Technological Change And Mature Industrial Regions

‘. . . the timing of this book is fortuitous as mature regions around the world struggle through the Great Recession of 2008–2009. Many of the chapters inform the reader about how regions with important manufacturing industries have responded to longer term forces of change from globalization to technological advances. Political constraints and limitations of regional development policy across a diverse set of mature industrial regions are revealed. Policy wonks, development bureaucrats, and academics will each find chapters that help them think about new directions for public development initiatives.’
– Mark Henry, Review of Regional Studies

‘Until recently, regional scientists put their main focus on successful regions but paid scant attention to mature industrial regions. A key achievement of this volume is that it goes beyond the usual description of mature regions as being hopeless cases. Instead, Farshchi et al. have brought together a number of superb contributions by world leading scholars that provide evidence-based insights on the complexity of structural adjustment in mature regions. This volume will also be of great value to policy makers who aim to change the economic fortunes of mature regions. There is no doubt this volume provides a timely and invaluable contribution to the literature on regional development and regional policy.’
– Ron Boschma, Utrecht University, the Netherlands

‘This book provides a comprehensive analysis of one of the major problems of our rapidly changing world: how is it that some cities and regions move from prosperity to economic decline and why is that some regions restructure quicker than others? The various chapters in this book show that this is often associated with the rise and fall of certain key industries. Yet, regional decline is not the end of the story. Even when these industries are mature or declining, the competences acquired in a specific territory offer the opportunity to start new adventures and to generate new jobs, income and well-being. This book provides an excellent tool-kit for analysts and policy-makers as to how such restructuring operates.’
– Daniele Archibugi, Italian National Research Council

Technological Change and Mature Industrial Regions explicitly adopts an inter-disciplinary approach to analysing the structural transformation of mature regions. The major focus of the book is from an economics perspective, but it also employs sociological analyses, business history approaches and technological analyses. It critically considers the identification and development of regional capabilities and regional policy initiatives for mature industrial areas in the context of globalisation and technological change. Specific cases from a range of different countries help to distinguish which aspects of mature regions’ technology, knowledge or structure are region-specific, and which are more generally applicable to mature industrial regions throughout the world. The book will prove to be invaluable for academic researchers as well as government and policy communities.

Contents:

PART I: MATURE REGIONS: TECHNOLOGY, SOCIETY AND INDUSTRIAL STRUCTURE
1. The Problems of Mature Regions: An Introduction and Overview
Mahtab Akhavan Farshchi, Odile E.M. Janne and Philip McCann

2. Regional Capabilities and Industrial Regeneration
Nick von Tunzelmann

3. Multinational Firms and Technological Innovation: The ‘Global Versus Local’ Challenge
Simona Iammarino, Odile E.M. Janne and Philip McCann

4. Interdependence Among the Brazilian States: An Input–Output Approach
Fernando Salgueiro Perobelli, Eduardo Amaral Haddad and Edson Paulo Domingues

5. The Changing Structure of Trade and Interdependence in a Mature Economy: The US Midwest
Geoffrey J.D. Hewings and John B. Parr

6. Mature Industries and Declining Regions: An Analysis of the Spanish Case
Josep-Maria Arauzo-Carod and Elisabet Viladecans-Marsal

PART II: MATURE REGION–INDUSTRY CASE STUDIES
7. Birmingham’s Marshallian Knowledge: A Constraining Geo-Historical Context for Domestic Saloon Manufacturers?
Peter Clark

8. Life After Longbridge? Crisis and Restructuring in the West Midlands Auto Cluster
David Bailey and Seiji Kobayashi

9. Massachusetts Medical Devices: Leveraging the Region’s Capabilities
Michael H. Best

10. Economic Restructuring, Regional ‘Visioning’ and the Role of Universities: The Outcomes of an Automobile Plant Closure in Southern Adelaide, Australia
Andrew Beer and Holli Thomas

11. Maturity or Decline of Italian Industrial Districts
Ivana Paniccia

12. Knowledge Spillovers and Industrial Transformation: The West Midlands and Saxony Automotive Clusters
Odile E.M. Janne and Mahtab Akhavan Farshchi

PART III: REGIONAL POLICY AND MATURE INDUSTRIAL REGIONS
13. A Cost–Benefit Approach to the Assessment of Regional Policy
J. Kim Swales

14. Regional Policies in Italy, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom: A Shift in Paradigm?
Ilaria Mariotti

15. Innovation Policy After the ‘Celtic Tiger’
Declan Jordan and Eoin O’Leary

16. Grants and the Location of Foreign Direct Investment: Evidence from the UK Regions
Colin Wren and Jonathan Jones

17. Cluster Policy Implementation and Evaluation in Slovenia: Lessons from a Transition Economy
Anja Cotic Svetina, Marko Jaklic and Hugo Zagorsek

18. Lagging Regions and Policy Options: The Case of Greece in the European Context
Yannis Psycharis and George Petrakos

Index