential pitfalls in preserving such sites, managing biota, and attracting and controlling tourism. The book also provides a provocative challenge to move beyond the typical concerns of "sustainability" to the more holistic concept of "futurability," or "future potential" for convivial human-environmental interactions.

This contributed volume is the first book in English to offer a current and critical vision of regional problems and policies in the countries of Latin America. The book is in three main parts: a general overview of regional processes and trends in Latin America as a whole; country-level coverage of seven individual countries; and comparative analyses of common major problems such as migration, education, labor, poverty, decentralization, exports and foreign direct investments. Written by renowned academics and experts from the region, the book seeks to provide a better understanding of regional challenges and trends, regional disparities that exist in many Latin American countries and the increasing importance of metropolitan areas.