Technology, resources and geography in a paradigm shift: the case of Critical & Conflict Materials in ICTs

Andreas Diemer, Simona Iammarino, Richard Perkins and Axel Gros

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: The mining of several critical raw materials – including the so-called ‘conflict minerals’ associated with armed conflict and human rights abuses – and their combination, refining and use in many new advanced electronic products, are providing an important material infrastructure to current technological progress. Relying on text analysis of USPTO patent data between 1976 and 2017, our explorative study provides a methodological and empirical starting point for exploring the technological and geographical linkages between technological paradigms and selected critical and conflict materials (CCMs). Our descriptive analysis finds evidence of a clear association between ICT technologies and CCM intensity over time, and of a striking resource-technology divide in global ICT value chains between value creating and value extracting activities across Global North and Global South and their regions. The paperintends to emphasize the need for a more critical, spatially sensitive approach to studying resource-based technological change to expose the uneven development consequences created, sustained, or mitigated by technological progress.

Keywords: critical and conflict materials; paradigm shift; technological demand; geography of technology; geography of resource supply (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O30 Q34 Q55 R11 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 34 pages
Date: 2021-09-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-geo, nep-ict, nep-isf and nep-tid
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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