Globalization, Innovation, and Regional Development in China

Abstract

Globalization, innovation, and regional development in China With the majority of the advanced economies continuing to languish in the shadow of the 2008 financial crisis, the robust growth of China's economy has attracted considerable attention from scholars from many disciplines (IMF, 2009;Lardy, 2007;Tilford, 2009). Particularly intriguing for economic geographers is whether China has been undergoing a transition from`the factory of the world' to a potentially knowledgeintensive or even innovative economy. Such a transition is not simply prescribed by orthodox developmental theories. It would also follow the precedents set by countries such as Japan and South Korea. More importantly, China's own domestic circumstances, including the sharp increase of Chinese labor costs and currency appreciation, have made it inevitable for China to transition from labor-intensive industries to those that rely more on technology. Yet, a central question on China's technological trajectory remains elusive: whether there exists a distinct Chinese model of technological change.The three papers included in this theme issue were drawn from a far larger pool of papers recently presented in several conferences, including the

Spatial Diffusion of Taiwanese Enterprises in Mainland China under the Vision of Rural Industrial Vitalization

“…A large percentage of Taiwanese rural enterprises are wholly-owned enterprises, and few local people have little control over the making of key decisions, although they have a higher level of insight into the local culture and local market. There is no incentive for Taiwanese rural enterprises to embed with local economies in research, technology, and strategy, which is consistent with findings based on other regions of China [44,45]. Taiwanese enterprises tend to adopt the strategy of group investment and geographical clustering, due to a similar cultural background, existing business relations, and the common political risks they face [46].…”

Analyzing the Space–Time Dynamics of Innovation in China: ESDA and Spatial Panel Approaches

“…The critical role of innovation in economic development has attracted considerable scholarly attention (Fagerberg, Mowery, and Nelson ; Lin and Wang ; Zhou and Wei ). The new growth theory argues that knowledge‐based innovation is a vital driving force of economic growth (Romer ).…”

Utilizing the linkage between domestic demand and the ability to export to achieve sustainable growth of construction industry in developing countries

“…Lee (2009) found that South Korea's new regionalism, which highlights self-sustaining endogenous capabilities in regional development, fails to reformulate theoretical and policy views on the globalization of regional development. The work by Zhou and Wei (2011) appreciated that some regions in China update strategies constantly to support the upward movements along the global value chain. Hence, in light of the aforementioned studies, it is noted that the linkage within the construction context can be examined similarly using the approaches of either "outside-in" or "inside-out".…”