Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
5. Comparative analysis and conclusion
Are old industrial areas locked in decline? Not necessarily so is the i rst conclusion that
can be drawn after analysing restructuring processes in four regional economies. The
chapter has shown that some regional economies, such as Westmünsterland, successfully
renewed and diversii ed their economies, partly because of the lack of regional lock-ins
and hence the 'quiet restructuring' process. Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Daegu, on
the other hand, are locked in adjustment, partly because of strong lock-ins blocking nec-
essary renewal (Table 21.1). Analysing the impact of lock-ins on restructuring processes
was the i rst aim of this chapter.
The second aim formulated in the introduction of this chapter was to work out
impact
factors
to explain the dif erences found: why is it that we i nd relatively strong regional
lock-ins in some old industrial areas and relatively weak ones in other old industrial
areas? Derived from the literature, two types of impact factors were listed, that is
economic-structural impact factors and political-institutional impact factors. It was
expected that in comparison to the textile industry, the shipbuilding industry clearly has
stronger tendencies towards regional lock-ins, given its stronger spatial concentration
and mono-structure, high entry and exit barriers because of its capital-intensive charac-
teristics and its oligopolistic market structure. At the same time, it was expected that the
German associative model leads to a stronger involvement of local and regional actors
involved in lock-ins than in the Korean developmental state model.
The empirical results show that each individual case study can only be explained by
a unique set of impact factors (Table 21.1). Mono-structure does not necessarily lead to
regional lock-ins, as the case of Westmünsterland shows us. Also the industrial structure
does not in all cases explain the dif erences in lock-ins, as can be seen in South Korea,
where a lock-in prone industry such as shipbuilding does not show regionally induced
lock-in tendencies, whereas the regionally induced lock-in unexpectedly emerged in the
textile region in Daegu. Regionalism and national political factors that led to clientelism
play a role here. To understand, therefore, why the intensity of lock-ins dif ers between
Table 21
.
1
Comparative analysis of case studies
Adjustment/
renewal
Regional lock-ins
Dominant impact
factors
Mecklenburg-
Vorpommern
Adjustment
Strong at several
spatial levels
Both economic-
structural and political-
institutional factors
Gyeongnam
Slow renewal
Fair and enabling,
mainly at national
level
Economic- structural
factors dominate
Westmünsterland
Renewal
Weak
Both economic-
structural and specii c
regional political-
institutional factors
Daegu
Adjustment
Strong at local level
Political-institutional
impact factors
dominate
