Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
example, the practices of non-collaborators getting low information (Table 11.3) com-
pared to their expectations, as well as not placing a particularly high value on 'reducing
uncertainty'. Some neoclassicals might see this as irrational, possibly as 'adverse selec-
tion' and inconsistent with neoclassical rational utility maximising or optimising norms.
6. Concludingremarks
This chapter has proposed empirical evidence that gives coni dence about the following
key observations. First, and in theoretical terms, there is an advance in our understanding
of the persistence and conceivable reinforcement of an asymmetric economic geography
of prosperity and accomplishment. In an evolving and intensifying knowledge economy,
science-driven and otherwise technologically sophisticated economic activity gives rise
to demands on industry organisation that reinforce collaborative activity among smaller
knowledge-intensive businesses, on the one hand, and between smaller, smart i rms and
university laboratories towards customer (and supplier) i rms, many of which can, on
the other hand, be shown to be large or even transnational corporations. This is impor-
tant and original support for the thesis that
regional
knowledge capabilities
increasingly
determine the distribution of growth regions, currently favouring those that gain increas-
ing returns from asymmetric knowledge distribution that assists in the construction
of regional advantage in terms of talent recruitment and retention, spatial knowledge
quasi-monopolies, and 'R&D outsourcing' or 'open innovation.' In UK ICT and bio-
technology such features are pronounced, with key bioregional capabilities attracting
these advantages to clusters like Cambridge and Oxford, while for ICT, London with its
satellites in the M25 and M4 corridors is the dominant market-led magnet.
We also found the evolutionary perspective far superior in explanatory power in
apparently non-utilitarian circumstances that nevertheless make sense when analysed
from the evolutionary point of view. This is promising from a policy as well as a more
academic viewpoint since it seems policy-making from a neoclassical point of view pro-
duces often counter-intuitive interpretations. This is, of course, because of the poverty
of neoclassical perspectives both on knowledge and innovation analyses. This is perhaps
surprising given that numerous founding fathers of neoclassical economics have empha-
sised the importance of both, but owing to the unnatural restrictiveness of modelling in
that i eld neither has seriously been explored by its adherents. These are sub-disciplinary
i elds where evolutionary economic geography is more or less theoretically, conceptually
and empirically unchallenged.
Thereafter, underlining the previous point, this research has tended to i nd support
for the superiority of collaboration in respect of a variety of performance indicators,
and clustered cooperation for innovation being supported more by the collaborating
part of the i rm sample than the respondent group as a whole. This broadly applies in
ICT and biotechnology, but as we have seen, less regarding clustering for innovation
activity by ICT than biotechnology i rms, and much more for research interactions by
biotechnology than ICT i rms. Research in ICT is less of a cluster-driver than innovation
activity, but the latter is not as pronounced as supply-chain innovation stretching global
and intra-i rm interactions, the latter partly a function of dif ering i rm-size between the
two samples. The one thing that appears to be almost transparent, especially in the ICT
data, is the superiority for i rm performance of collaborative knowledge exchange and
innovation activity over stand-alone competition, even for the large, dominating i rms in
