Economic Geography

Lindahl, David P.; Beyers, William B.

doi: 10.1111/j.1944-8287.1999.tb00071.xpmid: N/A

AbstractIn this paper we focus on how competitive advantage is constructed by producer service businesses, how it varies among establishments with different characteristics, and how it affects establishment performance. Sources of competitive advantage stem from characteristics such as quality, price, creativity and innovation, flexibility, timeliness of delivery, and scope of services offered. We present a detailed evaluation of the competitive advantage model developed by Porter (1990) and review applications of this model to the producer services. We find this model to be partially successful in distinguishing between superior and inferior performance by producer service businesses, with important differences observed across age, organizational type, and size of business. We develop an expanded model of factors related to competitive advantage and performance, which includes not only factors contained in the Porter model, but dimensions particular to the information-oriented producer services, such as creativity, geographic proximity, R&D capabilities, and adaptability to client needs.

HUallacháin, Breandán Ó; Wasserman, David

doi: 10.1111/j.1944-8287.1999.tb00072.xpmid: N/A

AbstractBrazil’s automobile component parts industry shows that vertical integration and scale economies endure within flexible production systems. Recent neoliberal economic reforms propelled vehicle assemblers to adopt flexible modes of production and subcontract component manufacturing. However, transactional hazards in supply chains escalated as first-tier subsystem assemblers had to rely on small, opportunistic, and inefficient parts makers. Large tier one suppliers purchased existing parts makers and invested in greenfield facilities to service both new flexibly organized vehicle assembly plants in southern Brazil and Argentina and restructured assembly plants in the traditional automobile complex of São Paulo. We focus on Dana Corporation, Bradesco Bank, and British Tyre and Rubber Corporation—firms that assemble chasses, engines, and body subsystems, respectively. These companies dominate their segment of the parts industry, delivering subsystems to a growing network of flexible vehicle assembly plants throughout Brazil. Large-batch parts production, subsystem assembly by a few major multinational tier one suppliers, and ownership consolidation underscore the continued role of vertical integration and scale economies in automobile production chains.

Mutersbaugh, Tad

doi: 10.1111/j.1944-8287.1999.tb00073.xpmid: N/A

AbstractThis ethnographic case study of a rural production co-op in the indigenous community of Santa Cruz (Oaxaca, Mexico) documents men’s efforts to enlist women’s participation in men’s co-op projects. Over an eight-year period, men initiated a number of production projects, only to see them fail when women refused to participate. I use data from participant observation, surveys, and interviews to construct gendered time-geographies of agricultural and co-op project labor. These reveal the existence of labor crises, moments in the agricultural calendar when men’s labor is insufficient to cover both household and co-op tasks. Men’s attempts to mobilize women’s labor power were met with women’s counterstrategies of resistance. Ultimately, women established their own co-op production section (bakery) when men opted to incorporate them into the co-op as decision makers. The analysis suggests, first, that development project dynamics are fluid and, within specific circumstances, can enhance women’s social and economic position vis-à-vis men. Second, participation is always partial and contingent and best examined within a context of ongoing negotiations. Lastly, poststructuralist time-geographies may contribute to development analysis when conceived as both material and discursive practices bound to geographic imaginaries.

Ying, Long Gen

doi: 10.1111/j.1944-8287.1999.tb00074.xpmid: N/A

AbstractI examine regional disparities in China during the reform period (1978–94) based on the latest measures of provincial per capita GDP. Results reveal a “U-shaped” pattern in regional inequality over time. Regional inequality in per capita GDP among the 30 provinces of China diminished as reforms progressed until 1990, after which it started widening. This diminishing trend was due to a significant decline in income inequality among provinces in the coastal region. A further test indicates that an increase in per capita GDP in the southern coastal provinces is the main reason for declining regional inequality in China during the early reform period (1978–90). Rising GDP in the southern coastal belt also led to widening regional disparities between coastal and interior regions after 1978. As a result, regional inequality in per capita GDP among the 30 provinces has worsened since 1990. From 1992 to 1994, regional disparities between coastal and interior provinces became more significant than the traditional North-South inequality in the Chinese space economy within the context of uneven regional development.

Winder, Gordon M.

doi: 10.1111/j.1944-8287.1999.tb00075.xpmid: N/A

AbstractAs a supply region for manufacturers, the nineteenth-century North American Manufacturing Belt can be conceived as a series of regional industrial systems, as one large industrial district, or as a chaotic conception, since industries built their own industrial networks without reference to the belt. Analysis of the supply linkages of two 1870s manufacturers reveals extensive disintegrated supply networks within the belt. The manufacturers functioned within the belt as a whole, and long-distance linkages were central to their activities, even when they located their operation within an “industrial district.” By 1880, manufacturers’ supply networks spilled over regional industrial system boundaries. Metropolitan centers did not dominate linkage behavior. These findings indicate that perhaps the belt as a whole functioned as an innovative milieu for manufacturers.

Hackworth, Jason; Holcomb, Briavel; Bagchi-Sen, Sharmistha; Muszynski, Alicja

doi: 10.1111/j.1944-8287.1999.tb00076.xpmid: N/A