Localised knowledge spillovers vs. innovative milieux: Knowledge “tacitness” reconsidered

Abstract. This article provides a critical discussion of the recent econometric literature on "localised knowledge spillovers" and the related notion of tacit knowledge. The basic claim of the article is that the increasing, and more or less automatic reliance of industrial geographers upon such econometric evidence and theoretical concepts to support their work on industrial districts, hi-tech agglomerations and, more broadly, local innovation systems is not well placed and risks to generate conceptual confusion and to distort research agendas. Following some recent advances in the economics of knowledge, the article also suggests that more research efforts should instead be devoted to exploring how knowledge is actually transmitted, among whom, at what distance, and on the basis of which codebooks.     

新型巨介电压敏陶瓷材料钛酸铜钙研究进展

介绍了一种新型类钙钛矿型巨介电非线性压敏陶瓷材料——CaCu3Ti4O12,概述了其在晶体结构、相结构、微观形貌、多条件下介电特性和电流-电压特性等方面的研究进展。比较了CaCu3Ti4O12陶瓷的各种巨介电性理论和模型,阐述了压敏特性的起源。指出CaCu3Ti4O12的巨介电特性还有隐含的物理意义没有被发现,其极化机制、拉曼谱上出现的特征能隙和特征频率的物理意义等都是有待解决的基本问题。应通过不同的制备工艺、产生不同缺陷和孪晶以及尺寸、应力研究介电特性与温度间的关系,为合理解决CaCu3Ti4O12的反常行为提供一些实验数据。同时CaCu3Ti4O12的压敏特性的研究还不充分,掺杂、复合及热处理工艺等对其影响的系统性研究工作还需要进一步的深入。纳米化可能会导致其某项特性的进一步提升,而薄膜化尽早与微电子的需要结合会产生更广的应用空间。     

Agglomeration and spillovers in a simultaneous framework

Previous studies have emphasized reduced transaction costs, knowledge spillovers, diverse intermediate goods suppliers, and deep labor pools as possible drivers of firm agglomeration. Among these candidates, knowledge spillovers lie at the heart of discussions in the literature. If knowledge spillovers are so important, it follows that firms tend to locate in proximity to capitalize on the knowledge stock in neighboring firms. Therefore, agglomeration and spillovers reinforce each other. However, most existing empirical studies ignore the potential endogenous relationship between the two. Moreover, few studies have even attempted to measure knowledge spillovers. In this paper, I address both issues by developing and estimating a simultaneous equation model of agglomeration and knowledge spillovers. The results suggest that traditional single equation models do indeed suffer endogeneity and that the accuracy of the estimation can be substantially improved by employing a simultaneous system.Received: June 2003/Accepted: March 2004The author gratefully acknowledges valuable comments and constant encouragement from Edward Feser.     

The general urban model: Retrospect and prospect

The general urban model is viewed in brief retrospectively, mainly emphasizing the transition for the monocentric 'classical' elements of such a model to the multicentric. The emphasis of the paper, however, is on future prospects. It is argued that it could be developed as the basis of a model-based 'big picture' of urban development through five layers of disaggregation – from the global to the local. There are many opportunities for submodel development but the main future challenge is the modelling of urban and regional evolution. Progress in modelling urban and regional systems as complex nonlinear systems with particular reference to path dependence and phase transitions is reviewed. The idea of urban and regional 'DNA' is introduced which leads to a 'genetic medicine' view of aspects of planning.     

An equation by any other name is still the same: on spatial econometrics and spatial statistics

Statistics is a branch of mathematics concerned with the collection, quantification, analysis, interpretation, and presentation of real-world data, and the use of probability theory to estimate population parameters with these data. Spatial statistics is a subset of statistics that is concerned with handling the special problems associated with geographically distributed data, which include spatial point patterns, regional and lattice measurement aggregations, irregularly spaced site-specific measurements on a surface, and image analysis. Meanwhile, econometrics is concerned with the application of statistical methods to the study of economic data and problems. When coining the term spatial econometrics in 1979, Paelinck and Klaassen characterized it as a subset of econometrics that is concerned with the role of spatial dependence in regional economic model response and explanatory variables, asymmetries in spatial relationships, the specification of geographic structure governing spatial interactions, and the explicit modeling of space. We outline and discuss principal similarities (e.g., testing for the presence of spatial autocorrelation) and differences (e.g., map generalization) between spatial statistics and spatial econometrics. In doing so, our goal is to help clarify past, present, and future relationships between these two subfields.     

Knowledge spillovers, location of industry, and endogenous growth

A Grossman–Helpman–Romer-type (Grossman and Helpman in Innovation and growth in the world economy, 1991; Romer in J Polit Econ 98:71–102, 1990) endogenous-growth model is developed in this study. This model has two countries in which there are knowledge spillovers that are partially local. Owing to these spillovers, the innovation costs in a particular country decrease as the number of firms locating in both that country and the other country increases. If international knowledge spillovers are symmetric, the innovation sector is in the country with the larger market. However, if international knowledge spillovers are asymmetric, the innovation costs may be in the small-market country. When innovation costs are lower in the country with a large market, the growth rate increases with a reduction of transportation costs. However, when innovation costs are lower in the country with the smaller market, the growth rate decreases with a reduction in transportation costs. We are grateful to Marcus Berliant, Masahisa Fujita, Koichi Futagami, Tatsuo Kinugasa, Takuo Imagawa, Tomoya Mori, Se-il Mun, Hisahiro Naito, Ryoji Ohdoi, Tatsuyoshi Saijyo, and Akihisa Shibata for their helpful comments and suggestions. Any remaining errors are the responsibility of the authors.     

Economic structure,productivity, and infrastructure quality in Southern Mexico

There are large and sustained differences in the economic performance of sub-national regions in most countries. In this paper, we examine economic structure and productivity in Southern Mexico and compare these to the rest of the country. We employ firm level data from Mexican manufacturing to test the relative importance of firm level characteristics such as human capital and technology adoption compared to external characteristics such as infrastructure quality and regulatory environment in explaining productivity differentials. We find that the economic structure of the South is considerably different from the rest of the country, with the economic landscape being dominated by micro enterprises and a relative specialization in low productivity activities. This coupled with low skill levels and fewer skill upgrading opportunities reduces the performance of Southern firms. Productivity differentials between Southern and other firms, however, only exist for micro enterprises. The econometric analysis shows that while employee training and technology adoption enhance productivity, access to markets through improvements in transport infrastructure linking urban areas also have important productivity effects.We would like to thank Jose Luis Guasch for comments and suggestions and Julio Gonzalez for assistance in getting access to the firm level ENESTYC data. We appreciate the cooperation and collaboration of the Mexican National Institute of Statistics, Geography and Informatics (INEGI) throughout the process. This paper is part of a larger program to examine the contribution of economic geography and investment climate to economic efficiency. The findings reported in this paper are those of the authors alone, and should not be attributed to the World Bank, its executive directors, or the countries they represent.Received: September 2002 / Accepted: May 2003     

Exploratory spatial data analysis of the distribution of regional per capita GDP in Europe, 1980−1995

The aim of this paper is to study the space-time dynamics of European regional per capita GDP. A sample of 138 European regions over the 1980–1995 period provides clear evidence of global and local spatial autocorrelation as well as spatial heterogeneity in the distribution of regional per capita GDP. The detection of spatial clusters of high and low per capita GDP throughout the period is an indication of the persistence of spatial disparities among European regions. The dynamism of European regions is investigated by exploring the spatial pattern of regional growth. Implications for applied econometric work on the convergence of European regions are then suggested. Received: 11 September 2000 / Accepted: 11 March 2002 RID="*" ID="*"Previous versions of this article were presented at the 6th RSAI World Congress 2000 “Regional Science in a Small World”, Lugano, Switzerland, May 16–20, 2000 and the 40th ERSA Congress “European Monetary Union and Regional Policy”, Barcelona, Spain, August 29 – September 1, 2000. We would like to thank L. Anselin, R.J.G.M. Florax, A. Getis, C. Baumont, an and suggestions. We would also like to thank Eurostat: G. Decand and A. Behrens from the regional statistics section (division E4) as well as J. Recktenwald and I. Dennis for the help they provided on the Eurostat-Regio database. The usual disclaimer applies.     

三种植物叶片类胡萝卜素含量的比较分析

以红继木、红苋和七彩扶桑的叶片为材料,采用丙酮-乙醇法提取,利用紫外-可见分光光度计对三种植物叶片中胡萝卜素、叶黄素和总类胡萝卜素的含量进行了测定。结果表明,胡萝卜素含量:红苋>红继木>七彩扶桑;叶黄素含量:七彩扶桑>红苋>红继木;总类胡萝卜素含量:红苋>红继木>七彩扶桑。     

Matching estimation,casino gambling and the quality of life

Little consensus exists in the literature as to the impact of casino gambling on regional economic development. This paper uses a propensity score matching estimator to assess the bottom line impact of casino gambling on the welfare of local residents. It extends the literature in two important ways. First, the traditional matching estimation model is extended to consider a kernel weighting formula that corrects for correlation between the outcome error term and characteristics of the regressors used in generating the propensity scores. Second, by using the matching procedure to control for selection bias in the casino location decision, this paper generates improved estimates for the impact of casino gambling on key economic variables and on local quality of life. Casinos are found to have no statistically significant net impact on the quality of life in their host counties, though Native American casinos do generate some additional economic activity in the form of increased population, employment, and housing starts. This paper was awarded the Charles M. Tiebout Prize for outstanding graduate student paper at the 2007 Western Regional Science Association annual meetings. I am thankful for helpful comments from Dan McMillen, Barry Chiswick, Joe Persky, Gib Bassett, John Tauras, seminar participants at the 2007 Western Regional Science Association meetings and the referees. I gratefully acknowledge support from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Doctoral Dissertation Research Grant Program. Any errors are my own.     

Regional convergence in the European Union: From hypothesis to the actual trends

Economic convergence or non-convergence between countries and regions continues to attract analytical attention in Europe. To converge in real terms and not only in terms of nominal variables is one of the basic aims of the European Union Treaty. A first objective of this paper is to offer an overview on what is actually happening in the European Union in contrast to some generally accepted hypotheses and models predicting regional convergence. Empirical evidence shows that after a period of (relative) regional convergence in GDP per capita as well in terms of labour productivity, this process has almost completely ended. Possible explanations go from the most pro-convergence theories (optimists) to those that outweigh real obstacles to theoretical assumptions (pessimists). As a second objective the paper examines two important facts that can contribute to explaining the actual trends. The first is named the `national effect', where regions of each country have economic behaviour strongly linked to the national economy as a whole. The second is the `differential' behaviour of many European regions in terms of economic outcomes.  Some suggestions and conclusions are drawn from the facts and the trends observed in the European integration process. Received: May 2000/Accepted: December 2000     

Urban spatial pattern as self-organizing system: An empirical evaluation of firm location decisions in Cleveland–Akron PMSA,Ohio

Economic models of urban spatial patterns have largely ignored complexity as an attribute of urban systems. Complexity theorists on the other hand have not made sufficiently serious and sustained attempts to verify empirically the relevance of complex systems models for urban spatial patterns. This research bridges this gap by simulating the evolution of an urban employment pattern as a self-organizing complex system and seeking its empirical validation. It estimates the model’s parameters by using firm data aggregated to the level of municipalities in Cleveland-Akron Consolidated Metropolitan Statistical Area in Ohio. The interaction among four parameters, forces of attraction and dispersion and their respective rates of dissipation with distance, are modeled as a two-dimensional complex system. The research compares the states of the modeled system with empirical data to present viable methods for verification, calibration and validation of such models.

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The agglomeration of U.S.-owned and foreign-owned plants across the U.S. States

Agglomeration in U.S. manufacturing is more common than initially thought. This clustering arises from location natural advantages and spillovers. Extant studies on agglomeration do not distinguish the activities of U.S.-owned plants from those that are foreign owned. This distinction is crucial since policies seem to have differential impacts on both types of plants. I find that industry scale, resource intensity and urbanization economies have larger impacts on foreign plant agglomeration whereas knowledge intensity has a larger effect on domestic plant agglomeration. Received: September 2001/Accepted: April 2002 I would like to thank the UNO University Committee on Research for support of this project and Ke Yang for invaluable research assistance. The paper has benefited from the comments made by an anonymous referee. The usual caveats apply.     

Impacts of national development and decentralization policies on regional income disparity in Korea

This paper analyzed the effects of national development and decentralization policies on the regional income disparity in Korea. It also attempted to test whether there was a structural change in the causal relationship between income inequality and its determinant factors. This study found that the degree of variation in regional incomes was positively correlated with the spatial distribution of decentralization instruments such as educational services, employment, infrastructure facilities, and information network variables. The effects of some decentralization policies on regional income inequality were fully realized within a period of three years. Finally, the impacts of the spatial decentralization of public goods on regional inequality fluctuated until the early 1980s but were stabilized as industrial restructuring and spatial reorganization progressed during the 1990s. Received: December 2001/Accepted: June 2002     

On the measurement of regional inequality: does spatial dimension of income inequality matter?

The paper concerns selected theoretical and empirical aspects of the decomposition of income inequality by spatially defined subgroups. Special consideration is given to the implications for measurement and comparison of regional inequality. The decomposition by the Theil coefficient is applied at global and European levels including estimates of historical development. Additionally, the empirical evidence on the decomposition of inequality in a number of countries is reviewed, regional inequality for 46 countries is estimated, and a simple method of cross-country classification according to relative importance of spatial dimension of inequality is provided.     

Intellectual leaders of regional science: A half-century citation study

Abstract. On the basis of citations to articles in regional science journals, this study identifies the most influential scholars in the field during various periods of its first-half century. It distinguishes among the pioneering generation who wrote its formative pieces, the generations who expanded its boundaries, and the current generation whose work is shaping the field and giving it direction. Useful insights into the nature of regional science flow from key facts about its intellectual leaders, including their disciplinary affiliations, periods of active research, and cited work outside the regional science journals. The article also discusses problems with the citation data and limitations of citation studies.     

Long-run development of a multi-regional economy

This article analyses models of a multi-regional economy with n regions and m factors, with a Cobb-Douglas or CES production function, and with or without economies of scale and Hicks-neutral technological progress, in which factors are imperfectly mobile as described by a revised gravity model. The article clarifies the incidence of interregional factor mobility, conditions of convergence of interregional per-capita income, the long-run equilibrium regional shares of factors and of income, and the convergence speed. The results are further generalised by explicitly introducing interregional distances. Received: 18 August 1997 / Accepted: 29 January 1999     

Exploring spatial features of science‐industry partnerships: A study on French data

The aim of this paper is to provide explanatory elements of the geography of collaboration by testing various potential factors related to the partners' features (sector of activity, location, affiliation to a parent firm, etc.) and to the pair of regions involved in the partnership (economic and scientific endowment of regions and proximities that separate them). Based on a database collecting around 15,000 Science‐Industry agreements signed in France between 1981 and 2006, we first realized a probit model that focus on the local dimension of science‐industry collaborations on an inter‐individual level. We then test a gravity model (sample selection model) in order to explain the probability and the intensity of interregional collaborations. El propósito de este artículo es aportar elementos que expliquen la geografía de la colaboración mediante el ensayo de varios factores potenciales relacionados con las características de los socios (sector de la actividad, localización, afiliación a una empresa matriz, etc.) y con el par de regiones involucradas en la sociedad (dotación económica y científica de las regiones y las proximidades que las separan). Mediante la utilización de una base de datos que incluye alrededor de 15.000 acuerdos de colaboración entre ciencia e industria firmados en Francia entre 1981 y 2006, establecemos en primer lugar un modelo probit que se centra en la dimensión local de las colaboraciones entre ciencia e industria a nivel inter‐individual. A continuación, hacemos ensayos con un modelo de gravedad (modelo de selección muestral) para explicar la probabilidad y la intensidad de las colaboraciones interregionales.