November 2021 – March 2022: University of Kiel, Germany Economic Geography and Sustainability, M.Sc. Sustainability, Society, and the Environment

1. Lecture 1 - Introduction: economic geography and its recent paradigms
Economic
Geography
and
Sustainability
WS 2021-220
Lecture 2 – 03.11.2021

2. • 27-10: Introduction
• 03-11: Making progress towards the SDGs through the lens
of evolutionary economic geography (EEG) (direct link literature)
• 10-11: Governance of sustainability transitions
• 17-11: Slow innovation and circular economy
• 24-11: Corporate social responsibility vs. corporate spatial
responsibility and Greenwashing effect
• 01-12: Mission-oriented innovation policies and sustainable
economic geography (e.g., degrowth; EU Green Deal)
6 lectures (recordings via this link)

3. I Part
• Brief on organization
• Defining (evolutionary) economic geography (EEG)
::::10’ Break:::
II Part
• Defining sustainable development (SD)
• Agenda 2030 and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
• SDG-EEG nexus approach (synergies and trade-offs)
• Operationalization of the SDGs through EEG
Today’s lecture
This is a collective endeavor

4. Office hours // Check OLAT Group
Send me an
email to
schedule

5. Presentation dates and final submission have
changed for SSE and International Students (EN)

6. Recommended literature:
lecture 2 on Wednesday 03/11/2021
The aims of:
• Relational economic geography
• Evolutionary economic
geography (EEG)
Both acknowledge the embeddedness
of economic action in context-specific
structures of social and
institutional relations
• Topics addressed in EEG
• Industrial clusters
• Networks
• Urban and regional
development
• Institutions and how
these co-evolve with
industrial dynamics in
regions.
Nexus
approaches have
the potential to
promote
integrated
planning,
management and
governance.
The nexus
approaches highlight
the need for and
potential benefits of
taking a broad,
multi-sector, multi-
scale and multi-
regional perspective
to solve global
challenges, such as
those related to the
SDGs.

7. A collective endeavor towards the future

8. The success of multidisciplinary approaches to address
sustainability challenges largely depends on the compatibility
between the research stances of the researchers involved.
(Jabareen, 2011)
A research stance – is the strategy used to deal with an
indeterminate phenomenon, and influences choices at all steps in
knowledge production, such as defining a problem in scientific
terms or selecting methods.
Collective quest
(Hazard et al. 2020)

10. Making progress towards the Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs)
through Evolutionary Economic Geography

11. Everyday life v.s. eco geography
Healthy food Rethinking supply chains
Air quality
Accelerate energy
transition strategies

12. Think geographically but multidisciplinary
Cocoa supply chain
✓ Production
✓ Consumption
✓ Distribution
✓ Beyond
✓ Communities
✓ Human rights
✓ Livelihoods
cocoa-barometer 2021

13. Economic geography and sustainability
Source
Deforestation hotspots
Uneven
development
Regional
inequality

14. Economic geography and sustainability
Lieferkettengesetz

15. But we lack agency or capacity to act
Source
Source
Source
Source
We can still play a role
• Enacting discourses
• Framing action
• Using online resources
• Conveying + messages

16. (Hassink and Gong, 2017)
Economic geographers emphasize that identifying
and analyzing the various networks of linkages
and flows across space is an essential premise for
understanding the organization of the economic
landscape, of economic activities through time.

17. Evolutionary economic geography (EEG)
Evolutionary economic geography
(e.g. Ron Boschma; after page 325 of Clark et al. 2018)
Unlike neoclassical theory (List, 2003), the school of evolutionary economic
thinking (Boschma & Lambooy, 1999; Dosi et al., 1988) takes history and geography
seriously by recognizing the importance of place-specific elements and processes
to explain both spatial patterns of technology evolution and persistence in
regional economic inequalities.

18. The lineage of theories of EG and related disciplines
(Hassink et al. 2014)
converse
Strong link
Engaged Pluralism
(Barnes and Sheppard, 2010)
Role of
institutions/
power/agency
across scales

19. Evolutionary economic geography
EEG examines and explains “the processes by which the economic landscape
– the spatial organisation of economic production, circulation, exchange,
distribution and consumption – is transformed from within over time”
(Boschma & Martin 2010; Hassink et al. 2009).
‘‘A path-dependent process or system is one whose outcome evolves
because of the processes or system’s own history’’ (Martin and Sunley,
2006, 399)
‘‘Lock-in is this notion that most fully captures the idea that the
combination of historical contingency and the emergence of self-
reinforcing effects, steers a technology, industry or regional economy
along one ‘path’ rather than another’’ (Martin 2010, 3)
This spatial pattern is perceived as the outcome of path-
dependent, place-based historical processes as well as
lock-in, and proximity concepts.

20. Geographically concentrated clusters can become insular, inward-
looking systems, as many old industrial areas, both resource based
mono-structural areas, dominated by for instance steel, coal-mining
and shipbuilding industry, and areas specialized in consumer goods
(textile for instance) have shown us (Hamm and Wienert, 1989;
Hudson, 2005).
Examples

21. Frequent across old industrial areas > locked in

22. comprise; enclose; surround; contain; include; lock in; close in; seal
up; pen in; lock; shut up; lock up; put away; lock away; shut away;
seal in.
Lock-ins in a day-to-day context
Writing
Language skills
IT skills
Sporting skills

23. Restructuring of a regional economy
Regional lock- ins
Lock-ins hindering of restructuring processes.
Lock-ins > adjustments or renewal > setting up new industries

24. Regional lock-ins: examples > Hassink 2010
Germany and South Korea
✓ Economic-structural context and political-institutional context led to the
following expectations: compared to the textile industry, the
shipbuilding industry clearly is expected to have stronger tendencies
towards regional lock-ins, given its stronger spatial concentration and
mono-structure, high entry and exit barriers because of its capital-
intensive characteristics and its oligopolistic market structure.

25. • Economic geographers started to develop new concepts based on
evolutionary thinking, including
From evolutionary economic thinking >
Evolutionary economic geography
• Generalized Darwinism (Essletzbichler and Rigby, 2010)
• Path dependency theory (Martin and Sunley, 2006)
• Complexity theory (Martin and Sunley, 2007)
• Geographical political economy (MacKinnon et al., 2009)
What these evolutionary approaches to economic geography
have in common is a focus on historical processes that
explain the uneven development and
transformation of the economic landscape.
Particularly relevant when discussing social sustainability
Improve
existing
theoretical
concepts

26. From
evolutionary
thinking
>
Evolutionary
economic
geography
• Locational opportunity (Walker &
Storper, 1991)
• Technology districts (Storper, 1992)
• Regional innovation systems
(Cooke, 1992)
• Knowledge-intensive innovative
entrepreneurship (Malerba et al.
2020)
• Regional economic development
(Frenken & Boschma, 2007)
• Old industrial areas (Hassink, 2010)
• Cluster dynamics (Cooke & De
Laurentis, 2010)
• Smart Specialisation (Asheim,
2019)

27. Central
question >
Evolutionary
economic
geography
• Why it is that some regional
economies become locked
into development paths that
lose dynamism, whilst other
regional economies seem
able to avoid this danger?
(Martin and Sunley, 2006).

28. From evolutionary thinking >
Evolutionary economic
geography > key challenge

29. Evolutionary economic geography > key
challenge
• …the task is not just about applying evolutionary
thinking and concepts to economic geography,
difficult enough though that
• The challenge is also about exploring and
explaining how geography — the role of place
and space — influences the process of economic
evolution itself
• and thereby how economic geography can
contribute to the development of evolutionary
thinking (economic/governance).

30. For example, >
Evolutionary economic geography
Low-growth regions
Experienced a persistent lack
of growth. They are less-
developed or transition regions
(regions with a GDP per head up
to 90% of the EU average) that
did not converge to the EU
average between 2000 - 2013.
Source; EU Commission, 2017
≈ 83 million inhabitants
Low-income regions
Remain far below the EU
average GDP per capita. They
cover all regions with a GDP per
head below 50% of the EU
average in 2013.

31. Real places
Evolutionary Economic Geography applied at different
levels of aggregation
For us to understand development paths at the macro-level (e.g.,
region) we certainly need to investigate the performance through time
at micro-level (firms or industries)

32. Path Dependence by Douglas Puffert, University
of Warwick, UK
Path dependence is the dependence of economic
outcomes on the path of previous outcomes, rather
than simply on current conditions.
In a path dependent process, “history matters” — it
has an enduring influence. Choices made based on
transitory conditions can persist long after those
conditions change. Thus, explanations of the outcomes
of path-dependent processes require looking at
history, rather than simply at current conditions of
technology, preferences, and other factors that
determine outcomes.
Magnusson and Ottosson, 2009

33. Example:
path-dependent/path-dependency theory
In path-dependent, positive adaptation theories, regional
resilience can be continually renewed/maintained; shocks may
stimulate the emergence of or branching into new regional
development paths. (
Economic adjustment is a path-dependent process shaped by
inherited and evolving structures:
• industrial specialization policies
• entrepreneurial and employment patterns
• institutional and regulatory arrangements (Martin, 2010).
Clark et al. 2018)

34. Path-dependent: energy transition
The concept of ‘energy transition’ is also concerned with how
previous decisions influence future alternatives, describing
path-dependency within energy transition influences on the
process of change to new energy systems, and persistence in
the use of existing energy systems.
When the wind of change blows, some build walls, others build windmills. (Chinese proverb)
Dynamics of past
experiences,
practices, norms
and the future

35. Example: Lock-in
A global fossil fuel economy maintained through both national
political alliances and continual active intervention by a network
of global firms that foster and cement those alliances in the
interest of maintaining their profit position.
These type of sectors are prone to lock-in and path
dependency but are largely geared to generate incremental
innovations and gradual change. (Boschma et al. 2017)

36. Overtourism through the lens of EEG

37. Recap today’s lecture
Boschma & Frenken, 2015
Evolutionary Economic Geography
To contribute to the understanding of topics in economic geography,
✓ why industries concentrate in space (micro-level),
✓ how networks evolve in space (meso-level),
✓ why some regions grow more than others (macro-level), and
✓ how regions move into green technologies (alternatives/disrupt)
Resilience
Simmie and Martin 2010
Transitions/energy/enviro.
Patchell and Hayter 2013
Governance
Foray 2015

38. Keywords to keep in mind > transitions >
innovative behavior > techno-economic paradigms
(Hayter, 2008)

39. Progress towards the 2030 > EEG > Why
Olat
Olat
Patchell and Hayter (2013) argue for the integration between environmental
and evolutionary economic geographies:
• Environmental EG emphasis on environmental imperatives is loosely
framed and needs a theoretical socio-economic evolutionary base that is
central to EEG.
• Evolutionary Economic Geography would be empowered by incorporating
environmental concerns within its mandate.
Olat

40. Environmental and/or evolutionary EG?
Environmental EG objective:
➢ “understand the difference that ‘environment’ makes
to processes we have traditionally considered to be
(purely) economic” (Bridge, 2008, 78)
Point of departure:
➢ Dissatisfaction with the marginalization of ecological
systems/lack of environment-oriented practices in EG
➢ International debates
Scholarly insights:
➢ Ecological modernization, regulation theory,
evolutionary institutionalism, theories of
governmentality, etc.

41. Techno-Economic
Paradigm
Institutional
perspective
Industrial revolution
1760-1920
Fordism
1920-1970
ICT
1970-2020
Green
revolution
2020 >
Environmental phases
(policy priority)
Frontierism
(pioneering)
Amenity and protection
(social priority)
Resource management
(protection priority)
Eco-development
(sustainability)
Industry attitudes
towards environment
Uncaring, environment
externalized
Environment is resilient Clean-up pre-empt
Sustainability is more
common
Industrial organization:
environmental impacts
Markets dominate:
market failure
Firms dominate: hierarchy
failure
Flexible systems: mixed
results
Green firms and
markets
Scale of environmental
problems
Local National / global Global Local
Land, sea and air as
property rights
Private property replace
commons
State regulation Rethinking of commons Private v.s. common
Environmental advocacy Pioneers
Urban and regional
planning
Global NGOs
(opponent role)
NGOs
(watchdog role)
Scale of environmental
regulation
Diverse National-local International Global-local
Co-evolution of Economy and Environment
(Hayter, 2008)

42. Health, demographic change and
wellbeing
Grand Societal Challenges
Food security, sustainable
agriculture and forestry, marine
and maritime and inland water
research, and the Bioeconomy
Clean and energy
Efficient societies
(Europe 2020)
Green and
integrated transportation
Planning housing accessibility
and affordability

43. Climate action, environment,
resource efficiency and raw
materials
Grand Societal Challenges
Inclusive, diverse, innovative and
reflective societies
Secure societies –
protecting freedom of expression
and security of citizens
(Europe 2020)
Global migration patterns

44. Grand Societal Challenges and EG
(Westkämper, 2014)

45. Grand Societal Challenges and EG
(Westkämper, 2014)

46. Several research avenues to explore
Societal
Challenges
Evolutionary Economic
Geography
Innovation Policy for Grand Challenges
(Coenen et al. 2015)
Requires a broader perspective that is not
only concerned with structural failures in
innovation systems and related policies
(in connection to capabilities, networks and
a limited set of institutional factors).
More attention should be directed to
analyses and policies targeting system
transformation and the “failures”
associated with such transformative
shifts in production and consumption.
Environmental evolutionary
economic geography (Patchell et
al. 2013)
Ultimately the case for
evolutionary economic
geographies is to ensure that
economic geographic
perspectives are fully incorporated
in debates over the co-evolution
of economy and environment, in
research and policy terms one of,
if not the, central challenges of
development in the 21st century.

47. Economy and Environment: current
debates

48. EEG > Addressing negative Challenges
This plea recognizes that integrating
economy and environment is a central co-
evolutionary challenge of the 21st century.
Although economy and environment have
been treated as distinctive issues, they are
interdependent within places / across scales.
Economic geographers have key roles to play
in understanding these interdependencies
and developing frameworks supporting
sustainable development. (Huber, 2010)

49. Key framework to achieve
sustainable development?
Partly address the negative side of societal challenges

50. I Part
• Defining evolutionary economic geography (EEG)
II Part
• Defining sustainable development (SD)
• Agenda 2030 and Sustainable development goals (SDGs)
• SDG-EEG nexus approach (synergies and trade-offs)
• Operationalization of the SDGs through EEG
III Part
• Seminar updates for SSE and Erasmus students
Today’s lecture

51. Climate change and environmental degradation practices have increased
the risk of:
Humanity is on a dangerous trajectory
Extreme weather events
Food system failures
Biodiversity loss, and
Geopolitical instability.
Humanity must change its practices, quickly and
strategically. A sustainability transition leveraging the
efforts of private companies, governments, and civil society
actors — i.e., non-governmental organizations (NGOs),
community organizations, philanthropic foundations, academia,
trade unions, etc. — is required. (Lambin et al. 2020)

52. Towards the future > a sustainable future

53. Defining sustainable development (SD)

54. Transition towards sustainable practices, whether large or
small, can have significant impacts in the long run.

55. Defining sustainable development (SD)
1983-87: Brundtland Commission
Economic development at the cost of
ecological health and social equity did not
lead to long-lasting prosperity.
It was clear that the world needed to find
a way to harmonize ecology with
prosperity.
After four years, the “Brundtland
Commission” released its final report,
Our Common Future.
It famously defines sustainable
development as:
(Source, 1987)

56. Defining sustainable development (SD)
to meet the needs and aspirations of the
present without compromising the ability to
meet those of the future.
recognizes that societal challenges of poverty
and uneven development cannot be solved
unless we have a new era of growth in which
developing countries play a large role and reap
large benefits.
(Source, 1987)

57. Objectives of SD
(Elliott, 2012)

58. Some consider that there is none so relevant a discipline
as geography to contribute to the sustainable
development debates given its ability to marry the
science of the environment with an understanding of
economic, political, and cultural change, that is,
development.
Multi, Intra and Transdisciplinary SD
Sustainable development is multidisciplinary concept in
its nature and is covered by various bodies of sciences.
(Elliott, 2012)
(Jabareen, 2011)
Greater intra-disciplinary work, including between
geographers is considered essential for understanding and
engaging in the challenges of SD and society.
(Elliott, 2009)

59. Justification
(Oliveira and Hersperger, 2018; Huber, 2010)
…understanding the processes that drive climate change requires
attention to the “denaturalized” geographies of – economic activities
– transportation, energy, and industrial production.
These geographies are not “given”, but emerged within power
relations, political relationships, historical trajectories, and cultural
ideologies…We simply need to begin to (re)read the line of reasoning
to see such relationships as worthy of nature-society analysis.

60. Agenda 2030 and Sustainable Development Goals
27 September 2015, UN member states will
formally adopt the Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs) as key
elements of the post-2015 development
agenda, successors to the eight Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs).
Source
Agenda 2030 is an action plan for
people, planet and prosperity.
It also seeks to strengthen universal peace.
Shift the world onto a sustainable and resilient path
Detailed objectives of Agenda 2030

61. Agenda 2030 > action plan for people and planet
17 Sustainable Development Goals and 169 targets
::People::
end poverty and hunger
fulfil their potential in dignity and equality
::Planet::
protect the planet from degradation,
including through sustainable consumption and production
::Prosperity::
human beings can enjoy prosperous and fulfilling lives and
that economic, social and technological progress occurs in
harmony with nature.
::Peace::
foster peaceful, just and inclusive societies which are free
from fear and violence – respect towards labour force.
::Partnership::
focused on the needs of the poorest and most vulnerable
and with the participation of all countries, all stakeholders
(economic players) and all people.

62. 17 Sustainable Development Goals and 169 targets
https://sdgs.un.org/goals

63. Synergies
Progress in one goal favours progress in another
Trade-offs
Progress in one goal hinders progress in another
(Liu et al. 2018)
By identifying synergies and trade-offs, nexus approaches can help
enhance sustainability pathways through promoting higher resource use
efficiency (Biswas et al. 2008), lower production of pollutants and wastes,
and more coherent policy (Amon et al, 2015).
Nexus approaches can help uncover synergies and detect harmful trade-
offs among different sectors, scales and regions, reveal unexpected
consequences and promote integrated planning, decision-making,
governance and management.
Nexus (about connections, Latin = to connect)
approaches to sustainable development

64. Nexus (about connections, Latin = to connect)
approaches to sustainable development
(Liu et al. 2018)
approach can influence
the achievement of all
SDGs directly or indirectly
by
strengthening synergies,
reducing trade-offs and
creating cascading effects
beyond food, energy and
water sectors.
The food–
energy–
water nexus

65. Six transformations that capture much of the global, regional,
and local dynamics and thus encompass major drivers of
future changes within society and economic landscape
The World in 2050 initiative

66. SDG-EEG nexus approach
(synergies and trade-offs)
Evolutionary Economic Geography towards SDGs
Dematerialization of production and consumption > de-growth
Re-oriented lifestyles (e.g. consumption patterns)
Re-regionalization of production systems > place-based
strategies
Cooperative, non-profit oriented business strategies
Sustainability oriented economic, innovation and energy policies
Global and regional distributive justice and pro-poor growth
Going beyond GDP > Use of alternative wealth indicators
Focused on slow innovation > valuing endogenous resources
(Krueger Schulz and Gibbs 2018) (Shearmur and Doloreux, 2016)

67. SDG-EEG nexus approach: synergies
Spatial organization
New interfirm networks > decrease of natural
resource consumption
Implementing new mobility patterns and
rethinking related environmental impacts >
changes in production organization
Rethinking regional capital accumulation > less
resource intensive transportation
More employment opportunities, emergence of
local trust-based networks and other non-market
cooperation > profits reinvested locally
Newly emerging markets and
production systems, global diffusion of
innovations (make patents common goods)
Improving capital allocation
Incorporating spatial externalities
Investing in local- and regional-based value
chains of financial products > investing in local
Progress Favours

68. Target 1.5
Target 11.A
Progress Hinders
SDG-EEG nexus approach: Trade-offs
SDG-EG nexus
More industrial investment > can increase the
exposure and vulnerability to climate related
extreme events and other economic and social
shocks
COVID-19 as example > implementing World
Health Organization Frameworks > is positive for
Goal 3 but could pave the way > for lower
productivity and reduce employment
opportunities
Environmental management practices or
conservation strategies > can hinder a fair
implementation of spatial plans, sectorial plans
or spatial organization of economic activities
which often impacts more vulnerable people
169 targets click here
Target 8.5

69. Lecture 1 - Introduction: economic geography and its recent paradigms
✓ Sustainable start-ups: how their business and climate performance relates?
✓ From local to global production networks: in what ways are the transformation
processes in industrial towns related to endogenous or exogenous development
dynamics?
✓ From fast-pace to slow innovation: to what extent can we use the concepts of
slow innovation to explain the diverse trajectories of sustainable transformation
of industrial areas (towns; cities; regions > real places)?
✓ Economic growth (SDG 8) – Climate Action (SDG 13) nexus: how to overcome the
trade-offs between strategies to attract business with environmental
sustainability principles?
✓ Prosperous v.s. lagging regions: How lagging regions that are focused on valuing
their unique and distinctive assets can thrive and shape their own sustainable
development paths?
✓ Global goals, local actions: how small- or medium-size towns can play a decisive
role in operationalizing some of the SDGs?
Operationalization of the SDGs through EEG

70. December 2021
Until 08 > Send me
your topic idea via
email (tentative title
+ research question);
Until 15 > You will
receive my feedback
in response
SSE and Erasmus
Questions about the Seminar?

71. January 2022
Until 05 > 2 pages of
reading material
Until 12 > Submission
of draft essay with
max. 2,000 words
excluding references
but with a 150
words abstract
SSE and Erasmus
Questions about the Seminar?

72. February 2022
Collective
presentation 5m.
• 5 slides
• 5 key take-
home
messages
• + discussion
February 2022
• Thursday 03
• 09:00-16:00
• Friday 04
• 09:00-16:00
• Saturday 05
• 09:00:-14:00
Details
will follow
New dates for the presentations

73. Submission of
final essay via
email as PDF
max. 4000 words
(excluding
reference list)
20 of February
2022
150 words
Abstract
Introduction
Development
Conclusion
References used
New date as submission deadline –
always midnight of the mentioned day

74. SSE and Erasmus
Questions about the Seminar?

75. Lecture 1 - Introduction: economic geography and its recent paradigms
Thank you
Questions?
See you on 10-11
(Wednesday):
Governance of
sustainability
transitions
(OLAT / Zoom)