Cluster Policy in the Light of Institutional  Context—A Comparative Study of Transition Countries

Lehmann, Tine; Benner, Maximilian

doi:10.3390/admsci5040188

Cited by 21 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 57 publications

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“…Other voids relate to the lack of formal educational organisations which lead to a pool of unskilled potential employees. Furthermore, inadequate provision of specialised information, non-participative procedures by governmental bodies, coupled with the absence or non-functional institutionalised intermediaries are also types of such institutional gaps [46,49,50]. Such voids can hamper development by prohibitively increasing operational costs or favouring one segment of the population over another [5,46].…”

Section: Theoretical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social Innovation to Sustain Rural Communities: Overcoming Institutional Challenges in Serbia

2019

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Responding to a number of longstanding challenges such as poverty, wide-ranging inequalities, environmental problems, and migration, requires new and creative responses that are often not provided by traditional governments. Social innovations can offer socio-ecological and economic solutions by introducing new practices that reduce social inequalities, disproportionate resource use and foster sustainable development. Understanding the role of social innovations is especially complicated in unstable institutional environments, e.g. in developing countries and countries in transition. This paper analyses nine social innovations in rural areas in Serbia, based on in-depth interviews and document analysis. This analysis reveals factors that facilitate or constrain social innovations whilst simultaneously identifying related formal and informal institutional voids, for example, poor law enforcement, a lack of adequate infrastructure, lack of trust, as well as norms and values that bolster patriarchal systems. The results that emerged from this research show that social innovations are operating in spite of these challenges and are facilitating improvements in a number of the aforementioned challenging areas. Some innovators engage in social entrepreneurship activities because of subsistence-oriented goals, while others follow idealistic or life-style oriented goals, thus creating new social values. Moving beyond these observations, this paper also identifies means to overcome institutional voids, such as creation of context-specific organisational structures, improved legal frameworks, and innovative financial mechanisms.

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Section: Theoretical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social Innovation to Sustain Rural Communities: Overcoming Institutional Challenges in Serbia

2019

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“…The second case study is based on a study that examined the regional economy of Haifa, Israel and proposed areas for diversified specialization under the smart specialization concept (Benner et al 2016). The third study about Sousse/Monastir in Tunisia is based on ongoing work in a research project about institutional features of Arab economies with a focus on Tunisia and related publications on regional development in Tunisia (Benner 2014a;Benner 2017b;Lehmann and Benner 2015). For the purpose of the present article, the research pursued under these three projects, which concentrated so far on literature reviews, document analyses and desk research, has been screened in view of its implications for tourism.…”

Section: Cases For Agglomeration-oriented Tourism Development In Medimentioning

confidence: 99%

“…While regional policies such as cluster initiatives have been subject to institutional analyses (e.g., Lehmann and Benner 2015), institutional analysis of tourism clusters is-to the author's knowledge-still an underdeveloped field of research. Considering the specificities of tourism (see Section 3) and the resulting need for collective action between a considerable number of agents within tourist destinations and beyond, and in view of the high complexity of tourism landscapes in many countries including, for example, private tourism enterprises, various levels of government, tourism associations, government-owned enterprises, semi-governmental or non-governmental organizations, and the multitude of more or less formalized interactions between these organizations (Benner 2013;Hjalager 2000;Kachniewska 2013), this lack of institutional analysis is surprising.…”

Section: Institutions In Regional Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

From Clusters to Smart Specialization: Tourism in Institution-Sensitive Regional Development Policies

Benner¹

2017

Economies

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Abstract:In the European Union and its neighborhood, regional development has increasingly come to focus on agglomerations during the last three decades. Notably, during the 1990s and early 2000s, clustering was the major policy focus in regional development. Currently, the concept of smart specialization is applied all over the European Union and is attracting interest in the EU's neighborhood. The tourism sector particularly tends to agglomerate regionally and even locally. While there is a large body of literature describing tourism clusters and while tourism features as a priority sector in many regional development strategies such as smart specialization strategies, there is a research gap on policy approaches applying agglomeration-oriented policy concepts to tourism destinations in an institution-sensitive way. This article argues that both cluster policy and smart specialization can be of considerable value for institution-sensitive tourism development, either when adapted to the specificities of the tourism sector or when integrating tourism development into wider, cross-sectoral strategies of regional development. Such a policy can be a valuable tool for local and regional development, provided that policies are designed in an institution-sensitive manner and respond to the particular institutional context prevailing in a tourist destination. The article illustrates some preliminary thoughts for institution-sensitive tourism development through cluster policy and smart specialization in Cyprus, Israel, and Tunisia.

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“…World class-clusters should be open, flexible and attractive to the best talent and expertise available worldwide. For this reason, the efforts at regional, national and EU level should facilitate the establishment of closer and more efficient linkages between strong clusters as well as with leading research institutes within Europe and abroad 27 . In the view of the European Commission, cluster management should be recognized as a new professional qualification that requires high quality standards and professionalism to efficiently provide the services needed by enterprises and institutions working together in clusters and to fully exploit the benefits ensuing from university-industry-government relations 28 .…”

Section: Towards World-class Cluster: Contemporary Challenge For Clusmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cluster Policy as a Determining Factor for Development of World Class-Clusters

Bembenek

Frankowska

Havierniková

2016

HSS

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The article aims to characterize the significance of cluster policy (cluster-based policy) for the development of world-class clusters. It indicates that the clusters functioning in the European Union (EU) member states are of very diversified nature, which ensues, inter alia, from different conditions (endo -and exogenous) of their development. The evolution of the clustering concept contributed to a greater interest and engagement of governmental organizations of European, national and regional levels in the process of direct and indirect support of cluster development. This kind of support is attributed to cluster policy. This policy, in principle, owing to various actions and instruments undertaken in coordination and stimulating the growth of clusters is supposed to contribute to the maximization of cluster synergy effect, accelerate economic growth, improve the competitiveness of an economy and the development of a knowledge-based economy. A crucial element of this policy is stimulating interactions between business, R&D sector, business support institutions and local and national government agencies in the development process of entrepreneurial ecosystems.The impact of the cluster policy on the cluster development and formation of world-class clusters is presented at the example of German and French cluster policy which focuses on building the cluster management excellence.Although they constitute an example of an organization of commercial nature, clusters necessitate active public support. Contemporary cluster policy particularly in EU countries is frequently of horizontal nature. It often consists in offering public support for the development of clusters of the greater competitive potential, which have the real chance of obtaining world-class cluster status. Owing to active R&D activity and international cooperation with key stakeholders, clusters of this type demonstrate the ability to develop strong cluster value chains. The achievement of the world-class cluster level requires cluster management excellence. Hence, the concepts of world-class clusters and cluster management excellence continuously create new strategic challenges for cluster management.

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Cluster Policy in the Light of Institutional Context—A Comparative Study of Transition Countries

Cited by 21 publications

References 57 publications

Social Innovation to Sustain Rural Communities: Overcoming Institutional Challenges in Serbia

Social Innovation to Sustain Rural Communities: Overcoming Institutional Challenges in Serbia

From Clusters to Smart Specialization: Tourism in Institution-Sensitive Regional Development Policies

Cluster Policy as a Determining Factor for Development of World Class-Clusters

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