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Theoretically, economic geography, new economic geography (NEG) and urban economics share much common ground. Several criticisms of the monopolistic modelling logic of NEG have come from economic geography schools of thought as well as from orthodox and heterodox schools of economics. These critiques focus variously on the immeasurability of notions of increasing returns, the static nature of assumptions, the specific focus on the representative firm, the presence only of pecuniary economies and the absence of either human capital or technological spillovers as externalities. However, advocates of the new economic approaches argue that their analyses provide insights into spatial economic phenomena which were previously unattainable under the existing analytical frameworks. In this chapter we reflect on these developments, putting equal weight on both conceptualisations, set off against a historical review of agglomeration and regional economic growth theories.

Handbook Chapter

In Handbook of Regional Growth and Development Theories

Edited by Roberta Capello and Peter Nijkamp

Published:: 26 July 2019

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.4337/9781788970020.00007

Collection: Economics 2019

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Entrepreneurial opportunity in innovative urban environments

New Horizons in Regional Science series

Otto Raspe and Frank Van Oort

Monograph Chapter

In Knowledge, Innovation and Space

Edited by Charlie Karlsson, Börje Johansson, Kiyoshi Kobayashi and Roger R. Stough

Published:: 25 July 2014

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.4337/9781783475988.00008

Collection: Economics 2014

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Regional economic competition and place- based policies

Frank van Oort and Mark Thissen

Analysing regional competitiveness by benchmarking regions on various indicators is a common practice. However, such rankings of regions are not based on actual competition; instead, they compare a set of regions on various indicators. This chapter benchmarks regions using a measure for revealed competition based on product-specific spatial market overlap on firms’ export markets, on knowledge cooperation among scientists, and on the attraction of foreign direct investment (FDI). This analysis shows that this revealed competition is not only spatially different for these three types of competition, but that it is also region- and market-specific. This confronts policymakers with complicated place-based decisions concerning investments aimed at enhancing a region’s competitive position in Europe, which is far more complicated than suggested by existing benchmarking exercises. The chapter illustrates this with the example of the city of Utrecht, which is currently the most competitive region according to the European Regional Competitiveness Index.