Solving the Riddle of Industrial Policy: A Comparative Perspective

Industrial policy would appear to be fertile ground for the application of evaluative comparison, that is, the use of comparative methods to elicit principles for policy improvement. Comparative methods have been used, although often on a highly selective basis, to support or rebut arguments about targeted government intervention in industry. This paper argues that it is only when industrial policy is reconceptualised as a system of incentives rather than as a set of allocative decisions that evaluative comparison comes into its own. By developing and applying the 'most different' method of comparison, it is possible to discern the key elements of successful industrial policy in a form which can be used to bring about practical improvement in any given country.     

Multinational Knowledge Strategies,Policy and the Upgrading Process of Regions: Revisiting the Automotive Industry in Ostrava and Shanghai

This paper revisits how and why new multinational knowledge-based strategies and multi-level governmental policies influence the upgrading process of regions in developing economies. Automotive multinationals traditionally exploited local asset conditions, but it is shown that they have also been contributing to knowledge-generation systems via investments in R&D centres and cooperation with regional knowledge producers. We discern three elements of the upgrading process of regions—upgrading of domestic firms, subsidiary evolution and establishment of strategic relations with local knowledge institutes—to analyse two case studies: Ostrava (Czech Republic) and Shanghai (China). The cases show that all types of upgrading—product, process, chain and functional—have taken place in the last years, and that follow sourcing may have a positive impact on regional upgrading. These observations provide lessons for governments in developing economies which aim to strengthen innovation-based regional development.     

Policy Knowledge, Policy Formulation, and Change: Revisiting a Foundational Question

Understanding the influence of policy knowledge (analysis, evaluation) on policy change represents a long-standing quest in the policy sciences. Despite attempts of Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) scholars, the first to embark systematically on this quest, utilization and policy process literatures still run parallel. Through a critique of ACF and utilization studies, we argue that the inability of policy theory to include how and which information decision makers use is the foundational issue hindering efforts to link process and substance in policy theory. Situating utilization studies in the policy design approach offers an improvement in conceptualizing relationships between policy knowledge, process, and change.     

Antarctic history: A reply to professor W. H. Hobbs

On July 25th 1983 a severe thunderstorm brought torrential rain and flooding to a small valley near Newcastleton in Roxburghshire. At one site within the valley, around 65 mm of rainfall was recorded in 75 minutes, though this was probably 2 km from the centre of the storm. The resulting peak flow was estimated at almost 170 m³s^‐1 from a drainage area of 36.9 km². Lightning killed some livestock whilst many more were drowned. The storm triggered peat slides on several hillsides and caused extensive erosion of river banks and damage to buildings and bridges. The associated high sediment load killed fish stocks in the receiving waters. The flood was a significant event in terms of its human disruption and its impact on the natural environment.