In this thesis, I propose that bike courier delivery is not merely a convenient service for clients but an important function in the operation of successful economies. By allowing the regions to function at higher speeds, same-day courier networks seem to play an active role in generating positive economic outcomes. The availability of courier networks is found to be as uneven as economic vitality itself. Cities like New York and Toronto have large, dense courier networks, capable of delivering items within an hour while smaller cites, do not support same-day courier service at all. They do this, in part, by allowing for couriers to cope with the precariousness of their work, and in part by providing supportive sub-cultures. These findings point to the role of service workers, and wider eco-systems in fostering regional advantage.

Building on recent work in economic geography, evolutionary economics, and international business, I examine how firms that enter from outside a region alter the knowledge and opportunity structure for potential entrepreneurial entrants and indigenous incumbents in that region. In particular, I examine the short and long run effects of both greenfield and acquisition entry on entrepreneurial entry, as well as on the exit and growth of indigenous incumbents in industry clusters. A comprehensive dataset of all firms in the Canadian biotech industry between 1976 and 2003 is used to study the dynamic effects within all regions that have experienced an external entry. The results show a complex set of processes at work. Newer greenfield and acquisition entrants have consistently opposing effects, with newer greenfields enhancing entrepreneurial entry, but dampening growth and survival of indigenous incumbents in the longer run. Older greenfields, those that have a long presence in a given region and are primarily traditional pharmaceutical firms, have a similar effect to that of acquisitions. Moreover, the level of agglomeration moderates the influence of ‘outsiders’ on the indigenous industry, especially in the case of acquisitions. The results suggest that legal constraints on labor mobility barriers have an important influence on the observed patterns. The overall patterns suggest that the search and site selection of outsiders is an important mechanism driving local industry evolution, complementary to other traditional mechanisms.

Knowledge, learning, and innovation are vital elements in facilitating economic development and growth. Technological change, which is a synonym for generating knowledge, the diffusion thereof, and subsequent application in the marketplace in the form of novel products and processes, i.e. innovations, has a strong effect on the collective wealth of regions and nations. Knowledge spillovers, which are unintended knowledge flows that take place among spatial (geography) and sectoral (industry) units of observation, provide a rationale for diverging growth rates among spatial units, well beyond what might be explained by variations in jurisdictional factor endowments, and thus are of particular interest in this context. Measuring and quantifying the creation and diffusion of knowledge has proven to be a challenging endeavor. One way to capture technical and economically valuable knowledge is by means of patent and patent citation analysis. Following this approach, and utilizing a novel patent database that has been specifically developed for this purpose, the present dissertation investigates the spatio-sectoral patterns of knowledge spillovers in the Canadian economy over the time period 1983 to 2007. The employed research methodology addresses existing limitations in this stream of research, and contributes to the continuing debate regarding the significance of sectoral specialization versus diversity, and local versus non-local knowledge spillovers as the main driver of knowledge formation processes leading to innovation at the sub-regional scale. The findings indicate that knowledge spillovers are localized, and furthermore, that this localization effect has increased over time for both spillovers within a particular industry, as well as between industry sectors. The analysis of micro-geographic industry specific spatio-sectoral knowledge formation processes, and the inquiry into local sectoral knowledge spillover patterns, outlines how regional evolutionary technology trajectories potentially shape the rate and direction of technological change, and consequently influence economic growth, at a particular place.

Traditional theories of industrial restructuring assign the most explanatory weight of the structural change phenomenon to increasing pressures via globalization and falling trade barriers. This thesis offers a new model of thinking about industrial restructuring that includes multiple stressors. The thesis focuses on three main drivers of structural change: market pressures, environmental regulation and changes in land use and land pricing, using two case studies of leather and footwear industrial clusters in Mexico, located in the cities of León and Guadalajara. Evidence of multiple drivers of structural change is found in the dissertation. Furthermore, responses to restructuring drivers in León and Guadalajara are found to be substantially different. Firms in the leather and footwear cluster in León have implemented countervailing strategies such as price competition, government lobbying, and more recently, investment in socio-economic research (competitiveness) projects. However, firms in the leather and footwear cluster in Guadalajara focused on a specific, high-end target market. At the larger, urban scale, footwear and its allied industries in the city of León resisted change and have tried to remain in operation while the city of Guadalajara has focused on a diversification strategy, attracting new (arguably more technically advanced) industries. This thesis offers empirical and theoretical advances. Empirically, it applies a firm demographics approach to the study of industrial clusters under multiple stressors. This approach has not been previously used on Mexican data. Theoretically, it demonstrates that future analyses of industrial complexes’ structural change can be strengthened through the use of an integrated assessment framework investigating the effect of multiple stressors (market forces, land pricing, technical change, environmental regulations, and consumer preferences) on industrial restructuring.

In the last decades, small firms have accounted for a disproportionately large share of new jobs. Using data from 1993 to 2009, the concern of this thesis is to examine regional differences in employment growth in Sweden, with  a focus at the role of small firms. The author employs findings from previous studies and theoretical discussions on advantages and disadvantages of small firms to derive a number of variables to use in two multiple regression models on regional employment growth, one for the period 1993-2001 and one for the period 2001-2009. The results show that, unlike increases of well educated workers and the population growth, increases in small firm employment is significant in explaining employment growth in both periods, with a positive relationship. For both periods, changes in small firms’ share of employment is not significant in explaining employment growth. Although many new jobs have been generated in service industries, changes in the service sectors’ share of employment is highly insignificant as an explanatory variable for employment growth. Moreover, an increased share of highly educated workers is negatively related to employment growth.

The Swedish geographer Gerd Enequist (1903-1989) left behind great amounts of private and work material when she passed away. This was donated to the University Library of Uppsala, Carolina Rediviva, in three different accessions. This resulted in three different record. The subject of this report is the progress of assembling these record into one complete record. The registering led to many important decisions such as the role of provenance and the relation of private and public documents. Above all the special nature of personal archives have been a topic of discussion. Personal archives separate themselves from public records and therefore demand a different strategy of listing. The width of kinds of material and the mixture of private and public records are important qualities that differ them from public records. The report is initiated with an introduction of Enequist, followed by a description of the three accessions. In the second part of the report the work with recording the archive is accounted for including a description of the headings of the record. Thereafter the problems encountered during the work are described and discussed. The report is completed with a short proposal of the research values of the archive.

Denna uppsats är en pilotstudie för Regionförbundet Östsam. Den syftar till att kritisera och testa en metod som behandlar serviceutbudet i tätorter inom Fjärde storstadsregionen. Denna metod bygger på att kartlägga utbudet, vikta detta enligt en poängmodell och sedan analysera resultatet och söka skapa en ortsklassificering. Metoden är tänkt vara ett verktyg i modern regionalplanering och kunna förbättra serviceutbudet i regionen. I studien har svensk regionalpolitiskt historia, centralorts- och nätverksteori använts för att visa på hur modern regionalplanering söker skapa samarbeten utifrån funktionella omland och inte genom administrativa områden.Det studien visar är att metoden står i förhållande till den politik som förs av dess användare. Metodens olika delar utformas utifrån den bakomliggande politiken. Vidare konkluderas det att metoden går att användas för regionalplanering men mest som ett initialt verktyg för vidare arbete. Inga direkta slutsatser kunde dras ur resultatet då underlaget för studien varit för begränsad. dock ges en exemplifiering av hur resultatet kan komma att presenteras och användas, bland annat genom en typ av klassificering av de använda orterna.

Abstract Attractiveness may be defined by a variety of factors but you should see it in the public planning as it is to have a positive population growth and economic growth, through working with communications, service, housing, to name a few. This is done primarily through direct projects both within the municipality and through various partnerships between local and regional level. The progress we have seen in recent years has gone more towards a clear shell level, particularly a regional level where these have had a much greater freedom with clear geographical boundaries in between each other. Within these regions there are also clear regional groupings that have common interests and competing between each other. In my thesis, we have been distinguished including three levels of scale levels. At the local level Osby municipality, together with the other municipalities in Skåne Nordost working Sound region and at regional level, Region Skåne after that will the national level and global level. Osby has for several years worked with attractiveness both within its own municipality, and through collaborations with both north-east Skåne, Region Skåne and a number of other formal and informal collaborations. Efforts to increase its attractiveness has been assumed to have a stable population and a positive economic growth. This work has been made concrete by using the outline above, and that through various projects, such as this can Pågatågen and Boda like to mention. Both projects are designed to increase the attractiveness of just Osby. Through working with these projects and to always show up, so will these projects lead to Osby will have a positive population growth and economic growth. Osby municipality has a good location for the future, especially their geographical position, especially in view of the main line gives them an edge against other municipalities located in the periphery of a strong growth region. Another reason that makes Osby has a good location that they went through a restructuring during the high economic climate and with it so has it been able to adapt its business is now located at a high national level.

No description available.

This thesis focuses on the changing modes of state intervention into the economy in neoliberalism. It contends that the so called free market is neither a natural process nor an inevitable result of the harmony of interest, but the result of a deliberate political making process. The global economic crisis provided ample evidence to refute the claim that state and market are separately existing and antagonistic entities and indicates that the issue is not the market or the state, since the state in a capitalist society is equally subordinate to capital, simply providing an alternative mode of regulation of capital accumulation. The state has always been essential for &quot / proper&quot / workings of the market, especially for the interests of capital and the neoliberal state is not an exception