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regional institutions - turned into stubborn obstacles to innovation' (the 'rigid speciali-
zation' trap) (Grabher, 1993, p. 256).
Grabher (1993) has dei ned these obstacles as three kinds of lock-in. First, a func-
tional lock-in refers to hierarchical, close inter-i rm relationships, particularly between
large enterprises and small and medium-sized suppliers, which may eliminate the need
for suppliers to develop so-called boundary spanning functions, such as research and
development and marketing. The lack of these functions hinders suppliers in switching
to new markets in times of a structural crisis. Second, a cognitive lock-in is regarded as
a common world-view or mindset that might confuse secular trends with cyclical down-
turns. Third, and closely related to cognitive lock-ins is the notion of political lock-ins
that might come up in a production cluster (Grabher, 1993; Hamm and Wienert, 1989;
McGillivray, 2004). Political lock-ins are thick institutional tissues aiming at preserv-
ing existing traditional industrial structures and therefore unnecessarily slowing down
industrial restructuring and indirectly hampering the development of indigenous poten-
tial and creativity. Institutional tissues consist both of networks of organizations, such as
political administrations at all spatial levels, trade unions, large enterprises and business
support agencies, and things that pattern behaviour, such as norms, rules and written
and unwritten laws. With regard to the latter part, there seems to be, therefore, a strong
relationship between cognitive lock-ins and political lock-ins. Such a particular and
thick institutional tissue can, together with the i rms and workers, form a so-called self-
sustaining coalition (Grabher, 1993; Hudson, 1994). In such a situation, large companies
might not want to give up sites for the attraction of inward investment, as they are afraid
to lose qualii ed employees to competitors. Local authorities might not see the point of
attracting inward investment or promoting restructuring in another way, as large tax
incomes are paid by traditional industries. In some regional production clusters, the
spirit of the Schumpeterian entrepreneur might dwindle because of increasing industrial
concentration and the domination of large companies. The self-sustaining coalition
also lobbies for sectoral interventions often at a national or supra-national level, which
hamper the restructuring process more than they support it, as they remove the incen-
tives to take initiatives for entrepreneurs and thus paralyse competition and tranquillize
large industries (Hamm and Wienert, 1989). Morgan and Nauwelaers (1999) emphasize
that in these kinds of network status is privileged over knowledge, power over learning
and the past over the present.
Taken together these three forms of lock-in, functional, cognitive and political, can
be considered as
regional lock-ins
(see also Martin and Sunley, 2006 and Boschma,
2005), which forms the core concept in this chapter. A regional lock-in refers to a set of
interrelated lock-ins that manifest themselves at the regional level, but are inl uenced
and af ected by both intra-regional and extra-regional factors. In a way regional lock-
ins explain why we can i nd in some mature industry clusters
adjustment
, 'which refers
to an extension of established trends, resulting in stagnation or gradual decline' or a
lack of
renewal
, which would involve 'a signii cant change of the existing trajectory
of development, enabling the cluster to sustain its prosperity' (Chapman et al., 2004,
p. 383). In the case of adjustment, i rms tend to focus on cost reduction and copying,
whereas in the case of renewal, the focus will be on innovation and diversii cation. If
institutional resistance to restructuring is strong in old industrial areas suf ering from
de-industrialization (strong cognitive and political lock-ins), there is a strong tendency
