Rents, knowledge and neo-structuralism: transforming the productive matrix in Ecuador

This paper explores the relationship between ground rent, production and knowledge in Ecuador’s neo-structuralist, state-led project to transform the productive matrix. Based upon insights from the Marxian approach to the critique of political economy, we interrogate how neo-structuralism has conceptualised the relationship between ‘natural resource income’ and ‘knowledge-based’ economic development. The paper argues that a rent-theoretical perspective, which takes seriously the regional unfolding of uneven geographical development in Latin America, can highlight the limits of a national development plan conceived according to the logic of Schumpeterian efficiency. In doing so, the paper identifies the contradictory relationship between natural resource exports, state-led ‘knowledge’-based development and capital accumulation. On this basis the paper offers a historically and empirically informed critical analysis of selective import substitution industrialisation and vanguard science and technology strategies designed to transition Ecuador away from primary resource dependence

Carrier localization on the nanometer-scale limits transport in metal oxide photoabsorbers

Metal oxides are considered as stable and low-cost photoelectrode candidates for hydrogen production by photoelectrochemical solar water splitting. However, their power conversion efficiencies usually suffer from poor transport of photogenerated charge carriers, which has been attributed previously to a variety of effects occurring on different time and length scales. In search for common understanding and for a better photo-conducting metal oxide photoabsorber, CuFeO2, α-SnWO4, BaSnO3, FeVO4, CuBi2O4, α-Fe2O3, and BiVO4 are compared. Their kinetics of thermalization, trapping, localization, and recombination are monitored continuously 100 fs–100 µs and mobilities are determined for different probing lengths by combined time-resolved terahertz and microwave spectroscopy. As common issue, we find small mobilities < 3 cm2V-1s-1. Partial carrier localization further slows carrier diffusion beyond localization lengths of 1–6 nm and explains the extraordinarily long conductivity tails, which should not be taken as a sign of long diffusion lengths. For CuFeO2, the localization is attributed to electrostatic barriers that enclose the crystallographic domains. The most promising novel material is BaSnO3, which exhibits the highest mobility after reducing carrier localization by annealing in H2. Such overcoming of carrier localization should be an objective of future efforts to enhance charge transport in metal oxides.Published versionThe authors acknowledge the financial support for this work from the Helmholtz International Research School "Hybrid Integrated Systems for Conversion of Solar Energy" (HI-SCORE), an initiative co-funded by the Initiative and Networking Fund of the Helmholtz Association (HIRS-0008). M.K. acknowledges funding from the German Bundesministerium fuer Bildung and Forschung (BMBF), project "H2Demo" (no. 03SF0619K). We acknowledge Avner Rothschild for providing lab facilities at the Technion. Open access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL