Multiscalar institutional complementarity and the scaling of clusters

Economic geographers have become strongly focused on two scales over the last 25 years : the local and the global. That’s why they mostly ignore the growing literature on the so-called variety of capitalism thesis that, contrary to what the glocalisation thesis claims, stresses a persistent continui...

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Main Author: Pieter Terhorst
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Société Royale Belge de Géographie and the Belgian National Committee of Geography 2009-03-01
Series:Belgeo
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Online Access:https://journals.openedition.org/belgeo/7815
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author Pieter Terhorst
author_facet Pieter Terhorst
author_sort Pieter Terhorst
collection DOAJ
description Economic geographers have become strongly focused on two scales over the last 25 years : the local and the global. That’s why they mostly ignore the growing literature on the so-called variety of capitalism thesis that, contrary to what the glocalisation thesis claims, stresses a persistent continuity of national forms of capitalism and national forms of the state in the era of globalisation. In this variety-of-capitalism literature the concept of institutional complementarity plays a key role. It means, among others, that one institution makes the other more efficient (and vice versa). In their studies on clusters economic geographers stress a strong “horizontal” institutional complementarity at the local level (although they do not use that concept) but largely ignore a “vertical” complementarity of local and national institutions. Adherents of the variety of capitalism thesis, on the other hand, stress a “horizontal” institutional complementarity at the national level but, being blind to geography, ignore a “vertical” institutional complementarity between the national and local level.In this paper I aim to bridge both bodies of literature and to explore the “vertical” institutional complementarity between national forms of capitalism and clusters. To give my arguments flesh and blood, I explore how and why the Dutch vegetables-under-glass cluster is interwoven with the national corporatist institutions, which is a key characteristic of the Dutch form of capitalism and state form.
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spelling doaj-art-1d271608528d44009a2d3371c51e7fd72025-08-20T03:18:04ZengSociété Royale Belge de Géographie and the Belgian National Committee of GeographyBelgeo1377-23682294-91352009-03-011436410.4000/belgeo.7815Multiscalar institutional complementarity and the scaling of clustersPieter TerhorstEconomic geographers have become strongly focused on two scales over the last 25 years : the local and the global. That’s why they mostly ignore the growing literature on the so-called variety of capitalism thesis that, contrary to what the glocalisation thesis claims, stresses a persistent continuity of national forms of capitalism and national forms of the state in the era of globalisation. In this variety-of-capitalism literature the concept of institutional complementarity plays a key role. It means, among others, that one institution makes the other more efficient (and vice versa). In their studies on clusters economic geographers stress a strong “horizontal” institutional complementarity at the local level (although they do not use that concept) but largely ignore a “vertical” complementarity of local and national institutions. Adherents of the variety of capitalism thesis, on the other hand, stress a “horizontal” institutional complementarity at the national level but, being blind to geography, ignore a “vertical” institutional complementarity between the national and local level.In this paper I aim to bridge both bodies of literature and to explore the “vertical” institutional complementarity between national forms of capitalism and clusters. To give my arguments flesh and blood, I explore how and why the Dutch vegetables-under-glass cluster is interwoven with the national corporatist institutions, which is a key characteristic of the Dutch form of capitalism and state form.https://journals.openedition.org/belgeo/7815scalinginstitutional complementarityvariety of capitalismclusters
spellingShingle Pieter Terhorst
Multiscalar institutional complementarity and the scaling of clusters
Belgeo
scaling
institutional complementarity
variety of capitalism
clusters
title Multiscalar institutional complementarity and the scaling of clusters
title_full Multiscalar institutional complementarity and the scaling of clusters
title_fullStr Multiscalar institutional complementarity and the scaling of clusters
title_full_unstemmed Multiscalar institutional complementarity and the scaling of clusters
title_short Multiscalar institutional complementarity and the scaling of clusters
title_sort multiscalar institutional complementarity and the scaling of clusters
topic scaling
institutional complementarity
variety of capitalism
clusters
url https://journals.openedition.org/belgeo/7815
work_keys_str_mv AT pieterterhorst multiscalarinstitutionalcomplementarityandthescalingofclusters