Canada's Ocean Supercluster initiative: A national policy in regional clothing?

Abstract

Since the late 1980s, there has been no explicit regional policy in Canada. Indirectly, though, equalization payments, industrial policies, as well as regional agencies encouraging the adoption of federal industrial and innovation policies, impact regional economies. In 2017, the federal government appeared to alter its approach: the Supercluster initiative was announced, drawing upon the idea that localized networks of interrelated firms can generate innovation and local development. In this paper, we discuss the mechanisms through which spatially focused industrial innovation policy can lead to regional development. We then focus on Canada's Ocean Supercluster initiative. The question we address is as follows: to what extent can this initiative (and, more widely, Canada's Supercluster policy) be understood as a regional development strategy driven by a coherent rationale for regional intervention? Apart from the fact that each Supercluster focuses on a pre‐existing core of firms located within a region, there is little evidence that the Supercluster initiative has regional development objectives or impacts.

Comparing innovation strategies: Canada's Ocean Supercluster and Europe's Smart Specialisation initiatives

“…Despite initial ambiguity on its role in regional development (ISED, 2017), the GIC's objective is now clearly to promote the five national domains globally (Shearmur et al, 2023). And, despite its Atlantic roots, the OSC is pan‐Canadian in scope, mobilizing an existing, but diffuse, knowledge base derived from Canada's ocean assets, capacities, and capabilities of its ocean‐based companies and stakeholders (ISED, 2019; Knubley, 2021; Shearmur et al, 2023), which are not confined to Atlantic Canada, nor necessarily to locations physically close oceans. It brings together private sector actors and university research centers but, beyond this, does not draw‐in other stakeholders or institutions (except for a peripheral involvement of Indigenous communities).…”

“…Since 1987, when Canada's Department of Regional Industrial Expansion closed, Canadian federal level industrial and innovation policy has focused on national programs: a series of regional development agencies essentially assisted local industries and communities in their access to national programs. These agencies act “as both switch point mechanisms shifting the purposes of federal policy and as institutional intermediaries aligning practices across levels of government and scales of economic activity” (Bradford & Wolfe, 2013: 332): however, the federal policies themselves have no regional focus, partly because such focus is problematic for constitutional reasons (Shearmur et al, 2023).…”

“…The GIC initiative funded five clusters, distributed across Canada for political and innovation‐related reasons (Shearmur et al, 2023). Here we focus on the Ocean Supercluster, as part of a larger study on innovation policy support and cross‐sectoral collaboration in Atlantic Canada.…”

“…In 2018, the OSC was selected as one of five winning proposals in a Canada‐wide competition. This selection, partly determined by the quality of the submission, also reflects an implicit federal imperative to ensure that each of Canada's principal regions (British Columbia, Prairies, Ontario, Québec, Atlantic) “obtain” one cluster: ambivalence between technological and industrial leadership on the one hand, and regional development on the other, is baked into this selection process (Shearmur et al, 2023).…”

“…Likewise, it is not possible to evaluate whether these economic impacts would have occurred without the GIC program. Additionally, there is little evidence so far that the OSC is having a local stimulation effect: projects are calling upon partners from across Canada, and the job creation and other benefits, to the extent they can be identified, appear to be Canada‐wide rather than regionally focused (Shearmur et al, 2023).…”