Change search
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf
Technological diversity and Jacobs’s externality hypothesis revisited
Jönköping University, Jönköping International Business School, JIBS, Economics.
(English)Manuscript (preprint) (Other academic)
Abstract [en]

Recent empirical evidence strongly supports Jacobs’s (1969) externality hypothesis that urban diversity provides a more favourable environment for economic development than urban specialization. In order to correctly gauge Jacobs’s hypothesis, economic development should be understood as a result of innovations. Furthermore, a relevant diversity measure should take into account the degree of diversity of the inherent classes (e.g. pharmaceuticals are closer to chemicals than to forestry). These ideas are tested using regionally classified Swedish patent application data as a measure of innovativeness. Patent data are also used to reflect technological diversity. The results show that the number of patent applications in Swedish regions, is highly and positively dependent on regional technological specialization, quite the opposite of Jacobs’s prediction. The paper raises general questions about earlier empirical results. It is concluded that the size of regions is an important factor to consider, since this in itself may affect patenting intensity and technological diversity.

National Category
Economics
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:hj:diva-31983OAI: oai:DiVA.org:hj-31983DiVA, id: diva2:1037151
Note

Included in the thesis "Perspectives on regional and industrial dynamics of innovation": "The first draft of this paper was presented at my visit to the Centre for Research on Innovation and Internationalization (CESPRI) at Bocconi University in Milan in 2002."

Available from: 2016-10-14 Created: 2016-10-14 Last updated: 2016-10-14Bibliographically approved
In thesis
1. Perspectives on regional and industrial dynamics of innovation
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Perspectives on regional and industrial dynamics of innovation
2004 (English)Doctoral thesis, comprehensive summary (Other academic)
Abstract [en]

This thesis consists of five essays in the field of innovation economics, with an introductory chapter. The focus is mainly empirical with four of the five chapters consisting of studies of aspects of Swedish innovation activity. These empirical chapters are an endeavor to quantify aspects of the effects of the public-good property of knowledge. To this effect, innovation indicators were collected regarding industrial and firm research and development (R&D); regional indicators were collected using business and university R&D and records of patent applications and granted patents assigned to Swedish regions using the residential location of inventors.

The first essay studies the productive effect (total factor productivity) of R&D on Swedish firms and the effect that R&D can be expected to have on other firms. The second essay analyzes, with corporate groups as the unit of observation, the effect of accessibility to R&D in universities, and in other groups’ R&D on the innovative capability of the individual group. The third essay tries to characterize the extent to which Swedish regions are specialized or diverse. This is summarized in a single variable which is used to test the effect on innovative activity as measured by the number of patent applications. The fourth essay, the theoretical study of the thesis, constructs a two-region model with two firms residing in each. The incentives for doing process R&D are worked out by agglomerating consumers in one of the regions, and by changing interregional accessibility. The sixth essay studies Swedish inventor networks and regional affinity based on networks.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Jönköping: Internationella Handelshögskolan, 2004. p. 181
Series
JIBS Dissertation Series, ISSN 1403-0470 ; 024
National Category
Economics
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:hj:diva-175 (URN)91-89164-53-9 (ISBN)
Public defence
2004-12-10, Sal B103, Internationella Handelshögskolan i Jönköping, 10:15 (English)
Supervisors
Available from: 2004-12-10 Created: 2004-12-10 Last updated: 2016-10-14Bibliographically approved

Open Access in DiVA

No full text in DiVA

By organisation
JIBS, Economics
Economics

Search outside of DiVA

GoogleGoogle Scholar

urn-nbn

Altmetric score

urn-nbn
Total: 34 hits
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf