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Apologies for cross-posting
Call for papers: RGS-IBG Annual Conference 2012, 3-5 July, University of Edinburgh
Sponsored by Economic Geography Research Group
Session convenors:
Dr Crispian Fuller, Sociology and Public Policy Group, Aston University
Professor Nicholas A. Phelps, Bartlett School of Planning, UCL
SESSION TITLE -
Evolutionary and institutional perspectives on the multinational corporation-institution nexus
In recent years there has developed a growing interest in the evolutionary relationship between corporate subsidiaries and the social and physical spaces in which they operate. Regarding the former, subsidiaries have become critical elements
of corporations in response to growing market segmentation, consumer sophistication and the increasing importance of place-specific knowledge and technology in the production process (Bettis and Hitt, 1995). Of notable importance is the growing significance
of certain specialised corporate subsidiaries, characterised by tangible and intangible knowledge-based capabilities and assets, but where there remains a heterogeneous range of subsidiary types (Meyer et al, 2010). This occurs within a broader context in
which networked, federative forms of corporate organisation are notable, and where parent companies exercise disparate decision-making powers (Forgren and Pedersen, 2000). This has been accompanied by the development of increasingly complex relations between
corporations and their production networks, which has been extensively documented within the global production networks perspective (Coe et al, 2008). At the same time there is greater understanding of the role of corporations in the construction of socio-spatial
relations through their interactions with external agents and networks, in which the distant can become proximate, and the immediate is distant (Yeung, 2009).
These corporate dynamics all suggest a complex relationship between corporations, space and place. The global production network perspective in particular has sought to conceptualise such relations, most notably in strategic coupling between
production networks and regional institutions. While not explicitly concerned with corporations, evolutionary economic geography has provided important insights into the co-evolutionary, yet dynamic and uneven relationship between firms and regions. Martin
(2010) has sought to advance this agenda by conceptualising processes of institutional change through layering, conversion and recombination. MacKinnon (2011) has taken this forward by linking institutional layering, conversion and recombination with strategic
coupling. However, while such perspectives present substantial insights into evolutionary and relational tendencies they have placed less focus on conceptualising the internal dynamics, or ‘black box’, of firms and corporation, although recognising that early
attempts have been made to outline a future research agenda (e.g. MacKinnon, 2011). Such an issue is of particular pertinence, and requires new conceptual thinking, given the substantial contemporary restructuring of the strategic and organisational configurations
of corporations and their socio-spatial relations.
Beyond economic geography there are a range of approaches that present new potential theoretical insights. International business studies and organisational analysis have increasingly focused on the evolutionary relationship between corporations
and national and regional institutions (Cantwell et al, 2010). Recent insights from institutionalism within organisational analysis are particularly important in that they emphasise the constant production of fragmented institutional arrangements. Corporations
are viewed as both active causal agents creating and reconfiguring institutions through politicised processes, as well as being influenced by institutions as change agents (Kostova et al, 2008). Equally, within international business studies the resource
and capabilities based views of the firm provide considerable conceptual understanding into the organisational decision-making in which firms organise and deploy resources, create organisational routines, and interact with external agents (Teece, 2007). These
approaches have the potential to advance economic geography’s conceptions of the internal workings of corporations, thus contributing to a more comprehensive understanding how these relate to socio-spatial relations.
We seek papers offering conceptual and empirical insights into the changing socio-spatial relations between corporations and institutions across a range of spaces, scales and places. Key themes include (but are not limited to):
·
Relationship between contemporary corporate restructuring, subsidiaries and their socio-spatial relations;
·
Application of evolutionary economic geography to our understanding of the changing role and responsibilities of corporate subsidiaries;
·
New conceptual insights into the co-evolutionary tendencies between corporations, subsidiaries and their host regions;
·
Role of particular spatially configured assets and relations in the internal dynamics of subsidiaries;
·
Relationship between national and sub-national institutions and corporate subsidiaries;
·
Role of corporations and their subsidiaries in processes of institutional change;
·
Relationship between the internal dynamics of subsidiaries and processes of strategic coupling;
·
International differences in relations between national/sub-national institutions and corporate subsidiaries.
Please send abstracts of no more than 250 words to
[log in to unmask] by 26th January.