Economic geography
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Economic geography is the subfield of human geography that studies economic activity and factors affecting it. It can also be considered a subfield or method in economics.
Economic geography takes a variety of approaches to many different topics, including the location of industries, economies of agglomeration (also known as "linkages"), transportation, international trade, development, real estate, gentrification, ethnic economies, gendered economies, core-periphery theory, the economics of urban form, the relationship between the environment and the economy (tying into a long history of geographers studying culture-environment interaction), and globalization.
Over the past few decades, economic geography has shifted its interest towards comprehending how contemporary economic changes are redefining spatial patterns of production, innovation, as well as development. Globalization has enhanced the geographic integration of economies due to the increased flows of capital, goods, labour, and knowledge resulting in the formation of sophisticated global supply chains of production. These activities have strengthened the strategic position of cities and regions as strategic venues of coordination, innovativeness, and sophisticated economic activities as well as adding to the uneven development of several territories.
The rise of digital and knowledge-based economies has also contributed to a further shift in the spatial organization of economic activity. The economic activity is highly concentrated in specific regions despite some of the distance barriers now being diminished due to the advancement in information and communication technologies. As economic geographers point out, innovation and learning can be based on the local interaction, institutional frameworks, and dense social networks. Consequently, digitalization has not yet displaced the relevance of place, but it has transformed the nature of the role of spatial proximity and connectivity on economic performance.
One of the most important fields of study in economic geography is the topic of innovation systems and regional collections. It has been noted by Bathelt et al. that the benefits of localization are realized when local regions experience localized buzz developed through frequent interaction of firms, workers and the supportive institutions as well as the presence of global pipelines linking local economies with the international sources of knowledge and expertise. This view can be used to understand how such specialized regional centres, as high-technology districts and clusters in the creative industry, are formed and sustained, and where geographic concentration can be beneficial to knowledge generation and competitive power.
Economic geography is also now increasingly concerned with problems of regional inequality, sustainability and place-based development. While in some parts of the world globalization and innovation-driven growth have produced some positive effects, in others the world has witnessed a long-term economic stagnation and marginalization. Research in this field is concerned with the structural and institutional factors contributing to slow-changing spatial disparities, and looks at policy strategies designed to promote inclusive and sustainable regional development. Environmental issues such as climate change and resource limitations are becoming increasingly an important part of the examination of interactions between economic activities and ecosystems in space.
Modern economic geography makes extensive use of a wide array of tools in order to analyze these dynamics, ranging from geographic information systems (GIS), spatial econometric methods, and network-based approaches. Such methods help researchers address economic processes of multiple sizes, and reinforce the position of economic geography as a key area for studying contemporary economic modification.