Conceptualizing Clusters as Dynamic and Path-Dependent Pools of Skills

Edward Kasabov and Usha Sundaram

Regional Studies, 2016, vol. 50, issue 9, 1520-1536

Abstract: Kasabov E. and Sundaram U. Conceptualizing clusters as dynamic and path-dependent pools of skills, Regional Studies. This paper conceptualizes clusters as pools of dynamic, path-dependent skills that sustain economic resilience, transformation and development. It draws on extensive archival, historical material and empirical findings from the city of Coventry, UK, to demonstrate the long-term nature and processes of skills accumulation, growth and development. This novel approach to theorizing and understanding clusters provides a critique of current cluster conceptualizations, and offers an alternative imaginary to understanding agglomerations of economic activity. The paper also highlights problems and failures in cluster development and their sustenance through a skills pool. It develops implications for the sustained nourishment and replenishment of skills and validates skills as a critical unit of observation and analysis of clusters. The paper provides a longitudinal, socio-historical account of clusters that morph and evolve over time through the reconfiguration of path-dependent skills in support of the conceptualization.

Date: 2016
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DOI: 10.1080/00343404.2015.1037826

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