Industrial districts, innovation and I-district effect: territory or industrial specialization?

Rafael Boix

Working Papers from Department of Applied Economics at Universitat Autonoma of Barcelona

Abstract: The I-district effect hypothesis establishes the existence of highly intense innovation in Marshallian industrial districts due to the presence of external localization economies. However, industrial districts are characterized by specific manufacturing specializations in such a way that this effect could be due to these dominant specializations. The objective of this research is to test whether the effect is explained by the conditions of the territory or by the industrial specialization and to provide additional evidence of the existence and causes of the highly intense innovation in industrial districts (I-district effect). The estimates for Spain of a fixed effects model interacting territory and industry suggest that the high innovative performance of industrial districts is maintained across sectors whereas the industrial specialization behaves differently depending on the type of local production system in which it is placed. The I-district effect is related to the conditions of the territory more than to the industrial specialization. The territory is a key variable in explaining the processes of innovation and should be considered a basic dimension in the design of innovation and industrial policies.

Keywords: industrial districts; innovation; external economies; district effect (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O14 O31 R12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 32 pages
Date: 2008-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-geo, nep-ino, nep-tid and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Journal Article: Industrial Districts, Innovation and I-district Effect: Territory or Industrial Specialization? (2009)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:uab:wprdea:wpdea0807

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