Industrial districts: something more than a neighbourhood

The expansion of globalization has led to the relocation of many industrial activities. In particular, this process has affected industrial districts in the traditional industries. However, different districts vary in their capacity to retain activities. The robustness of industrial districts and, in consequence, their capacity to retain core activities at home and thus avoid painful relocations can be analysed by means of the relational capital developed at the district level. The relational structure within the district affects and determines the capacity of innovation of the district firms. This paper analyses the extent to which innovation depends on the amount of relational capital developed at the district level. We have addressed this proposition using internal human mobility, shared vision and trusting co-operation as indicators of the amount and quality of relational capital. In order to support theoretical propositions we have conducted empirical research comparing different industrial districts in the Valencian region of Spain. Research findings suggest a significant association between social capital variables and innovation outcomes. In consequence, these factors can facilitate retaining activities in districts.     

The decline of the industrial district of Como: recession,relocation or reconversion?

Industrial districts are experiencing intensifications in those economic conditions that have historically favoured them. Some of them have entered a process of decline, which might seem the cause or the effect of recession, relocation or reconversions into different models. The present paper aims at contributing to the debate on the evolutionary patterns of industrial districts, offering an explorative look at the phenomenon of industrial districts’ decline. This topic has been widely overlooked in literature and demands further empirical evidence and conceptual insights. To this purpose, the paper builds on the longitudinal case study of the industrial district of Como, illustrating and analysing its decline process from 1980 to 2003. The focus of the study is on the determinants of an industrial district's decline and the consequences on the structures of the district itself. The findings are then abstracted to a model for the understanding and explanation of the decline of industrial districts. The conclusion is that scholars, practitioners and policy-makers might benefit from enhancing their knowledge of industrial districts’ decline and also from interpreting industrial districts’ evolution in a wider sense. The paper concludes with contributions and suggestions for further research.     

Industrial and knowledge relocation strategies under the challenges of globalization and digitalization: the move of small and medium enterprises among territorial systems

Owing to globalization and digitalization, small and medium firms adopt relocation strategies to transfer their activities (and implicitly also knowledge) among territorial systems, inducing transformations into both source and destination areas. Cognitive proximity and knowledge creation/transfer play a crucial role, especially critical when concerning tacit knowledge, which can be transferred only by moving people. In each industrial cluster or industrial district it is possible to identify a kernel of critical activities, which requests complex competencies and has high added value, and a kernel of tacit knowledge, which is based on repeated face-to-face interactions. The former resists globalization and the latter prevents digitalization, which impacts heavily on territorial systems lacking trust, cooperative attitude, and other socio-cognitive factors. Relocation strategies are divided into selective and replicative alternatives, depending on the ability to preserve large kernels. When replicative strategies are followed by many firms, the socio-cognitive integrity and the economic competitiveness of the territorial system are severely damaged. Thus, in order to prevent the ruinous consequences of massive replicative relocation, local and regional governments should steer territorial systems towards selective relocation strategies supporting innovation and improving human capital, paying attention and developing socio-cognitive factors too. In the final part of the paper, case studies of industrial and knowledge relocation at intra-European level are discussed, and a general model is proposed.     

Drivers and antecedents of manufacturing offshoring and backshoring—A German perspective

Discussions on the potentials and risks of the relocation of manufacturing activities to low-wage countries have resurged in recent years in the wake of a new globalisation debate. Manufacturing offshoring has become an increasingly interesting option for firms of all sizes. Besides the chances to improve the company's cost position, the risks of production offshoring are also evident. An analysis of the manufacturing offshoring and backshoring activities of 1663 German manufacturing companies shows that production offshoring has currently lost momentum. On the other hand, backshoring of once offshored manufacturing capacities is also a quantifiable phenomenon. Every fourth to sixth offshoring activity is followed by a backshoring activity within the following 4 years, mainly due to lack of flexibility and quality problems at the foreign location. A deeper, qualitative analysis in 39 German manufacturing companies shows that not all companies do pay sufficient attention to qualitative factors crucial for success and competitive advantage in their location decisions. Thus, managerial implications for a systematic location planning process are drawn from our findings.     

中国制造业外包对劳动力需求弹性及就业的影响

研究目标：测算中国30省份的生产者责任以及消费者责任CO2排放量;各个省份的净碳转移量以及进出口隐含碳排放;测算省间的碳转出量,计算8大区域的净碳转移量,并分析了碳转移的方向。研究方法：借助投入产出表,用多区域投入产出模型测算各省份各行业的CO2排放量以及省间的碳转移量。研究发现：两种责任测算的CO2排放量差别较大;广东、上海、北京、浙江、江苏的净碳转出量最大,内蒙古、山西、河北、新疆、贵州的净碳转入量最大;东部沿海、南部沿海以及京津地区的净碳转出量最大,西北地区的净碳转入量最大。研究创新：用投入产出表结合能源平衡表测算各省份各行业的直接CO2排放量;研究了省间的碳转移。研究价值：对中国的碳减排具有一定的政策建议。     

上海生产性服务业发展研究——基于产品内分工视角

产品内分工是当代经济全球化的基本特征和重要动因之一,产品内分工的深入发展促成了全球制造外包和服务外包的盛行,也为发展中国家的产业成长和结构升级创造了重要机遇。改革开放以来,上海的发展正日益深刻地融入经济全球化进程,参与国际范围内的产品内分工不仅已经成为上海先进制造业发展的有效途径,而且可能成为上海生产性服务业发展的重要推进因素。文章以上海参与产品内分工的必要性与可行性研究为基础,初步探索了上海在开放背景下发展生产性服务业的动力目标、战略重点、区位选择和政策建议等方面的问题。     

我国制造企业物流外包模式初探

21世纪,随着经济全球化进程的加快,制造企业面临的竞争日益激烈。面临竞争压力的加大和经济活动的全球化与区域化,制造企业不得不专心于自己的核心制造业务,专注于降低制造成本和提高运行效率,集中于发展核心竞争力,而将非核心的物流业务外包出去。物流外包已成为影响制造企业竞争力的重要因素之一,是企业提高绩效的有效途径。主要从制造企业物流外包的发展现状分析和现有的物流模式研究,探索制造企业物流外包模式的应用。目的在于,为制造企业寻求合适的物流外包模式,进一步提高制造企业物流核心竞争力,促进企业繁荣发展。     

论战略性新兴产业的发展对京津冀区域经济的推动

京津冀与长三角、珠三角是中国东部地区率先发展的三大引擎,是我国最重要的经济增长极,也是中国最有可能建成全球巨型城市区、实施全球化战略的地区。发展新兴产业可以促进京津冀区域协调发展,推进经济一体化进程。     

我国城市群经济整合的理论与实践

文章基于区域经济发展和城市群发展两个视角分别从经济全球化、区域经济发展、区域分工与合作、城市群内部的产业集聚与扩散、城市群内部的企业扩张和内部的网络化组织的促进作用等几个方面就城市群经济整合进行了理论上的阐述论证.最后,论文从城市群内部的产业整合、市场整合、基础设施整合和区域协调机制的建立等四个方面进行城市群经济整合实证方面的研究.     

Enhancing green product and process innovation: Towards an integrative framework of knowledge acquisition and environmental investment

Despite the increasing interest in green innovation literature, little is known on how and under what conditions firms' knowledge transfer activities affect green innovation. There is lack of research that on how particular organizational capabilities are seen more useful and how it influences on green innovation performance. To address this research gap, we examine a mediation model in which we explore whether a firm's knowledge acquisition capability and investment in environmental management mediate the impact of buyer-driven knowledge transfer activities on green product innovation and green process innovation. On the basis of an analysis of a sample of 239 manufacturing firms, we find that buyer-driven knowledge activities have a greater positive impact on green product innovation than green process innovation. Investment in environmental management fully mediates the relationship between buyer-driven knowledge transfer activities and green process innovation, and knowledge acquisition capability partially mediates the relationship between buyer-driven knowledge transfer activities and green product innovation. The current study provides evidence that internal competencies and the role of buyers in knowledge transfer are critical for explaining the green product innovation and green process innovation. Our results suggest that buyer involvement pushes firms to develop resource acquisition capability to enhance green product innovation. Our results also highlight the importance of investment in environmental management for overcoming the environmental challenges in the manufacturing firms.     

Italian industrial districts as cognitive systems: Are they still reproducible?

Adopting a knowledge-based perspective, this study develops a framework of how Italian industrial districts (IDs) operate and evolve as cognitive systems. First, we analyse the mechanisms that facilitate knowledge diffusion across firms within IDs, the enabler of cross-firm knowledge transfer (absorptive capacity) and the process of producing new knowledge by combination. Within this analysis, we consider the formation of new firms resulting from the break-away of human resources from existing district firms (spin-offs) as a particular form of knowledge transfer and production within districts. Knowledge production by combination may take place not only within boundaries of IDs, but also involve external sources. We suggest that innovations made by combining internal and external knowledge have played an important role in shaping the evolutionary trajectories of IDs. Finally, again from the cognitive perspective, we address the issue of how globalization impacts on district systems, concentrating on the positive role that two different types of local actors play in their reproduction and evolution: the global–local firms and institutions providing knowledge-intensive business services.     

A mathematical programming approach to elementary school facility decisions

Beginning in the early 1970's, school districts throughout the United States were abruptly faced with a dramatic decline in enrollments. These declines required that many administrators adjust their planning procedures to include the effects of unused or under-used facilities. The most prominent of these decisions was the closing of selected schools. Most districts addressed this issue by establishing citizen task forces to analyze the current situation, to recommend how school facilities should be reorganized, and to develop the timing of these activities. These citizen task forces clearly operate in a political environment, and are necessarily concerned with qualitative social issues as well as those issues that are traditionally more quantifiable.

In this paper we develop and investigate the use of quantitative tools that enhance this decision making process. Specifically, we discuss the development of a zero-one integer program designed to assist in facility allocation problems faced by many school districts. The paper includes a demonstration case study using this model with data from the State College, Pennsylvania school district.     

基于价值链管理的制造型企业内部控制探讨

制造型企业是我国国民经济的支柱,加强其内部控制研究具有极其重要的意义。目前我国有关内部控制的研究对于这类企业的适用性不强,使得这类企业的内部控制在实际运行中的效果不尽理想。制造型企业内部控制研究的关键是对各业务流程活动的控制。因此,本文结合制造型企业的基本特点,将价值链理论引入这类企业内部控制体系的研究之中,重构其业务流程体系,加强其关键控制点的控制力度,建立一套基于价值链管理的制造型企业内部控制体系,以期完善其内部控制体系架构,促进企业的价值增值与最终目标的实现。     

The psychological impact of expatriate relocation on partners

Abstract This paper reports upon a study of the psychological impact of relocation on partners of fifty-eight expatriate and repatriate managers. The study examined associations for several factors, namely company assistance, culture shock experienced, perceived cultural distance between home and host countries and personal factors, with partners' psychological adjustment to relocation. The most important positive predictor of psychological adjustment was found to be company assistance. Also, general support for a process of phases in psychological adjustment to relocation was found, although not following the postulated curve. Increased recognition of the importance of the factors examined here and their role in the process of psychological adjustment to relocation is recommended for expatriates and their organizations alike.     

Globalization and insurance activity: Evidence on the industrial and emerging countries

This study applies panel cointegration with cross-country dependence and causality tests to uncover the extent and the magnitude of the relationship between insurance penetration and globalization. The results first confirm evidence of the long-run relationship between insurance market activities and globalization. Second, we find positive impacts of all three globalization indices on life and non-life insurance penetrations, and globalization has a larger impact on insurance market activities in the industrial countries than in the emerging countries. Finally, the results of panel causality tests roughly show bidirectional causality between insurance market activities and globalization in the long run.     

Cities as the Industrial Districts of Housebuilding

In North America the housebuilding industry is ubiquitous and locally autonomous. In Ontario during the 1990s, 81% of urban single‐family homes were erected by locally based builders, a proportion that varied with urban isolation. Urban areas may be regarded as the industrial districts of home builders: numerous small, specialized firms interact frequently within a rich, embedded market network; subcontracting is the norm; networks and firm boundaries are fluid. The theory of industrial districts offers a useful vocabulary for analysing the neglected building industry. Analytically, the building industry offers unequalled opportunities to explore the dynamics of industrial districts, and how economic globalization meets local limits.     

Relocation of second degree: Moving towards a new place or returning home?

We study the “Relocations of Second Degree” (RSDs), i.e., the location decisions that modify the country of destination of a previous offshoring investment. Specifically, we distinguish between two types of RSDs, i.e., “Relocation to the Home Country (RHC)”, also known as back-reshoring, and “Relocation to a Third Country (RTC)”, i.e., the choice to move to a second host country.Specifically, we explore how the location advantages underlying the previous offshoring decision affect the probability to undertake an RHC, rather than an RTC. Location advantages reflect the favourable conditions that a foreign country offers with respect to the home one, in terms of market-seeking, asset-seeking and efficiency-seeking (i.e., cost-saving and productivity-enhancing) opportunities. Using data from the European Restructuring Monitor, we focus on the RSDs regarding manufacturing activities, implemented across European countries between 2002 and 2015. We find that, on the one hand, when a previous offshoring investment is driven by market-seeking location advantage, firms undertaking the RSD are more likely to opt for an RHC, except during the economic crisis where market-seeking European firms seem to prefer RTCs. On the other hand, RTC is a preferred choice when the location advantage is of efficiency-seeking type. In addition to offering a broader characterization of RSDs, our study provides empirical evidence of the relationship between the offshoring and relocation decisions. Managers should be aware of this connection when designing their manufacturing internationalization strategies.     

Territorial systems and relocation: Insights from eight cases in Japan

This paper investigates the evolution patterns of eight territorial systems in Japan during the period of industry relocation. Multiple case study methodology was applied. Data were collected through interviews with entrepreneurs and local government officials. Based on the findings that reveal adaptation processes in which manufacturing firms are involved, we propose a three-stage evolutionary model to conceptualize the changes that are taking place in Japan's territorial systems. We argue that the transactional relationships are evolving towards more socialized relationships and that these relationships are evolving towards more formalized, knowledge-based innovation networks.     

Context‐bound configurations of corporate HR functions in multinational corporations

Considerable attention has focused on how multinational corporations (MNCs) deal with the simultaneous pressures of globalization and localization when it comes to human resource management (HRM). HR function activities in this process, however, have received less focus. The study presented here identifies configurations of the corporate HR function based on international HRM (IHRM) structures, exploring how issues of interdependency shape corporate HR roles. The study is based on 248 interviews in 16 MNCs based in 19 countries. The findings are applied to develop a contextually based framework outlining the main corporate HR function configurations in MNCs, including new insights into methods of IHRM practice design. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Shuttling Goods,Weaving Consumer Tastes: Informal Trade between Turkey and Russia

In ‘top down’ conceptualizations of globalization, people often enter the analytical picture merely as resisters to globalization or as receivers of corporate produced goods, messages and ideas. This article, in contrast, focuses on a process in which ‘ordinary’ people are the active makers of global processes and meanings. I describe the transnational trade network between post-Soviet countries and Turkey, in which Western fashions and images get circulated and transformed through the activities of informal entrepreneurs. I thus challenge accounts of globalization in which the dissemination of images is depicted as a top down process originating in corporations located in metropolitan countries. Based on ethnographic evidence collected in Istanbul and Moscow on the informal ‘shuttle trade’, I demonstrate that the mobility of ‘ordinary’ people across borders facilitates the flows of signs and images. Moreover, Western images and fashions get remoulded and acquire new meanings in the process of circulation.