Different strands of literature have provided important insights into the economic effects of high-skilled migration. Evolutionary economic approaches have provided robust evidence and theories to explain how innovation unfolds in regions. However, with few exceptions they have been silent with regard to the role of migration in this process. This paper, while building on the insights of the above streams of literature, will elaborate a conceptual framework which applies evolutionary economic geography concepts to explore the link between migration, knowledge diffusion and regional diversification. By bringing together all the above arguments, this paper brings evolutionary economic geography (EEG) into an unchartered terrain, one where regional innovation meets migration studies. By engaging in these debates, EEG can prove its interpretative power and provide further insights into the drivers of regional economic dynamics and innovation.
{"title":"Towards an evolutionary economic geography research agenda to study migration and innovation","authors":"Andrea Morrison","doi":"10.1093/cjres/rsad013","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad013","url":null,"abstract":"Different strands of literature have provided important insights into the economic effects of high-skilled migration. Evolutionary economic approaches have provided robust evidence and theories to explain how innovation unfolds in regions. However, with few exceptions they have been silent with regard to the role of migration in this process. This paper, while building on the insights of the above streams of literature, will elaborate a conceptual framework which applies evolutionary economic geography concepts to explore the link between migration, knowledge diffusion and regional diversification. By bringing together all the above arguments, this paper brings evolutionary economic geography (EEG) into an unchartered terrain, one where regional innovation meets migration studies. By engaging in these debates, EEG can prove its interpretative power and provide further insights into the drivers of regional economic dynamics and innovation.","PeriodicalId":47897,"journal":{"name":"Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society","volume":"32 12","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"50167669","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Jürgen Essletzbichler, Manuel Scholz-Wäckerle, Lena Gerdes, Hans-Peter Wieland, Christian Dorninger
This contribution argues that evolutionary economic geography needs to widen its conceptual apparatus in order to engage with the grand challenges of our times. Instead of understanding evolution as a gradual, path-dependent and geographically localized process, the current challenges result from various global political-economic transformations requiring an understanding of evolution as a outcome of variational and transformational change, the incorporation of macro-scale analysis, the augmentation of territorial with relational conceptualizations of space and a focus on historical analysis of political-economic development rather than ahistorical descriptions of regional outcomes of a generalized evolutionary process. We illustrate the potential impact of globalization on the competitive advantage of US metropolitan areas through an analysis of relations of unequal exchange between the USA and the Global South. The estimated value drain constitutes a potential source of revenue for producers in the North that complements the competitive advantages of cities based on superior localized technological performance.
{"title":"Geographical evolutionary political economy: linking local evolution with uneven and combined development","authors":"Jürgen Essletzbichler, Manuel Scholz-Wäckerle, Lena Gerdes, Hans-Peter Wieland, Christian Dorninger","doi":"10.1093/cjres/rsad014","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad014","url":null,"abstract":"This contribution argues that evolutionary economic geography needs to widen its conceptual apparatus in order to engage with the grand challenges of our times. Instead of understanding evolution as a gradual, path-dependent and geographically localized process, the current challenges result from various global political-economic transformations requiring an understanding of evolution as a outcome of variational and transformational change, the incorporation of macro-scale analysis, the augmentation of territorial with relational conceptualizations of space and a focus on historical analysis of political-economic development rather than ahistorical descriptions of regional outcomes of a generalized evolutionary process. We illustrate the potential impact of globalization on the competitive advantage of US metropolitan areas through an analysis of relations of unequal exchange between the USA and the Global South. The estimated value drain constitutes a potential source of revenue for producers in the North that complements the competitive advantages of cities based on superior localized technological performance.","PeriodicalId":47897,"journal":{"name":"Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society","volume":"15 6","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2023-06-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"50167804","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Existing research on the adverse impact of digital platforms on democratic politics has generally focussed on supply side factors underlying illiberal populism. Yet by reinforcing a services-led growth model of capitalism in the developing world, the platform economy has also been implicated on the demand-side of the global populist upsurge by fostering new insecure classes as well as precarious urbanisation patterns. Through a case study of the rise of Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines’ 2016 elections, we show how our theoretical argument has unfolded in one of the most well-known cases of illiberal populism within the Global South. Even while waging unprecedented disinformation campaigns on social media, the political opportunity structure underlying Duterte’s electoral victory in 2016 was fostered by the growth of ‘rising yet insecure’ classes linked to the Philippines’ services and platform economy, as well as the socio-spatial legacies of the country’s experience of premature deindustrialisation.
{"title":"Platforming populism: the services transition, precarious urbanization, and digital platforms in the rise of illiberal populism in the Philippines","authors":"J. Cruz, Emille de la Cruz","doi":"10.1093/cjres/rsad012","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad012","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Existing research on the adverse impact of digital platforms on democratic politics has generally focussed on supply side factors underlying illiberal populism. Yet by reinforcing a services-led growth model of capitalism in the developing world, the platform economy has also been implicated on the demand-side of the global populist upsurge by fostering new insecure classes as well as precarious urbanisation patterns. Through a case study of the rise of Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines’ 2016 elections, we show how our theoretical argument has unfolded in one of the most well-known cases of illiberal populism within the Global South. Even while waging unprecedented disinformation campaigns on social media, the political opportunity structure underlying Duterte’s electoral victory in 2016 was fostered by the growth of ‘rising yet insecure’ classes linked to the Philippines’ services and platform economy, as well as the socio-spatial legacies of the country’s experience of premature deindustrialisation.","PeriodicalId":47897,"journal":{"name":"Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society","volume":"31 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2023-06-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78764230","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper investigates the unequal effect of Airbnb on the spatial organisation of economic activity in Madrid, Spain. Using establishment-level data from Madrid City Council and consumer-facing information from this short-term rental company, we find that Airbnb reshapes the urban space by encouraging tourist-oriented businesses, defined as businesses where tourists spend more than locals, at the expense of businesses primarily oriented to locals. These findings prove that short-term rentals do displace not only the local population but also resident-oriented businesses. Ultimately, our findings remain solid regardless of how we measure short-term rental activity and are not influenced by the growth of e-commerce or gentrification.
{"title":"When local business faded away: the uneven impact of Airbnb on the geography of economic activities","authors":"Alberto Hidalgo, M. Riccaboni, F. J. Velázquez","doi":"10.1093/cjres/rsad009","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad009","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 This paper investigates the unequal effect of Airbnb on the spatial organisation of economic activity in Madrid, Spain. Using establishment-level data from Madrid City Council and consumer-facing information from this short-term rental company, we find that Airbnb reshapes the urban space by encouraging tourist-oriented businesses, defined as businesses where tourists spend more than locals, at the expense of businesses primarily oriented to locals. These findings prove that short-term rentals do displace not only the local population but also resident-oriented businesses. Ultimately, our findings remain solid regardless of how we measure short-term rental activity and are not influenced by the growth of e-commerce or gentrification.","PeriodicalId":47897,"journal":{"name":"Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society","volume":"51 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2023-05-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79807218","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
There is a proliferation of digitalisation of urban and health services in India under the Smart City and Digital Health missions, respectively. This study brings digital and feminist geographies together to understand the role of technologies in urban areas, particularly in health service delivery and how healthcare workers mediate these health platforms. Using a case study of Varanasi city in Uttar Pradesh, India this study documents whether—and to what extent—digital technologies and services enable citizens and service providers to access and improve their lived experiences. The findings indicate a top-down, innovation-focussed model is adopted which excludes and alienates different user groups and citizens shaping their interaction and access to these services.
{"title":"Digitalisation of Indian smart cities: post-Covid-19 approaches to data, recognition and health monitoring","authors":"Sneha Krishnan","doi":"10.1093/cjres/rsad010","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad010","url":null,"abstract":"There is a proliferation of digitalisation of urban and health services in India under the Smart City and Digital Health missions, respectively. This study brings digital and feminist geographies together to understand the role of technologies in urban areas, particularly in health service delivery and how healthcare workers mediate these health platforms. Using a case study of Varanasi city in Uttar Pradesh, India this study documents whether—and to what extent—digital technologies and services enable citizens and service providers to access and improve their lived experiences. The findings indicate a top-down, innovation-focussed model is adopted which excludes and alienates different user groups and citizens shaping their interaction and access to these services.","PeriodicalId":47897,"journal":{"name":"Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society","volume":"40 9","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2023-05-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"50167998","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The power of platforms—precarity and place","authors":"Anna R. Davies, B. Donald, M. Gray","doi":"10.1093/cjres/rsad011","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad011","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":47897,"journal":{"name":"Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society","volume":"26 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2023-05-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74717141","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Valentin Niebler, Giorgio Pirina, Michelangelo Secchi, Franco Tomassoni
The issue of employment classification has been central in the politics around the platform economy. Crucial has been the phenomenon of ‘bogus self-employment’, whereby workers in de facto dependent employment relationships conduct services as independent contractors. Legislators around the world have aimed to tackle this issue by obliging platforms to classify their workers as employees. Based on empirical research in the ride-hailing industry of Berlin, Paris and Lisbon, where such classification exists already, we highlight its contradictory outcomes. We argue that platform companies have managed to introduce forms of ‘bogus employment’ whereby even formally employed workers lack basic worker rights.
{"title":"Towards ‘bogus employment?’ The contradictory outcomes of ride-hailing regulation in Berlin, Lisbon and Paris","authors":"Valentin Niebler, Giorgio Pirina, Michelangelo Secchi, Franco Tomassoni","doi":"10.1093/cjres/rsad007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad007","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 The issue of employment classification has been central in the politics around the platform economy. Crucial has been the phenomenon of ‘bogus self-employment’, whereby workers in de facto dependent employment relationships conduct services as independent contractors. Legislators around the world have aimed to tackle this issue by obliging platforms to classify their workers as employees. Based on empirical research in the ride-hailing industry of Berlin, Paris and Lisbon, where such classification exists already, we highlight its contradictory outcomes. We argue that platform companies have managed to introduce forms of ‘bogus employment’ whereby even formally employed workers lack basic worker rights.","PeriodicalId":47897,"journal":{"name":"Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society","volume":"257 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2023-05-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75957327","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This commentary explores the feasibility of blockchain technologies (and cryptocurrencies) in contesting the power of centralized, corporate platforms. While proponents of blockchain and cryptocurrencies regularly proclaim their power to decentralize and counter corporate power, I am much more constrained in my assessment and note the significant challenges facing open blockchain approaches in competing with platforms. From this, I highlight three key areas in which blockchains may complicate platform operations, albeit in indeterminate ways. These include (i) closed, state-based blockchain systems focused on making back-office processes more efficient, (ii) the use of cryptocurrencies for platform-based transactions and (iii) providing digital objects with an element of “uniqueness” that makes them tradable in new ways. In the end, blockchain and cryptocurrencies are technologies like any others, providing affordances for some kinds of action over others but ultimately their embeddedness in practice and space shapes how they impact the organization and geography of economies, societies and regions.
{"title":"Platforms, blockchains and the challenges of decentralization","authors":"Matthew Zook","doi":"10.1093/cjres/rsad008","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad008","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 This commentary explores the feasibility of blockchain technologies (and cryptocurrencies) in contesting the power of centralized, corporate platforms. While proponents of blockchain and cryptocurrencies regularly proclaim their power to decentralize and counter corporate power, I am much more constrained in my assessment and note the significant challenges facing open blockchain approaches in competing with platforms. From this, I highlight three key areas in which blockchains may complicate platform operations, albeit in indeterminate ways. These include (i) closed, state-based blockchain systems focused on making back-office processes more efficient, (ii) the use of cryptocurrencies for platform-based transactions and (iii) providing digital objects with an element of “uniqueness” that makes them tradable in new ways. In the end, blockchain and cryptocurrencies are technologies like any others, providing affordances for some kinds of action over others but ultimately their embeddedness in practice and space shapes how they impact the organization and geography of economies, societies and regions.","PeriodicalId":47897,"journal":{"name":"Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society","volume":"52 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2023-05-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87650098","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper develops case studies of the UK and China to analyse divergent national financial regulatory approaches to FinTech as a novel political economy of platforms. Regulating with platforms is core to the approach taken in the UK, where start-up and early-career platforms are enrolled into an innovation-friendly financial regulation regime that promotes consumption and competition balanced with stability. In China, meanwhile, measures are being instituted to enhance rules and restrictions imposed on FinTech platforms. BigTech-led FinTech expansion was encouraged to expedite financial reforms to fuel economic growth and ensure authoritarian state control, but regulation is now shown to be working against the furtherance of platform power.
{"title":"FinTech platform regulation: regulating with/against platforms in the UK and China","authors":"P. Langley, A. Leyshon","doi":"10.1093/cjres/rsad005","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad005","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 This paper develops case studies of the UK and China to analyse divergent national financial regulatory approaches to FinTech as a novel political economy of platforms. Regulating with platforms is core to the approach taken in the UK, where start-up and early-career platforms are enrolled into an innovation-friendly financial regulation regime that promotes consumption and competition balanced with stability. In China, meanwhile, measures are being instituted to enhance rules and restrictions imposed on FinTech platforms. BigTech-led FinTech expansion was encouraged to expedite financial reforms to fuel economic growth and ensure authoritarian state control, but regulation is now shown to be working against the furtherance of platform power.","PeriodicalId":47897,"journal":{"name":"Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society","volume":"29 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2023-03-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80235225","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The actions of platforms and their all-inclusive impact on place development is coined platform-based place making in this article. We use the actor-network theory to analyse a typical e-commerce platform-based place making, namely the emergence, development and upgrading of Taobao villages in China, and to explore the mechanisms of platform place making power. Our study shows that platforms ‘make’ places by platform–place interactions of progressively expanding the enrolment of intra-regional and extra-regional actors. In addition, our research advances the actor-network theory and its application and transcends the urban and production-side bias of economic geography.
{"title":"Placing the platform economy: the emerging, developing and upgrading of Taobao villages as a platform-based place making phenomenon in China","authors":"Hanyue Chu, R. Hassink, D. Xie, Xiaohui Hu","doi":"10.1093/cjres/rsad004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad004","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 The actions of platforms and their all-inclusive impact on place development is coined platform-based place making in this article. We use the actor-network theory to analyse a typical e-commerce platform-based place making, namely the emergence, development and upgrading of Taobao villages in China, and to explore the mechanisms of platform place making power. Our study shows that platforms ‘make’ places by platform–place interactions of progressively expanding the enrolment of intra-regional and extra-regional actors. In addition, our research advances the actor-network theory and its application and transcends the urban and production-side bias of economic geography.","PeriodicalId":47897,"journal":{"name":"Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society","volume":"128 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2023-03-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78760503","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}