A BS T R A C TThis article outlines a framework for the analysis of economic integration and its relation to the asymmetries of economic and social development. Consciously breaking with state-centric forms of social science, it argues for a research agenda that is more adequate to the exigencies and consequences of globalization than has traditionally been the case in 'development studies'. Drawing on earlier attempts to analyse the cross-border activities of rms, their spatial con gurations and developmental consequences, the article moves beyond these by proposing the framework of the 'global production network' (GPN). It explores the conceptual elements involved in this framework in some detail and then turns to sketch a stylized example of a GPN. The article concludes with a brief indication of the bene ts that could be delivered by research informed by GPN analysis. K E Y WO R D SGlobalization; economic development; business networks; institutions; embeddedness.The analysis of economic development has been bedevilled by a series of analytic disjunctions that have resulted in work either at macro or meso levels of abstraction or, where empirical investigations have probed micro level processes, the larger analytic picture has often been absent, merely implicit, or at best weakly developed. While there are notable exceptions to this general rule (for instance, Armstrong and McGee, 1985) behind it lies half a century and more of scholarship in development economics (irrespective of its paradigmatic stripe) and in the political economy and sociology of development. 1 What is more, from the beginnings of 'dependency' approaches to development in the 1940s through to debates over the respective roles of states and markets in the East

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Recent literature concerning regional development has placed significant emphasis on local institutional structures and their capacity to ‘hold down’ the global. Conversely, work on inter‐firm networks – such as the global commodity chain approach – has highlighted the significance of the organizational structures of global firms’ production systems and their relation to industrial upgrading. In this paper, drawing upon a global production networks perspective, we conceptualize the connections between ‘globalizing’ processes, as embodied in the production networks of transnational corporations, and regional development in specific territorial formations. We delimit the ‘strategic coupling’ of the global production networks of firms and regional economies which ultimately drives regional development through the processes of value creation, enhancement and capture. In doing so, we stress the multi‐scalarity of the forces and processes underlying regional development, and thus do not privilege one particular geographical scale. By way of illustration, we introduce an example drawn from recent research into global production networks in East Asia and Europe. The example profiles the investments of car manufacturer BMW in Eastern Bavaria, Germany and Rayong, Thailand, and considers their implications for regional development.

This article critically evaluates the concept of labour agency. First, we briefly reprise structure/agency debates in human geography in order to distil how agency is best conceived. Second, we propose a more discerning approach to labour agency that unpacks its many spatial and temporal dimensions. Third, we develop a ‘re-embedded’ notion of labour agency and identify global production networks, the state, the community and labour market intermediaries as key arenas for consideration. The paper argues that worker strategies must always be assessed in relation to these wider social relations, suggesting a constrained, variegated notion of labour agency.

Global production networks (GPN) are organizational platforms through which actors in different regional and national economies compete and cooperate for a greater share of value creation, transformation, and capture through geographically dispersed economic activity. Existing conceptual frameworks on global value chains (GVC) and what we term GPN 1.0 tend to under‐theorize the origins and dynamics of these organizational platforms and to overemphasize their governance typologies (e.g., modular, relational, and captive modes in GVC theory) or analytical categories (e.g., power and embeddedness in GPN 1.0). Building on this expanding literature, our article aims to contribute toward the reframing of existing GPN‐GVC debates and the development of a more dynamic theory of global production networks that can better explain the emergence of different firm‐specific activities, strategic network effects, and territorial outcomes in the global economy. It is part of a wider initiative—GPN 2.0 in short—that seeks to offer novel theoretical insights into why and how the organization and coordination of global production networks varies significantly within and across different industries, sectors, and economies. Taking an actor‐centered focus toward theory development, we tackle a significant gap in existing work by systematically conceptualizing the causal drivers of global production networks in terms of their competitive dynamics (optimizing cost‐capability ratios, market imperatives, and financial discipline) and risk environments. These capitalist dynamics are theorized as critical independent variables that shape the four main strategies adopted by economic actors in (re)configuring their global production networks and, ultimately, the developmental outcomes in different industries, regions, and countries.