Department of Political Science
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“The Department of Political Science at U of T ranks among the world’s best! The Department provides an ideal setting for students and learners at all levels to engage with novel ideas, thorough scholarship and creative research in all of the discipline’s subfields, as well as in an array of interdisciplinary areas of inquiry. As a community of established and emerging scholars — teachers and students — the department uniquely positioned to draw upon a Canadian perspective as well as the university’s intellectual buzz and the city’s cultural diversity, to address the most enduring questions of politics, locally and internationally. More than ever, the Department’s mission is to encourage students to think broadly, critically, and internationally about the core features of democratic and global citizenship. We do this with a faculty that includes award-wining teachers, building on a legacy of famously gifted instructors — the likes of Harold Innis and C.B. Macpherson, Alan Bloom, Tom Pangle, and Janice Stein. With a history going back to the 1880s, the department now has a total faculty complement of over seventy-five across the three campuses of the University of Toronto.”
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Item Open Access Persistent Structures in a Turbulent World: The Division of Labor in the German Chemical Industry(SAGE, 2000-02) Bathelt, HaraldSince the late 1980s, various scholars have concluded that a recovery from the Fordist crisis will require that rigid Fordist practices and structures in the industrial sector be replaced by flexible ones. The mode of development to follow, often referred to as a post or after-Fordist mode, is often assumed to be characterized by flexible technologies, labor and production processes. Aside from idealistic scenarios and limited empirical findings, relatively little is known about the product, process and linkage structures which will lead to a new mode of development. The degree to which flexibility processes will be influential is also unclear. It is within this context that I try to provide new insights into the changing nature of industrial production and the social and technical division of labor using results from a recent study of the German chemical industry (i.e. basic chemicals, pigments/dyes/paints/varnishes (PDPV), pharmaceuticals). Based on a postal survey of 155 German chemical firms and 18 firm case studies, I investigate how firms have adjusted their product and process configurations and their supplier and customer relations to meet the changing technological, economic and societal settings. According to my analysis, it seems unlikely that industrial development will follow a single growth trajectory towards flexibility. Increases in product and process flexibility are often only subordinate goals or are not considered necessary. I will describe how chemical firms benefit from spatial proximity to their supplier and customer base. I will also provide evidence that most firms rely on strategically important, stable linkages within the short and middle distance.Item Open Access Regional Competence and Economic Recovery: Divergent Growth Paths in Boston’s High Technology Economy(Taylor & Francis, 2001-04) Bathelt, HaraldSince the 1960s, the growth of high technology industries in Boston’s Route 128 region has attracted the attention of academics, planners and politicians. What was especially remarkable about the region was the capability of its economic basis to recover from major structural crises. Due to this ability, the region is often looked at as being an American example of an industrial district. In contrast to Silicon Valley, however, Boston does not readily fit into the definition of an industrial district because of the dominance of large, vertically-integrated producers and the proprietary nature of high technology production. In the late 1980s, Boston was hit by an additional structural crisis when the minicomputer industry lost its competitive basis and defence expenditures were drastically reduced. As a result, almost 50 000 high technology manufacturing jobs were cut between 1987 and 1997. My paper aims to identify the forces behind the region’s economic recovery in the mid 1990s and relate my findings to the discussion of the importance of collective learning processes in industrial production and the development of localised competencies. In the literature, it is argued that firm-specific competencies and learning processes can lead to a regional competitive advantage if they are based on localised capabilities (e.g. specialised resources, skills, conventions and institutions). I will demonstrate in an explorative way that the economic recovery of the Boston region is related to a number of specific forces which differ greatly between the subsectors of the high technology economy. I will also provide tentative evidence of how the willingness to co-operate and engage in interactive learning processes has encouraged economic recovery.Item Open Access Toward a relational economic geography(Oxford University Press, 2003) Bathelt, Harald; Glückler, JohannesIn this paper, we argue that a paradigmatic shift is occurring in economic geography toward a relational economic geography. This rests on three propositions. First, from a structural perspective economic actors are situated in contexts of social and institutional relations. Second, in dynamic perspective economic processes are path‐dependent, constrained by history. Third, economic processes are contingent in that the agents' strategies and actions are open‐ended. Drawing on Storper's holy trinity, we define four ions as the basis for analysis in economic geography: organization, evolution, innovation, and interaction. Therein, we employ a particular spatial perspective of economic processes using a geographical lens.Item Open Access Toward a Reconceptualization of Regional Development Paths: Is Leipzig's Media Cluster a Continuation of or a Rupture with the Past?(Wiley, 2003-07) Bathelt, Harald; Boggs, Jeffrey S.This article develops a model of regional development that is then used to examine the evolution of two media industries in Leipzig, Germany. We note that the city's current media cluster, centered on television/film production and interactive digital media, shares little in common with the city's once-premier book publishing media cluster. Treating interactive learning as the primary causal mechanism that drives economic growth and change, our conceptual framework incorporates both sectoral/technological and political crises as mechanisms that rupture regional development paths. These regional development paths are not homogeneous, but instead consist of bundles of various technological trajectories. Regions recover from crises as their actors continually rebundle local assets until they find a combination that generates growth. As a result of these crises, new opportunities for growth may arise for new and previously marginal industries. In turn, these expanding industries shape the region's development path.Item Open Access Growth Regimes in Spatial Perspective 1: Innovation, Institutions and Social Systems(SAGE Publications, 2003-12) Bathelt, HaraldThis Progress Report discusses innovation, institutions and social systems in the context of ‘growth regimes in spatial perspective’. It raises the question as to how we should define systems in the context of innovation and makes reference to the theory of social systems. The report then emphasizes the role of institutions in enabling interactive learning and knowledge creation within a system. Using this framework, national innovation systems are defined as having the capability to reproduce their basic structure and the difference between themselves and their environment. The report argues that it is not easy to define regional systems of innovation in a similar way. Regional configurations of production and innovation rarely have the potential to retain structural independence, especially as the important institutions are typically defined at the supraregional level.Item Open Access Clusters and Knowledge: Local buzz, Global Pipelines and the Process of Knowledge Creation(SAGE Publications, 2004-02) Bathelt, Harald; Malmberg, Anders; Maskell, PeterThe paper is concerned with spatial clustering of economic activity and its relation to the spatiality of knowledge creation in interactive learning processes. It questions the view that tacit knowledge transfer is confined to local milieus whereas codified knowledge may roam the globe almost frictionlessly. The paper highlights the conditions under which both tacit and codified knowledge can be exchanged locally and globally. A distinction is made between, on the one hand, the learning processes taking place among actors embedded in a community by just being there dubbed buzz and, on the other, the knowledge attained by investing in building channels of communication called pipelines to selected providers located outside the local milieu. It is argued that the co-existence of high levels of buzz and many pipelines may provide firms located in outward-looking and lively clusters with a string of particular advantages not available to outsiders. Finally, some policy implications, stemming from this argument, are identified.Item Open Access The German Variety of Capitalism: Forces and Dynamics of Evolutionary Change(Wiley, 2005-01) Bathelt, Harald; Gertler, Meric S.This paper introduces a special section of Economic Geography that explores the dimensions of evolutionary change in the German variety of capitalism. It reviews the principal forces and dynamics that have recently shaped the evolution of the German model: those forces that are challenging the German model in its existing form, as well as the efforts of agents to respond to these current pressures. Following this, we discuss how the papers in this special section sheds new light on the nature of this continuing evolution.Item Open Access Exporting the German Model: the Establishment of a New Automobile Industry Cluster in Shanghai, P.R. China(Wiley, 2005-01) Depner, Heiner; Bathelt, HaraldRecent work has provided evidence that the establishment of new industry clusters cannot be jump-started through policy initiatives alone. This evidence does not imply, however, that the genesis of a new cluster cannot be planned at all. Especially in the context of a developing economy, it seems useful to reinvestigate the relation among economic development, the strategies of multinational firms, and state intervention in this respect. Drawing from the case of the automobile industry and its supplier system in Shanghai in which German firms play an important role, we provide empirical evidence of the evolution of a new cluster that is supported by the state in various forms and characterized by a focal, hierarchically structured production system. We use a multidimensional approach to clusters, which leads to a more nuanced understanding of the evolution and growth of a cluster than that provided by earlier accounts. This approach allows us to distinguish the development of the Shanghai automobile industry cluster along its vertical, horizontal, external, institutional, and power dimensions. We provide evidence that another dimension—“culture”—plays an important role, especially in its relation to issues of power and institutions. The role of this dimension is demonstrated in the case of German firms, which tap into the Chinese innovation system. This system is characterized by particular business relations, institutions, norms, and various social practices that are new to German firms. We demonstrate how this difference creates problems in establishing local production and supplier relations and how these problems can be overcome.Item Open Access Cluster Relations in the Media Industry: Exploring the ‘Distanced Neighbor’ Paradox in Leipzig(Taylor & Francis, 2005-02) Bathelt, HaraldThis paper uses a multidimensional cluster concept which views processes of knowledge creation as being decisive in explaining how clusters are established, why they grow and how they reproduce themselves. It is suggested that clusters can only create new knowledge and continue to grow if the cluster firm shave linkages with external markets and employ a mix of local and non-local transactions. The point made is that local interaction or ‘buzz’ and interaction through global or trans-local ‘pipelines’ create a dynamic process of knowledge creation which is key to understand a cluster’s growth process. It is argued that the lack of a reflexive mechanism of local and trans-local interaction is the reason as to why the Leipzig media industry cluster has stagnated in recent years after a decade of substantial growth. In this cluster, we are confronted with what I refer to as the ‘distanced neighbor’ paradox. Firms in the Leipzig media sector are neither characterized by strong pipelines to firms and markets outside the cluster, nor do they engage in intensive local networking and interactive learning. This paper explores the conceptual foundations of this phenomenon and applies it to the case of Leipzig.Item Open Access Geographies of production: Growth Regimes in Spatial Perspective 2 – Knowledge Creation and Growth in Clusters(SAGE Publications, 2005-04) Bathelt, HaraldThis report reviews some recent advances in the literature and argues for a multidimensional conceptualisation of clusters. This can help us understand why some clusters continue grow and reproduce themselves while others stagnate and disappear over time. This is done by focussing on the knowledge creation effects of clusters instead of their material flows.Item Open Access Resources in Economic Geography: From Substantive Concepts Towards a Relational Perspective(SAGE Publications, 2005-09) Bathelt, Harald; Glückler, JohannesResources are crucial for the technological and economic development of firms in spatial perspective. In this paper we contrast two ways of conceptualizing resources, and argue that a conventional, substantive understanding implies a number of shortcomings which can be overcome through the application of a relational conception of resources. In examining four types of resources—material resources, knowledge, power, and social capital—our argument is that resources are constituted in a relational way in two aspects. First, resources are relational in that their generation, interpretation, and use are contingent. This depends on the particular institutional structures and social relations, as well as on the knowledge contexts and mental models of the agents involved. Second, some types of resources, such as power and social capital, are also relational because they cannot be possessed or controlled by individual agents. They are built and mobilized through day-to-day social practices. Individuals or groups of agents may appropriate the returns, but not the resources themselves. We conclude that a relational concept reflects the contextual and interactive nature of the selection, use, and formation of resources. This offers new insights into the explanation of heterogeneity in firm strategies and trajectories, as well as regional differences in the development of localized industry configurations, such as clusters.Item Open Access Geographies of Production: Growth Regimes in Spatial Perspective 3 – Toward a Relational View of Economic Action and Policy(SAGE Publications, 2006-04) Bathelt, HaraldSince the 1990s, the basic foundations and core ideas of economic geography have been under intensive scrutiny. A microperspective of human action should be applied to economic geography which emphasizes its contextual, path-dependent and contingent nature. This also implies that general spatial laws of economic action do not exist.Item Open Access Building Global Knowledge Pipelines: The Role of Temporary Clusters(Taylor & Francis, 2006-09) Maskell, Peter; Bathelt, Harald; Malmberg, AndersBusiness people and professionals come together regularly at trade fairs, exhibitions, conventions, congresses, and conferences. Here, their latest and most advanced findings, inventions and products are on display to be evaluated by customers and suppliers, as well as by peers and competitors. Participation in events like these helps firms to identify the current market frontier, take stock of relative competitive positions and form future plans. Such events exhibit many of the characteristics ascribed to permanent spatial clusters, albeit in a temporary and intensified form. These short-lived hotspots of intense knowledge exchange, network building and idea generation can thus be seen as temporary clusters. This paper compares temporary clusters with permanent clusters and other types of inter-firm interactions. If regular participation in temporary clusters can satisfy a firm's need to learn through interaction with suppliers, customers, peers and rivals, why is the phenomenon of permanent spatial clustering of similar and related economic activity so pervasive? The answer, it is claimed, lies in the restrictions imposed upon economic activity when knowledge and ideas are transformed into valuable products and services. The paper sheds new light on how interaction among firms in current clusters coincides with knowledge-intensive pipelines between firms in different regions or clusters. In doing so, it offers a novel way of understanding how inter-firm knowledge relationships are organized spatially and temporally.Item Open Access The organizational paradox in advertising and the reconfiguration of project cooperation(Elsevier, 2007-01-11) von Bernuth, Caroline; Bathelt, HaraldIn recent literature, projects are mostly seen as an efficient form of organization which is particularly suited for mastering tasks of high complexity and creativity and adapting to changing economic and institutional conditions. This paper challenges the assumption that inter-firm projects are persistent organizational arrangements of production in the advertising industry and presents a novel argument about the potential threats to forms of project organization in crisis situations. By exploring the cases of Frankfurt/Main and Leipzig (East Germany), we show that the organization of production is substantially affected by periods of economic crisis or political transformation. We demonstrate that inter-firm projects might be replaced by more durable organizational configurations or might not be viewed as viable options in situations of severe rupture. This applies particularly to the cooperative arrangements in the creative process and leads to an organizational paradox. Although creativity is often a pivotal force to gain competitive advantage, the advertising agencies respond to the challenges of crises by reducing cooperation with external partners to a minimum and sometimes fully rely on in-house personnel. This threatens the potential of the respective firms to develop innovative and creative ideas which would enable the firms to acquire new customers and market segments. Instead of trying to overcome crises by focusing on their creative capabilities, many advertising agencies develop a cost-cutting strategy and rely on more durable network-forms of organization instead of inter-firm projects.Item Open Access Necessary Restructuring or Globalization Failure? Shifts in Regional Supplier Relations after the Merger of the Former German Hoechst and French Rhône-Poulenc Groups(Elsevier, 2008) Bathelt, Harald; Kappes, KatrinA large part of the work in economic geography and other social sciences surrounding globalization processes has focused on the prospects of economic growth due to the establishment of global production chains and the rise of new clusters of industrial activity. In recent years, much less attention has been paid to former growth industries and regions that have suffered from the negative consequences of internationalization processes. This paper will explore the cases of two chemical regions, i.e. southern Hessen, Germany and Rhône-Alpes, France. Both regions were forced to undergo drastic restructuring since the mid 1990s due to the merger of the chemical groups Hoechst and Rhône-Poulenc into Aventis. The paper argues that it is beneficial to develop a relational perspective of economic action and interaction in order to better understand these regional transformations and restructuring processes and their consequences. Instead of investigating the development of activities, which became the core operations at Aventis, we will focus on other activities that were considered less important and consequently split off. In analyzing the logic of restructuring and the associated changes in regional supplier relations, this paper aims to contribute to a relational understanding of economic globalization and its associated threats to regional development by focusing on agents who are subject to negative restructuring consequences.Item Open Access Between Luminaires and Meat Grinders: International Trade Fairs as Temporary Clusters(Taylor & Francis, 2008-07) Bathelt, Harald; Schuldt, NinaThis paper claims that international trade fairs, viewed as temporary clusters, are important events that support economic processes of interactive learning and knowledge creation. In such settings, geographical proximity and face-to-face contact enable actors from different countries to exchange information about markets, products and innovations. The variety of planned and unplanned meetings and the rich ecology of information flows and different forms of interaction create ‘global buzz’. Firms use such events to consciously establish ‘pipelines’ with new business partners worldwide. The paper will present empirical evidence from two flagship fairs held in Frankfurt/Main, Germany, to support these claims.Item Open Access Internal and External Dynamics of the Munich Film and TV Industry Cluster and Limitations to Future Growth(SAGE Publications, 2008-08) Bathelt, Harald; Gräf, ArminThis analysis uses the case of a seemingly successful industry cluster (ie the film and TV industry in Munich) to demonstrate that deficits in the structure of social relations can impact a cluster's growth potential. In the period after World War II, Munich grew into a national centre of media industries in Germany due to the introduction of private/commercial TV, national entry barriers, and a supportive institutional infrastructure. The recent advertising crisis and the dissolution of the Kirch Group have, however, reinforced already existing internal dilemmas and contradictions. We suggest that the growth prospects of this industry are limited due to a lack of reflexive, interconnected communication and interaction patterns. In conceptual terms, we apply a model which emphasizes that local interaction or ‘buzz’ in clusters and interaction with external firms and markets through translocal or global ‘pipelines’ create reflexive dynamics. Based on this conception, participatory observation and semistructured interviews were conducted with sixty-five Munich firms, as well as with planners and media experts from the region. The results indicate that the regional, national, and occasional international project networks have had a smaller impact on the Munich film and TV industry than expected. Our investigation provides evidence that the cluster's structure of social relations is relatively weak. Internal networks which could drive creative recombination and innovation are underdeveloped, and linkages with external markets which could provide substantial growth impulses to the region are lacking. We argue that this structural weakness limits the potential for future growth.Item Open Access Regional Deindustrialization and Re-bundling: Evidence from the Merger of the former German Hoechst and French Rhône-Poulenc Groups(Taylor & Francis, 2008-10) Bathelt, Harald; Kappes, KatrinA large part of the work in economic geography and other social sciences has focused on new growth prospects due to the establishment of global production chains and the rise of new clusters of industrial activity. Much less attention has been paid to former growth industries and regions that have recently experienced shrinking processes due to internationalization. This paper will explore the cases of two chemical regions, i.e. southern Hessen, Germany and Rhône-Alpes, France. These two areas have both undergone drastic restructuring since the mid 1990s, due to the merger of the prominent chemical groups Hoechst and Rhône-Poulenc into Aventis. Instead of investigating the development of the core activities at Aventis, we will focus on the operations that were considered less important and consequently split off. In addition to the negative consequences produced by these activities, in our analysis we also emphasize regional opportunities which arise from competence building, reorientation and new firm formation. These processes can be viewed as re-bundling existing and new knowledge bases with other resources to help overcome economic crises and develop a new competitive edge. As such, the paper aims to contribute to a relational understanding of economic globalization and regional restructuring.Item Open Access The Changing North–South and South–South Political Economy of Biofuels(Taylor & Francis, 2009) Dauvergne, Peter; Neville, Kate J.Since the 2007 food crisis, controversy has engulfed biofuels. Leading up to the crisis, world-wide interest in these fuels—which include biomass, biogas, bioethanol, and biodiesel—had been surging as states increasingly saw these as a way to meet greenhouse gas reduction targets and promote sustainable economic development. Now some consumers, notably in Europe, are scaling back demand as they worry that biofuels are responsible for increased food prices and deforestation. In contrast, some states—particularly Brazil and the USA, the world's leading bioethanol producers—continue to promote biofuel development, especially in developing countries. Partnerships arising from these efforts, we argue, reflect new patterns in the international political economy, where trade relationships among developing countries are strengthening, and where economic lines between developed and emerging developing countries are blurring. Given previously observed patterns of resource exploitation involving complex webs of North–South and South–South trade (such as for resources like palm oil in Indonesia), we anticipate that the emerging political economy of biofuels will repeat and reinforce many of these same environmentally destructive trends.Item Open Access Small capacity and big responsibilities: financial and legal implications of a human right to water for developing countries.(Georgetown University Law Center, 2009) McCaffrey, Stephen C.; Neville, Kate J.As a cholera epidemic sweeps across Zimbabwe, and as climate change models predict increasing droughts across parts of sub-Saharan Africa, the urgency of the need for access to clean water in southern Africa has re-emerged in the media.1 A right to water, internationally recognized through General Comment 15 of the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ESC Committee), takes on particular immediacy in light of these outbreaks; however, while the recognition of this right internationally and by some states is no doubt a positive development, the implications of its implementation are less well-defined, particularly in many developing countries, including those that have entrenched the general right into their domestic legislation.