Advanced methods and applications in regional science

Abstract

The spatial distribution of economic activity is a central and general issue in regional economic theory and policy. Accordingly, methods andmodels play (and have played) an important role in understanding economic activity’s spatial distribution. Agglomeration of firms in the same industrial sector gives rise to technological externalities by pointing to localisation economies. Externalities are also found, from knowledge spillovers within industries, and furthermore in agglomerations of firms belonging to different industries as a result from a variety of business services and knowledge spillovers across industries. How to understand and to analyse these economic processes depends upon the accessibility of appropriate quantitative methods. All these germane topics called the attention of researchers that attended to theThird Jean Paelinck Seminar held in Cartagena (Spain) in 2008. In this meeting advanced methods and models with applications in regional science were presented. The papers of this special issue, entitledAdvanced Methods and Applications in Regional Science, have its origin on this biannual international meeting. The special issue therefore focuses on methods and applications with a direct and clear relevance in regional science’s frontier of knowledge. For that reason, the reader can find two types of papers. First type are openly related with advanced methods that help in analysing some interesting regional topics as industry concentration in large