Gert-Jan Hospers

Abstrakt  Die italienische Insel Sardinien zeichnet sich unter den Regionen Westeuropas durch ihre besonders periphere Lage und geringe Entwicklung aus. Jahrhundertelang übten hier Fremdherrscher ihre Macht aus. Erst in den 1990er Jahren, als die „Cassa per il Mezzogiorno“ ihre Arbeit einstellte, erhielten die Sarden mehr Verfügungsrechte über ihre Insel. Die neu gewonnene Autonomie trägt allmählich Früchte: Agritourismus, regionale Produkte, traditionelles Handwerk und Molekulargenetik bilden die Basis einer stärkeren sardinischen Wirtschaft. Mit der Wahl des ehemaligen Tiscali-Topmanagers Renato Soru im Juni 2004 zum Gouverneur der Insel zeigten die Sarden, dass sie auf eine Zukunft nach dem Motto „Im Trend dank Tradition“ vertrauen.

The replacement of raw materials or other natural endowments with human capital and creativity as the crucial wellspring of economic growth means that in order to be successful in the emerging creative age of the knowledge economy, regions must develop, attract and retain talented and creative people. Such people are not spread equally across nations or places, but tend to concentrate within particular city-regions. Richard Florida (2002a; 2002b) thus argues that regional economic outcomes are tied to the underlying conditions that ...

In July 2002 the Treaty on the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) expired. The ECSC is now being dissolved, its assets are transferred into special research funds, and European coal and steel policy is integrated into mainstream EU industrial policy. The ECSC's main task was to integrate the post-war European coal and steel industry, but the ECSC can also

What is the main source of economic growth in the twenty-first century? If we listen to today’s analysts and politicians, the answer to this question comprises something like ‘competition’, ‘knowledge’ or ‘technology’. According to the American economist Richard Florida, however, none of these three factors are fundamental growth drivers: in the end, he says, economic growth is driven by human

Abstract: All over the globe, authorities in charge of cluster policy are trying to build their own'Silicon Somewhere'in an attempt to emulate Silicon Valley, the world's most famous example of geographical clustering of economic activity of the last three decades (Saxenian 1994; O'Mara 2004). For long, this area of South San Francisco Bay around Santa Clara County and its main cities, San Jose and Palo Alto, was mostly known for its orchards. In 1891, however, Leland Stanford founded Stanford University, which, under the leadership ...

ABSTRACT Silicon value geldt in het algemeen als het schoolvoorbeeld van hoe gebiedskenmerken - gesproken wordt van de software van een gebied, social capital - (innovatieve cultuur, bereidheid tot nemen van risico's, non-conformisme als norm, tolerantie) innovaties en creativiteit stimuleren (untraded interdependencies). Dit sooer gebieden zijn gekenmerkt door een intensieve uitwisseling tussen tacit en codified knowledge en tevens openheid voor externe kennis. Verwezen wordt naar het Japanse woord BA (shared space) vanNonaka en Konno.

Contemporary economic activity is increasingly dominated by 'knowledge-based'activities. Increasingly internationalisation of competition has increased pressures on firms in all advanced economies to compete primarily in terms of product differentiation (Porter, 1990). This has changed the nature of the production process, placing an increasing premium on intangible inputs; macro-economic analyses (for a review see Temple, 1998) have determined that investment in physical assets and labour alone does not account for much ...

ABSTRACT Public authorities in the European Union actively promote the dissemination of so-called ‘best practices' in regional policy. With the help of scoreboards, case studies and interregional benchmarks, policy makers hope to improve the competitiveness of Europe's regions. In practice, however, this development has resulted in a tendency for regions to simply imitate a limited number of alleged success stories such as Silicon Valley. Hence, we can observe the emergence of a range of ‘Silicon Valley' type initiatives across Europe. In this article the usefulness of such best practices in regional policy is assessed with the aim of drawing lessons. For this purpose, insights are combined from Schumpeterian thinking, economic geography and comparative public policy. First, the copycat behaviour in regional policy is explained by placing Schumpeter's innovation theory in a political context. Then, the factors that are generally regarded in the economic-geographical literature as the determinants of regional competitiveness are reviewed. Thereafter, insights from comparative public policy are used to identify the ‘contingencies of lesson-drawing', i.e. the preconditions that affect whether a policy can be transferred from one place to another. When combining the different bodies of literature, it is concluded that exactly those conditions that explain the success of a particular region are the most difficult elements to learn from. It is thus argued that the possibilities of lesson-drawing from best practices in regional policy are only limited. Moreover, by relying too heavily upon them, it is feared that regions undermine their competitiveness and become victims of a territorial race to the bottom. Policy makers are therefore advised to take care with the further propagation of ‘best practices' in regional policy. Only when authorities are stimulated to attune their policy to area-based assets (‘regional realism'), will the wasteful attempts of regions to grow into the next ‘Silicon Somewhere' be prevented.

For centuries, the so-called 'Blue Banana' has shown the greatest development potential in Europe's geo-economy. This metropolitan area, extending from the north-west of London through Germany to Milan, traditionally has been a breeding place for entrepreneurship and innovation in Europe. Recently, however, commentators have identified the 'Sunbelt' from Milan to Valencia and - anticipating the coming enlargement of the European Union - the 'Yellow Banana' from Paris to Warsaw as the growth poles of the future. Ultimately, it is claimed, these emerging centres of gravity may even take over the dominant position of the Blue Banana in the European economy. In this paper we explore the question how likely it is that the contemporary structure of Europe's economic-geographical system is really changing in the next decades. After a short discussion of the 'stylized facts' of unbalanced growth in Europe we develop a framework in which insi...

... The city is crowded with visitors and has developed into a destination for mass tourism ( Marshall, 2004 ). ... 2009 Palgrave Macmillan 1751-8040 Place Branding and Public ... sure that they provide the visitors an experience that resembles the images used in the marketing of their ...

ABSTRACT Worried about demographic and economic shrinkage, more and more cities and regions in Europe invest in place marketing. With campaigns, they try to seduce new residents and firms to settle in their community. In this article, we question the usefulness of such `cold' place marketing by referring to geographical insights and recent empirical evidence from the Netherlands. In fact, data on migration flows clearly demonstrate the geographical inertia of citizens and companies. Contrary to popular thinking, Dutch residents and firms do not easily move - they show a lot of spatial self-preference resulting from a strong sense of place and/or location-specific capital. Although this article mainly deals with the Dutch situation, we suggest that, in general, place marketing will be of limited use to acquire in-migrants and new firms. Therefore, we plea for `warm' place marketing that starts with the needs of a community's existing residents and entrepreneurs. In the end, we think, pleased locals are a place's best ambassadors.

Inspired by the recent rediscovery of work of Schumpeter in science and policymaking the author reviews and appraises Schumpeterian theory and that of his followers in innovation studies. Although Schumpeter’s vision suffers from some defects, I argue that there is more to learn from this author than his well-known idea of “creative destruction”. In particular, Schumpeter’s view on innovation policy

In promoting European regional development, policymakers tend to pursue either an offensive, future-oriented or a defensive, tradition-preserving type of policy. Backed by theoretical notions and case evidence from an “ordinary” region, i. e. the Italian island of Sardinia, the following paper argues that European regions could benefit more from a “connective” type of policy that aims to connect lobal trends with local traditions.

ABSTRACT Purpose – This article seeks to explore the usefulness of city marketing as a method to attract new residents and firms from a geographical perspective. Design/methodology/approach – To answer the research question, the paper reviews relevant theoretical concepts, empirical data on migration flows and Dutch case examples. Findings – A geographical approach towards city marketing makes clear that residents and firms show spatial self-preference and do not easily move. This insight questions the usefulness of cold city marketing aimed at attracting newcomers. Research limitations/implications – The article is largely based on Dutch migration data and cases. More detailed research on other countries is needed to be able to generalize. Practical implications – Local authorities should shift their focus from cold to warm city marketing: they should invest in existing residents and firms rather than in newcomers. To operationalise this approach, the literature on relationship marketing might be helpful. Originality/value – City marketing is mostly aimed at attracting new investors, residents or visitors. This geography-based paper sheds a new light on the topic and provides empirical support to take into account a city's existing population in city marketing.

In this paper, we explore the innovative capacities of old industrial regions by studying the case of the former textiles agglomeration of Twente. We argue that the hardware, software and mindware of old industrial regions tend to suffer from path dependency. For innovation in this type of regions a breakthrough is needed. In this paper we study the case of Twente and show how a well-networked university, the University of Twente (UT), has served as a focal point for both industrial and institutional attempts to promote regional upgrading. We ...

... of what are known as "space-shrinking technologies", which have made the knowledge society and the glo ... Here we see a clear example of the "Matthew effect", a phenomenon named after the old ... There are various types of creative city, and even cities of the same type, such as ...