Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
also the technological, knowledge and organizational characteristics of
the MNE.
5.6.1
Evolution of Spatial Structures
The arguments developed in the previous sections allow us to ask ques-
tions about how observed industrial clusters themselves may evolve over
time and how such features may relate to the types of multinational firms
that locate there. The reason is that, following our original Alchian (1950)
arguments in Chapter 3, because of global scale, global network effects,
and knowledge and technological advantages, the location of multina-
tional investment into a region can stimulate processes of change within
that region. In this respect, the interdependence of industrial and spatial
dynamics in the current era of multinationalism and globalization depends
on the balance between the internal and external sources of innovation or,
in other words by the degree of
closure
versus
openness
of the innovation
models at both the firm and spatial system level (Belussi et al. 2008). For
example, on the one hand, in the case of the industrial complex and the
two types of social networks, the extent to which firms within the cluster
or region rely on internal (intra-firm) or external (extra-firm) innova-
tion sources is largely determined by the technological regime conditions
within the cluster, whereas in the case of pure agglomeration it is essen-
tially space-driven. On the other hand, the extent to which the cluster or
the region as a whole is inward or outward looking is largely influenced
by the system's capacity for learning at the boundaries, and also by the
system's potential for developing dynamic interactive capabilities and
spreading its knowledge base outside its boundaries. The way in which the
firms belonging to a particular cluster modulate their strategy, combin-
ing local and global sources for innovation and building intra-regional,
interregional and international knowledge networks, is an indicator of
the openness of the spatial system as a whole. An MNE's local presence
can substantially alter such innovation and production models at the
spatial level (Belussi and Sammarra 2010). This is because even in a largely
closed innovation model in a particular location, multinational intra-firm
knowledge sourcing will be external to the cluster, thereby influencing its
evolutionary paths.
All of the taxonometric categories presented in Table 5.2 assume that
local knowledge spillovers operate in some form, although they may vary
significantly in both nature and scope across the cluster typologies. As
such, the knowledge-technology-cluster categories presented in Table 5.2
therefore offer a framework for examining the interactions between the
global and local location behaviour of MNEs, and how both inward
