Skip to main content
  • Book
  • © 2001

Local Development and Competitiveness

Part of the book series: GeoJournal Library (GEJL, volume 59)

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 84.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check for access.

Table of contents (10 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xiv
  2. Part One

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 1-1
    2. Space and technological dynamics

      • Sergio Conti, Paolo Giaccaria
      Pages 3-34
    3. The plural economy

      • Sergio Conti, Paolo Giaccaria
      Pages 65-88
    4. Regional development and policies. The legacy of functionalism

      • Sergio Conti, Paolo Giaccaria
      Pages 89-106
    5. The language of systems

      • Sergio Conti, Paolo Giaccaria
      Pages 107-129
  3. Part Two

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 131-131
    2. Competitiveness and development: from enterprise to place

      • Sergio Conti, Paolo Giaccaria
      Pages 133-155
    3. Time, scales and local systems. Theoretical foundations

      • Sergio Conti, Paolo Giaccaria
      Pages 157-186
    4. The relational economy: networks, space and knowledge

      • Sergio Conti, Paolo Giaccaria
      Pages 187-215
    5. The local value production system: empirical evidence

      • Sergio Conti, Paolo Giaccaria
      Pages 217-242
  4. Conclusions

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 243-243
    2. A story still to be told

      • Sergio Conti, Paolo Giaccaria
      Pages 245-253
  5. Back Matter

    Pages 255-282

About this book

In recent years, the contemporary social sciences have again turned their attention to space and places. The hypothesis is that these are not accidental episodes but a full-blown revolution in the way of viewing economic processes and their links with social and cultural structures. In other words, this new sensitivity to places offers the possibility of rethinking issues typical of economics in a different perspective that might be defined as local development, one of the terms most (ab)used in the contemporary scientific and political debate.
In this book the authors will thus try to support more strongly, although in a necessarily simplified manner, the possibility of constructing a theory of local development. The key idea is that there is no single development model operating at a given time and valid for all places, but that it is more correct to talk of multiple development paths that co-exist in the same place at the same time (multiplicity of development paths). The central point is not to identify the succession of distinct hegemonic models (Fordism versus post-Fordism, mass production versus lean production and so on), but to show how the complexity of the contemporary economy demands new concepts to explain its apparent contradictions. In the authors' view, the conception of a theory of local development implies radical rethinking in institutionalist terms of the way of viewing the economy and production, recognising that behind economic development lies a wealth of institutional assets that make the encounter between local and global more open and varied than ever before (institutional biodiversity).

Authors and Affiliations

  • Dipartimento Interateneo Territorio, University of Turin, Torino, Italy

    Sergio Conti, Paolo Giaccaria

Bibliographic Information

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 84.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access