Institutional Economic Geography Research Articles

Benbanꞌs Solar PV Park in Aswan, Egypt: A Study in New Institutional Economic Geography

Benbanꞌs Solar PV Park in Aswan, Egypt: A Study in New Institutional Economic Geography

Participation and Alternative Economic Practice: Discourses, Identities and Imaginaries of Change

In the context of economies referred to as diverse or different, Alternative Economic Practices (AEP) are actions that, alternative to capitalism in varying degrees, aim to fulfil people's basic needs. The Great Recession of 2008 gives a new incentive to their theoretical and empirical analysis as a result of the new meaning given to alternative economic and political spaces, particularly in an area hit hard by the crisis – Southern Europe. This paper examines an aspect hardly represented in academic literature: the profile of the social basis of alterna-tive economic practices and its operational significance. By means of the frameworks provided by institutional economic geography and contributions made by the theo-ry on urban social movements as well as social mobilisation, it explores the characteristics of the social basis of Spanish AEP using that which prior studies highlighted from the profile of the participants in Greek practices as a point of comparison and reference. We suggest that the contextual conditions determine the attributes of the key actors and the strategies to challenge the existing social institutions and structures and mobilise the social forces to support collective projects that contradict the dominant relations. The result is that of nominally identi-cal AEP, belonging to a common alternative repertoire yet composed of social bases with clearly distinct pro-files. This means that both are built upon different values, discourses, motivations and identities, leading to their varied geographical significance and potential to transform.

Regional state innovation in peripheral regions: enabling Lapland’s green policies

ABSTRACT 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.

Developing the Shanghai online games industry: A multi‐scalar institutional perspective

AbstractIn recent decades, while place‐based policies and local development have attracted the interest of institutional economic geography, the issue of features of certain industries and how they are shaping and shaped by institutions at multiple spatial scales, has not been taken up sufficiently. This paper, based on a local creative industry—the Shanghai online games industry, which is an essential part of the new media sector, takes issue with it. It explores two aspects, namely how multi‐scalar institutions relate and influence the development of the online games industry in Shanghai and how local firms and entrepreneurs affect local and national institutions. It shows that the three aspects that are related to media sector in general and games industry in particular (i.e., cultural influence, technological significance, and economic value) matter much as they have resulted in diverse industry‐relevant policies and regulations devised by local and national states. Moreover, local firms and entrepreneurs with different capacities and characteristics also differ much in influencing the design of the industry‐specific institutions in the face of institutional voids.

Framing the Nexus of Globalisation, Logistics and Manufacturing in Europe

Under the ongoing influence of globalisation, supply chains have changed significantly. New logistics and manufacturing systems have emerged, causing longer transport distances and increasing transport emissions. The existing research into the sustainability impacts of freight transport has largely viewed it as being a macro-level economic and political phenomenon and has ignored the interdependencies amongst micro-level economic actors, including firms and businesses in the private sector. In this paper, we presume that the lack of conceptualisation of freight transport in relation to wider institutional contexts and firm behaviour results in the lack of a holistic approach to understanding freight governance in the face of globalisation. We argue for the use of institutional economic geography lenses to elucidate the distribution networks of emerging logistics and manufacturing practices and its implications for freight transport. We illustrate our argument through a broad look at the European logistics and manufacturing practices and global production.

Corporate foundations in the mining industry: the relationship between responsible investment and social investment

This article explores the relationship between responsible investment (RI) initiatives in capital markets and lending institutions, and the performance of social investment as a specific form of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in the mining industry. It focuses on how the nature of institutional investment initiatives encourages certain organizational structures for CSR activities. The argument is developed by exploring an inherent conflict between the business case motivations for CSR as promoted by RI initiatives, and the legitimacy of CSR activities being based on their performance-fulfilling normative CSR values. Corporate foundations in the mining industry provide the empirical context for examination. These organizations distribute the benefits of mining operations through social investment. They are – interestingly – both connected to their sponsoring mining firms and yet self-governed. The organizational form of corporate foundations works as a strategic response to RI initiatives because the form allows social investment practices at a distance from the corporation to maintain its normative legitimacy and thus create the CSR desired by investors. Framed by an institutional economic geography lens, this organizational dynamic indicates that the inherent conflict in RI initiatives produces greater attention to the form of delivery of CSR than to its functions.

The emerging empirics of evolutionary economic geography

Following last decade’s programmatic papers on Evolutionary Economic Geography, we report on recent empirical advances and how this empirical work can be positioned vis-a-vis other strands of research in economic geography. First, we review studies on the path dependent nature of clustering, and how the evolutionary perspective relates to that of New Economic Geography. Second, we discuss research on agglomeration externalities in Regional Science, and how Evolutionary Economic Geography contributed to this literature with the concepts of cognitive proximity and related variety. Third, we go into the role of institutions in Evolutionary Economic Geography, and we relate this to the way Institutional Economic Geography tends to view institutions. From this discussion, a number of new research challenges are derived.

Rules of the Game: The Place of Institutions in Regional Economic Change

Gertler M. S. Rules of the game: the place of institutions in regional economic change, Regional Studies. Institutions exert a pervasive influence on the evolution and character of regional economies. Yet, this role is poorly understood within recent debates on neoliberalism, varieties of capitalism, and other approaches to the study of economic change. A reconstituted institutional economic geography must accommodate individual agency, institutional evolution, interscalar relations, and comparative methodologies. Examining recent work on universities in local economies, as well as on creativity-based strategies and social inclusion/polarization, it is shown how locally distinctive institutional architectures shape evolutionary trajectories, leading to differentiated social and economic outcomes. The paper then enunciates some important principles of methodology and theory-building in institutional analysis. Gertler M. S. Les règles du jeu: le rôle des institutions dans le développement économique, Regional Studies. Les institutions ont une influence omniprésente sur le développement et les caractéristiques des économies régionales. Néanmoins, ce rôle s'avère mal-entendu dans les débats récents sur le néo-libéralisme, les tendances capitalistes, et d'autres façons d'étudier le développement économique. Une géographie économique institutionnelle repensée doit comporter des méthodologies spécifiques aux agences individuelles, à l'évolution institutionnelle, aux relations interscalaires, ainsi que des methodologies comparatives. A partir des recherches récentes sur les universités situées dans des économies locales, aussi bien que sur des stratégies basées sur l'innovation et sur l'inclusion/la polarisation sociale, on montre comment l'architecture institutionnelle, qui se distingue sur le plan local, influe sur les trajectoires futures, ce qui entraîne des résultats sociaux et économiques distincts. L'article expose d'importants principes quant à la construction de méthodologies et de théories dans le domaine de l'analyse institutionnelle. Institutions Capitalismes comparatifs Développement futur Universités et économies locales Economies innovatrices Méthodologies institutionnalistes Gertler M. S. Die Spielregeln: der Platz der Institutionen in der regionalen wirtschaftlichen Veränderung, Regional Studies. Institutionen üben einen umfassenden Einfluss auf die Evolution und das Wesen von Regionalwirtschaften aus. In den aktuellen Debatten über Neoliberalismus, Spielarten des Kapitalismus und weitere Ansätze zum Studium wirtschaftlicher Veränderungen wird diese Rolle jedoch nicht ausreichend verstanden. In einer rekonstitutierten institutionellen Wirtschaftsgeografie müssen die individuellen Handlungen ebenso berücksichtigt werden wie die institutionelle Evolution, die interskalaren Beziehungen und die Vergleichsmethodologien. Bei einer Untersuchung der aktuellen Arbeiten von Universitäten in Lokalwirtschaften sowie der kreativitätsbasierten Strategien und der sozialen Eingliederung bzw. Polarisierung zeigt sich, wie lokal unterschiedliche institutionelle Architekturen evolutionäre Bahnen prägen, was zu unterschiedlichen sozialen und wirtschaftlichen Ergebnissen führt. Anschließend werden in dem Beitrag einige wichtige Prinzipien der Methodologie und der Theoriebildung in der institutionellen Analyse formuliert. Institutionen Kapitalismusvergleich Evolutionäre Veränderung Universitäten und Lokalwirtschaften Kreative Wirtschaften Institutionalistische Methodologien Gertler M. S. Las reglas del juego: el lugar de las instituciones en el cambio económico regional, Regional Studies. Las instituciones ejercen una influencia dominante en la evolución y el carácter de las economías regionales. Sin embargo, esta función apenas se entiende en los recientes debates sobre neoliberalismo, variedades del capitalismo y otros enfoques para el estudio del cambio económico. Una geografía económica institucional reconstituida debe acomodar a la acción individual, la evolución institucional, las relaciones interescalares y las metodologías comparativas. Al examinar el trabajo reciente sobre las universidades en economías locales, así como las estrategias basadas en la creatividad y la inclusión/polarización social, observamos que las arquitecturas institucionales distintivas a nivel local forman las trayectorias evolucionarias lo que conduce a unos resultados sociales y económicos diferenciados. En este artículo formulamos algunos principios importantes de metodología y construcción teórica en el análisis institucional. Instituciones Capitalismos comparativos Cambio evolucionario Universidades y economías locales Economías creativas Metodologías institucionalistas

Some Notes on Institutions in Evolutionary Economic Geography

Within the evolutionary economic geography framework, the role of institutions deserves more explicit attention. We argue that territorial institutions are to be viewed as orthogonal to organizational routines since each territory is characterized by a variety of routines and a single firm can apply its routines in different territorial contexts. It is therefore meaningful to distinguish between institutional economic geography and evolutionary economic geography as their explanans is different. Yet the two approaches can be combined in a dynamic framework in which institutions coevolve with organizational routines, particularly in emerging industries. Furthermore, integrating the evolutionary and institutional approach allows one to analyze the spatial diffusion of organizational routines that mediate conflicts among social groups, in particular, those between employers and employees. An evolutionary economic geography advocates an empirical research program, both qualitative and quantitative, that can address the relative importance of organizational routines and territorial institutions for regional development.