区域经济韧性：研究综述与展望

自金融危机以来，区域经济韧性成为了研究热点。现有文献从均衡论及演化论的视角建构了区域经济韧性的理论框架，认为区域经济韧性不仅是区域发展的结果也是区域发展的动态过程。大量实证研究关注区域发展过程，探讨了不同尺度下经济系统对冲击的抵抗力、恢复力，并分析了经济韧性的影响机理。区域经济韧性是时间维度与空间尺度的统一。现有研究多关注区域本身特性，缺乏从动态性、多主体互动性、多尺度融合视角审视区域经济韧性的形成过程。因此未来研究一方面应当在现有理论基础上与关系经济地理、管理学等领域紧密结合，更重视危机与冲击的异质性，系统揭示行为主体在区域经济韧性形成、维持过程中的重要作用；另一方面应当进一步关注中国发展背景与制度优势，重视韧性研究对经济发展深远的意义，从而增强中国经济在不确定环境下的稳定性。     

韧性概念演变与区域经济韧性研究进展

区域经济韧性试图解释当冲击发生时为何部分区域能够适应恢复,实现区域经济的持续发展,而有的区域不能摆脱冲击影响,步入经济衰退轨迹。本文通过对国内外相关文献的梳理,总结了工程韧性、生态韧性和演化韧性的概念演变以及从均衡论观点到演化观点的转向,据此重新定义了区域经济韧性的概念内涵,认为区域经济韧性是系统面对冲击时,抵抗冲击影响避免脱离发展轨迹或通过适应恢复实现经济持续发展的能力,是一个不断演化的过程。探讨了区域经济韧性研究的三个理论分析方法,对关于区域经济韧性的测度和影响因素的实证研究进行了评述,强调亟需加强韧性理论研究,界定清晰概念内涵,同时加强区域经济韧性定量本土化研究,将区域经济韧性理论应用到我国老工业基地等经济衰退地区的经济振兴与转型问题中,以期对区域经济发展提供科学参考。     

Determinants of regional resilience to economic crisis: a European perspective

The impact of the economic crisis has been highly asymmetric across the European regions. The objective of this paper is to investigate the determinants of resilience to economic crisis across European regions. Regional economic resilience was assessed based on employment changes during 2008–2013, while socioeconomic determinants were analysed pre-crisis (2002–2007). A highly heterogeneous pattern of resilience was observed within countries, while significant differences were also revealed between the continental northern-central regions and the southern periphery. A multilevel logistic regression model indicated the magnitude of country-effects on the performance of regional employment during crisis periods. Both EU-referenced and country-referenced regional resilience identified the positive effect of accessibility and the negative effect of a large manufacturing sector in the ability of regions to withstand recessionary shocks. Education and economic development level positively affected the resilience of both large and small regional European economies. Investing in education enhances the spatial homogeneity across Europe in terms of its ability to react to economic shocks. The results reveal the importance of narrowing disparities among regions and formulating targeted and differentiated regional development policies at country level, taking into consideration the size of the economy of the regions.     

Sectoral Resilience: Conceptualizing Industry-Specific Spatial Patterns of Interactive Crisis Adjustment

While the regional resilience approach stresses major place-specific factors of adaptability to economic crises, industry-sector-specific mechanisms of shock response, which often cross-regional boundaries, still require conceptualization relating to aspects of resilience. This paper proposes the concept of sectoral resilience, which acknowledges that the actors who constitute the value chains and production systems of an industry sector, when struck by a major global crisis, collectively and interactively form a sector-specific pattern of response and adaptation. As these actors often strategically use assets at different locations, industry-specific spatial patterns of adaptation emerge that affect various regions in differing ways. After defining the suggested concept and related terminology, its geographical logics are outlined. Then major conceptual pillars of sectoral resilience are depicted, relating to six major, partly interdependent process fields. For each of them, mechanisms of shock adaptation of an industry sector and major factors of inter-sectoral distinctions of resilience patterns are pointed out, briefly illustrated by the examples of the automotive and mechanical engineering sectors. The approach helps us better understand industry-specific features of crisis adaptation and intersections of regional and corporate logics of resilience.     

Remaking the architecture: the emerging powers,self‐insuring and regional insulation

This article examines the interaction between the emerging and traditional powers in global governance reform, and asks whether we are heading towards an international financial system that is more fragmented, where power is more diffused and national and regional arrangements play a more prominent role, at the expense of global multilateral institutions. It begins with a brief discussion of the global systemic and country‐specific factors that motivate Brazil, China and other emerging countries to accumulate large currency reserves. We find that national arrangements for managing financial and currency crises will continue to hold sway for emerging countries in the wake of the global crisis. However, the actual capacity of regional arrangements in managing future financial crises is uncertain, and the significance of regional alternatives in the emerging architecture should not be overstated. The real capacity of East Asian regional arrangements to manage financial crises, payments problems or currency attacks is still untested, and key thresholds in multilateralization still lie ahead. In South America, multilateral lender‐of‐last‐resort support inside the region is largely confined to the sub‐regional level and is limited by Brazil's reticence. Enduring reliance on bilateral measures for financial crisis management is noted. Where there has been progress in regional solutions, since the global crisis, has been in the role of regional development banks in providing financing for developing countries to enact counter‐cyclical policies. Such support also provides insulation for states in the region against the contagion effects of international financial crisis. We are in the midst of transitioning to a more diverse and multi‐tiered global financial and monetary system. A reformed IMF could have a role to play in addressing global imbalances and encouraging a shift from national reserves to collective insurance, however, it would be preconditioned by significant shifts in the policy, lending operations, and internal governance of the Fund, and willingness among the G20 to strike a new consensus on how to deal with imbalances, and new accommodation on acceptable reserve levels.     

Persistence of innovative activities in times of crisis: the case of the Basque Country

By drawing on a large sample of Spanish manufacturing and service sector firms, the changes in firms’ innovation expenditures that have taken place since the onset of the 2008 economic crisis are analysed, as is the relationship between such changes and the location of the company. Special focus is placed on firms in the Basque Country. Compared to other Spanish regions, the Basque Country differs in terms of its fiscal status, its earlier experience of crises, its innovation performance and its greater focus on innovation-related policies. Our results show that the impact of the crisis on firms’ innovation expenditures in the Basque Country has indeed differed from that in comparable Spanish regions. Even after controlling for sectoral differences and for detailed characteristics at the firm level, firms with R&D employment in the Basque Country showed a significantly lower probability of abandoning innovation activities and even a somewhat higher probability of increasing their innovation efforts. This regional effect is especially significant for small and medium-sized enterprises.     

Agency and resilience in the time of regional economic crisis

Using a comparative case study on the closure of the research and development facilities of a pharmaceutical company in two regions in Sweden, this paper investigates the emergence of regional economic resilience from an agency perspective. Findings include a networked region engendering agency from non-state actors whilst substantial state intervention is needed to facilitate agency from a less networked region. The paper finds broad confirmation that interactions of actors are due to how a region is organized and the contingencies of its institutional context. Collective agency depends on the ability of actors to align interests and coalesce agendas which, as shown by the two cases, can be based on shared regional affinity as in the case of Södertälje or innovation strategies as in the case of Lund. Regional economic crises bring forth conditions and impetus for temporary modes of cooperation that mobilize resources to launch adaptive resilience strategies. Conflicts in resource distributions or operational complexity make developing agency-based resilience challenging. Emergent regional outcomes from agency-based resilience from these two cases exhibit adaptation with the potential for adaptability in Lund, and adaptability with degrees of adaptation in Södertälje.     

Economic crises in the ASEAN area: types and responses

Southeast Asia, the world region covering the countries of ASEAN, lies at the crossroads between China and India. Since early times it has been part of the global economy, going through cycles of boom and bust at least from the nineteenth century onwards. This essay compares three successive economic crises during the 1880s, 1930s and late 1990s. It shows how different types of crisis reflected as well as produced changes in the connectivity between production factors and institutional arrangements. Whereas the crisis of the 1880s was ‘local’, that of the 1930s was both ‘national’ and ‘delegated global’ and that of the 1990s ‘regional’ in nature. The types of crisis and the ways in which they were handled reflected structural changes in the institutional architecture of the global economy.     

Border-regional resilience in EU internal and external border areas in Finland

European border regions have witnessed a long history of remarkable mobility shocks stemming from complex ecological and economic changes and geopolitical events. The experience of near-continuous regional and global crisis has increased interest towards the idea of resilience, that is, the ability of communities and regions to adapt and cope with disturbances and transitions. Inspired by the literature of regional resilience and the evolutionary approach, this paper will examine the difference that borders and geopolitical conditions make from the perspective of regional resilience and especially ‘border-regional resilience’. Particular focus will be on irregular cross-border mobilities and consequent transitions in EU external and internal border towns, here the Finnish towns of Lappeenranta and Tornio. The study points out that the geopolitical environment and the openness of the border partly determine the regional development trajectories and the ways of coping with cross-border mobility-related changes. Although the border location entails some vulnerability, formal and informal cross-border institutions and relations of trust are of crucial importance from the perspective of border-regional resilience. The paper proposes a research agenda for studying border-regional resilience in the context of environmental, economic and social changes and geopolitical events.     

Unfolding the relationship between resilient firms and the region

ABSTRACT

This research explores organizational resilience in four manufacturing firms in four different regions of Norway. While regional resilience has gained attention in research, there have been few studies with a micro-level focus, investigating firms and their distinctive features of resilience. We chose a qualitative multiple-case study approach and employed a critical incident technique to study resilience in selected firms that had experienced external shocks and shifts in regard to changing markets, globalization and advances in technology. Each, however, had managed to continually develop resilience capacity over time. Our framework considered three dimensions of organizational resilience: the cognitive, the behavioural and the contextual. We address how resilience is sustained over time, the evolutionary nature of organizational resilience in firms and how resilient firms relate to the region. We found that all three dimensions of resilience capacity were evident in each firm, but appeared as a complex and unique blend. Furthermore, each dimension was supported by regional ties and affiliations. The findings suggest that organizational resilience is a dynamic capability conditioned by firm–region interactions, which are cultural, social and economic. Regional resilience is built through the contribution of the firm to the economic and social systems of the region.     

The role of path-dependence in the resilience of EU regions

The paper studies the role of path-dependence in the resilience of EU regions. Particularly, employing a nonparametric analysis, the paper demonstrates that historical adjustments of EU regions materialized by productivity improvements, primarily in the manufacturing sector and incidentally in the sectors of construction, financial and non-market services, during the period 1995–2008 secured high(er) levels of regional resilience during the economic crisis period 2008–2013. Such a finding provides implications not only for theory but also for policy. Policies aiming at boosting regional productivity and competitiveness, which through a positive regional performance of high growth rates is concealed, a well-structured and robust production restructuring, might affect regional resilience in a way that shields regional economies not only from current imbalances but also from any future downturns.     

Out of the crisis: an empirical investigation of place-specific determinants of economic resilience

This article attempts to isolate the structural characteristics that affect the resilience of a regional economy. It focuses on the role played by related/unrelated variety and differentiated knowledge bases as drivers for regional resilience and originally explores their interdependences. Italy is the empirical setting, and Italian local labour systems the unit of analysis. Regional resilience is measured as growth of the employment rate after the Great Recession that began in 2008. Results confirm the importance of related variety and of differentiated knowledge bases as drivers for regional resilience. We found support of the creative capacity of culture argument, providing evidence that a moderate concentration in symbolic knowledge-based economic activities contributes to resilience. Synthetic and analytical knowledge-based activities provide positive and no support to regional resilience, respectively. Finally, the relatedness of the symbolic knowledge-based activities increases regional economic resilience. Some policy implications are then derived from these findings.     

There are Many Roads to Reindustrialization and Resilience: Place-based Approaches in Three German Urban Regions

Reindustrialization has become a major political objective in the European Union. This paper provides three urban case studies on reindustrialization pathways and experiences during the global economic crisis to reveal the specificities of place-based approaches on the local level despite common policies on EU, federal and state levels. Moreover, the evolutionary perspective on reindustrialization and economic resilience shows the importance of adaptive capabilities on the local level, although the sources for these capabilities differ according to context- and place-specific structures.     

Do behaviours in cultural markets affect economic resilience? An analysis of Italian regions

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relation between the economic resilience and cultural behaviour, resorting to the evidence provided by 20 Italian regions at the time of Great Recession. We consider specific cultural behaviours, which provide a specific meaning of culture; its relation with the economic resilience of regions is analysed. We document that higher levels of supplied and demanded quantity of cultural goods in a region are associated with higher regional economic resilience as measured by the ability of limiting employment drop; the relation with the considered cultural behaviours is weaker in the case of economic resilience as measured by the ability of limiting income drop. We propose possible explanations for this asymmetry.     

中国西部开发研究评述

本文在改革开放以来我国东西部经济发展差距日益扩大的地区经济发展格局下,在充分吸收前人研究成果和参阅大量文献的基础上,对改革开放二十年以来我国学术界对西部开发的研究著作、西部开发中关于东西部经济发展差距拉大的原因、西部经济开发战略、西部产业结构调整、西部开发的经济布局、西部开发中对外开放和区际贸易等问题一一做了评述,指出了西部开发研究工作中取得的成绩和今后研究中可资注意的有关问题。     

THE INDUSTRIAL RESTRUCTURING OF SOUTH WALES: THE CAREER OF A STATE MANAGED REGION

This paper examines the causes of the current economic crisis in the industrial region of South Wales. The authors maintain that past as well as current government policies have played a major role in bringing about the crisis by contributing to the vulnerability of communities in South Wales. The authors review the history of the policies which have contributed to the current steel and coal crises. They then provide a brief discussion of current legislative policies designed to combat the crises. Finally, they critique alternative strategies: continued monetarism; a return To Keynesian/‘corporatist’ policies; and the radical restructuring demanded by an ‘Alternative Economic Strategy’ (AES).     

环北部湾海洋经济圈发展研究

随着海洋世纪潮的全球涌动,实施海洋经济开发已成为中国经济和社会发展的重要战略取向。而横跨中越两国边境的北部湾海洋经济区,是中国西南地区出行东盟国家的必经通道,具有重要的国际合作开发价值,所以已经纳入海洋区域开发和西部大开发的国家战略安排。为此,考察北部湾海洋经济区的基本结构,依托自身优势打造北部湾海洋经济圈;发挥区域内核心城市的引擎功能,促进北部湾海洋经济区协调发展;充分利用海洋资源禀赋,依据西部大开发政策打造环北部湾海洋经济圈,使之成长为中国与东盟的区域性物流基地、跨国境商贸基地、现代制造业基地和国际信息交流中心,应当从研讨课题推进到合作开发实践。     

经济韧性视角下城镇产业演化的路径依赖与路径创造——基于东莞市樟木头、常平镇的对比分析

在经济韧性视角下,本文基于路径依赖与路径创造理论构建了一个研究城镇产业衰落与转型的分析框架,进而对东莞市樟木头与常平的产业发展路径进行详细梳理和对比分析,探讨地理区位、产业结构等初始条件相似的城镇受到相同外部冲击时出现韧性差异的原因,包括地方制度、技术变革、经济结构、劳动力结构、社会文化氛围等。据此提出转型升级对策：寻找新主导产业,提升经济主体潜力与联系;科学规划空间结构,调整存量用地功能,提高土地利用效率,全面升级硬件设施;重塑强调风险管控与危机意识的社会文化氛围。通过建立演化经济地理学与经济韧性相结合的实证研究范式,本文为产业结构单一城镇提供了具有借鉴意义的韧性增强途径和路径创造方式。     

Australian foreign policy in political time: middle power creativity,misplaced friendships,and crises of leadership

Over the past century, Australian foreign policy orders have been stabilised by the construction of ideas that have reduced uncertainty regarding national interests. Yet, such ideas have often evolved in ways that have engendered misplaced certainty, renewed instability, and crisis. To explain such shifts, I highlight the role of an Australian ‘pragmatic liberal tradition’, one which has enabled alternating tendencies to principled stability or technocratic hubris. In a tripartite model, I trace stages over initial ‘middle power’ efforts to construct ideas that lead states—and particularly great powers—to identify interests in cooperation, misplaced certainty in great power ties which obscures new challenges, and the construction of crises that impede or enable change. Empirically, I apply this framework to the construction, conversion, and crises of the ongoing ‘Reform order’. These span the initial Hawke-era middle power integration of US and regional ties, Howard-era misplaced certainty in US-styled neoconservative bandwagoning and neoliberal macroeconomic accommodation, and evolving constructions of the War on Terror and Global Financial Crisis. In the conclusion, I address theoretical and policy implications, highlighting the initial challenges that crises can pose for middle power leadership, and the subsequent scope for creativity.