Research on the Innovation Imbalance Between Coastal and Inland Port Cities Along the Belt and Road: Based on the Three Helix Theory

Zhen Chen

doi:10.1177/2158244021994589

Abstract

Port cities will be the important growth poles along the Belt and Road, including coastal and inland ports. But the innovation stimulus driven by the Belt and Road Initiative on the coastal and inland port cities is imbalance. This research takes two groups of Chinese port cities as empirical objects, one has coastal port and the other has inland port, and then establishes a system dynamics model based on the theory of triple helix to analyze port cities’ innovation features. The empirical case shows that the positive stimulation of Belt and Road Initiative to innovation activities of coastal port cities is better than that of inland cities in general. If the decision makers of inland cities want to achieve innovation output like that of developed coastal areas, they need to encourage local universities and research institutes to conduct more market-oriented research on one hand. On the other hand, they need to cooperate with multinational companies; meanwhile, they need to provide more technical resources for local start-ups. In addition, stimulating local house prices and living pressure in a reasonable range can stimulate the innovation enthusiasm of existing R&D personnel, attract top talents to join in, and then drive the innovation output of the whole region.

Highlights

Since 2013, the Chinese government has proposed to establish Silk Road Economic Belt in the inland region of Eurasia and 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road in the coastal region
Perroux (1950) proposed that a series of “growth poles” had emerged, which were clusters of economic factors based on trade that could drive the development of regions around them
This study focuses on different types of port cities in China, which are located along the Belt and Road, and compares the trend of development indicators of these cities to determine whether Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) can achieve sustainable economic growth of these port cities through innovation

Summary

Introduction

Since 2013, the Chinese government has proposed to establish Silk Road Economic Belt in the inland region of Eurasia and 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road in the coastal region. Considering China’s strong transport transformation capability, including the expansion of China’s coastal port facilities in the 1990s and early 21st century and the construction of high-speed rail network at the end of the 21st century, it is expected that at least part of BRI will occur. Such major government initiatives are nothing new, take the example as the United States’ Interstate Highway System (IHS) beginning in the 1950s, which was trying to change the domestic transportation and regional system, so as to promote the regional economic development of the surrounding areas (Ng et al, 2018). They have a broader coverage area, and the characteristics of their economic factors are more diverse (Liu, 2015)

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Discussion

Conclusion