The competitive advantage of a peripheral university town: Human and social capital perspectives from Joensuu, Finland

The positive impacts of social and human capital on individual, firm and geographical level are well known. Accordingly, the literature on social capital has advocated the impacts of social networks, norms and trust in securing individual and mutual benefits. Already, the early literature on human capital was concentrated on the economic advantage of individuals, that is, on the impact of education on wage levels. Recent economic studies underline the importance of human capital in creating firm-level innovations and fostering regional economic development. The role of universities has been highlighted in this discussion. However, it seems that this educated human capital is geographically concentrated on the largest urban regions. Whether, this imposes difficulties for firms located in more peripheral regions is discussed here with a case study from a small university town of Joensuu situated in peripheral Eastern Finland. The proposition presented here is that the negative impacts of locational factors, in the periphery, and having a small labour pool will be partially compensated with close social ties and worker immobility. First, the question is approached through official statistics showing that the mobility of educated workforce is smaller in more rural and peripheral regions compared to that of the capital and other densely-populated regions of Finland. Second, the tentative picture drawn from the statistics is deepened with data from semi-structured thematic interviews conducted in Joensuu. The main stakeholders interviewed were chosen, according to the framework of regional innovation systems, from both public and private organizations (n = 15). The results confirm that although a peripheral location of firms does impose limitations to the availability of human capital at hand, the negative impact is compensated with low outmigration of educated workers due to existing well-knit social ties. Furthermore, employee loyalty to their employers is high in Joensuu, that is, the thinner possibilities for other employment renders the educated workforce in Joensuu relatively immobile even in intraregional scale. Although, worker immobility can be seen as a drawback for a region it can also be considered as a regional asset for firms that have decided to locate their activities in Joensuu, as it saves the firms from the mandatory allocation of resources to the training and introductory procedures of new employees. Accordingly, a local university both attracts and supplies educated workers in the region for the benefit of local enterprises and is an important partner in cooperation for local firms

Border region studies:The structure of an ‘offbeat’ field of regional studies

The contemporary conditions of academic capitalism exert pressures on researchers to avoid ‘peripheral’ journals and ‘unfashionable’ topics. This paper sheds a light onto the structure of one such ‘offbeat’ field, namely ‘border region studies’, by discussing its geographical distribution, key themes, significance and impact. The review suggests that border region studies can be considered a significant and important ‘branch’ of regional studies, which accounts for a small but increasing proportion of regional studies research, particularly in Europe and North America. Four main distinct, but interconnected, research themes are discussed: cooperation, development, governance and mobility. Based on the review, potential directions for further research are proposed and the implications of valuing research based almost solely on journal rankings is scrutinized

Knowledge-based urban development of cross-border twin cities

Knowledge-based urban development (KBUD) has recently emerged as a central topic of discussion among scholars and practitioners interested in urban development tools and policies. However, what has rarely been discussed before is whether KBUD can be achieved in a cross-border context. This paper sets out to propose an analytical framework for empirical studies on the shared KBUD processes of cross-border twin cities, based on indicators adapted from the literature on cross-border regional innovation systems. The proposed framework was tested with two cases: Helsinki-Tallinn and Copenhagen-Malmö. The results demonstrate the feasibility of the framework, guide potential further studies on KBUD and twin cities and raise relevant suggestions for urban policy-makers in border regions

Cross-border knowledge transfer and innovation in the European neighbourhood: Tourism cooperation at the Finnish-Russian border

Knowledge transfer and innovation cooperation between the EU and its neighbours has remained weakly developed. To promote this cooperation, the EU has set up initiatives for the European neighbourhood. The issue has, however, received very limited scholarly attention in the field of tourism. This research gap is addressed here via interview data collected from participants in tourism related EU-funded projects in the Finnish-Russian cross-border region. These underline the importance of EU-funding in facilitating knowledge transfer and innovation between Finland and Russia. While language issues, and differences in business culture and administrative/legislative systems between the two countries, constitute barriers for practical cross-border cooperation, it is cross-border differences in culture and technological capabilities that drive cross-border knowledge transfer and innovation in the cross-border region. The paper concludes with policy recommendations for promoting future cross-border cooperation in innovation and tourism

Business intelligence and the role of external information in small- and medium-sized enterprises of the Finnish marine industry

The availability of external data sources and information for firms has expanded in recent decades. At the same time, the importance of business intelligence (BI) in the competition between firms has been increasingly highlighted. This competition poses challenges, however, especially for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The purpose of this paper is to delineate a general picture of the conditions of the role of external information in BI as it applies to SMEs in the Finnish marine industry. According to the results, the use of external information in BI was generally occasional and unsystematic. This was due to time and resource limitations to be allocated for BI. However, the interest in developing BI processes is evident. Thus, this study puts forward development proposals that promise to help SMEs enhance and rationalise their BI processes, according to the development targets that they have identified

Science and Technology Cooperation in Cross-border Regions::A Proximity Approach with Evidence for Northern Europe

Given the sheer number of cross-border regions (CBRs) within the EU, their socio-economic importance has been recognized both by policy-makers and academics. Recently, the novel concept of cross-border regional innovation system has been introduced to guide the assessment of integration processes in CBRs. A central focus of this concept is set on analyzing the impact of varying types of proximity (cognitive, technological, etc.) on cross-border cooperation. Previous empirical applications of the concept have, however, relied on individual case studies and varying methodologies, thus complicating and constraining comparisons between different CBRs. Here a broader view is provided by comparing 28 Northern European CBRs. The empirical analysis utilizes economic, science and technology (S&T) statistics to construct proximity indicators and measures S&T integration in the context of cross-border cooperation. The findings from descriptive statistics and exploratory count data regressions show that technological and cognitive proximity measures are significantly related to S&T cooperation activities (cross-border co-publications and co-patents). Taken together, our empirical approach underlines the feasibility of utilizing the proximity approach for comparative analyses in CBR settings

Geography of innovation in Europe and Finland : Empirical studies on innovation indicators and regional development

Innovation is commonly considered as the engine of economic growth. However, the role of education and training has been a recurrent subject raised as the actual driver of regional development. Accordingly, the role of universities has been highlighted as a significant contributor to local economies. The empirical literature remains inconsistent on the causal relationships between these phenomena. At the heart of this discussion is the on-going debate about which indicators should be used to measure innovation, as there seems to not be a single measure that could be claimed as clearly superior. This brings the question of the possible interconnections between innovation indicators and regional economic development to the fore on different scales: European Union, national, regional and local. ---- First, the sensitiveness of different innovation indicators and indexes is analysed. Second, the impacts of innovation indicators on regional and economic development are investigated. Third, the proposed role of education and training as the factors behind innovation and economic growth are put under scrutiny. Fourth, the role of universities in the local economy is studied. The analyses are mainly carried out with standard statistical methods, including principal component analysis and Granger causality tests, but the picture is also deepened with a semi-structured thematic interview case study. The data for the statistical analysis are constructed from official statistical databases and from a unique innovation count database compiled by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland. The results show that great care is needed, when choosing the indicators to measure regional innovation with, as different measures produce highly divergent rankings. In worst cases this can lead to non-robust messages, if the shortcomings of the different indicators are not taken into account when drawing policy conclusions. The results also show that in a geographical context the innovative (European and Finnish) regions are among the most economically developed. The links between continuing vocational training, innovation and economic development are manifest in a similar fashion. Still, although innovation is clearly linked to regional development, other socio-economic variables, workforce characteristics, and education in particular, seem to offer higher explanatory power for the success of regions. In fact, educational attainment is shown to Granger cause economic development and innovative capacity, whereas the relationship between innovative capacity and economic development is bidirectional. Finally, in peripheral settings, Joensuu in this case, the impact of university on to the local economy is not as straightforward as in the case of well-to-do regions and top universities: there are evident mismatches between the needs of local business life and the research, the teaching and entrepreneurial characteristics of the university and its staff and graduates. Still, when successful the university-industry collaboration has produced good experiences and beneficial cooperative projects in the locality. In conclusion, since the link between innovative capacity and actual innovative outputs is not straightforward, policies simply relying on increasing regional research and development expenditures are not guaranteed to succeed. Therefore, although there is no universal `one-size-fits-all policy´, the strengthening of the educational base of the regions is highlighted here as a possible alternative to strive towards high levels of innovation and economic growth.Innovaatioiden maantiede Innovaatioita pidetään nykytietämyksen mukaan yleisesti taloudellisen kasvun moottoreina. Koulutuksen rooli innovaatioiden takana on kuitenkin noussut tiedeyhteisön keskusteluissa laajasti esiin tärkeänä taustatekijänä. Tästä johtuen myös yliopistojen rooli paikallistaloudessa on korostunut. Empiiriset tutkimukset eriävät toisistaan johtopäätöksissään innovaatioiden, koulutuksen ja taloudellisen kehittyneisyyden syy-seuraus suhteista. Tärkeänä tekijänä tässä keskustelussa on ollut ristiriita siitä, millä muuttujilla innovaatioita pitäisi mitata (vaihtoehtoja on monia kuten tutkimus ja kehittämistoimintatilastot, patentit ja innovaatiokyselyt). Tässä tutkimuksessa tarkastellaan empiirisesti innovaatioindikaattoreita ja niiden suhdetta taloudellisen kehittyneisyyden mittareihin Euroopan Unionissa sekä Suomessa. Tulokset osoittavat, että on tärkeää suhtautua innovaatiotutkimukseen kriittisesti, koska eri innovaatioindikaattorit tuottavat alueellisesti tarkasteltuna toisistaan poikkeavia tuloksia. Pahimmassa tapauksessa tämä voi johtaa epätarkkoihin kehittämissuunnitelmiin ja -ohjeistuksiin. Yleisesti katsoen innovatiivisimmat alueet Euroopassa sekä Suomessa ovat myös taloudellisesti kehittyneimpiä. Innovaatioilla on selvä yhteys alueelliseen kehittyneisyyteen, mutta useiden muiden sosio-ekonomisten muuttujien (erityisesti koulutus) vaikutus näyttää olevan voimakkaampi. Tilastollinen testaus osoittaa, että koulutuksella on suora syy-seuraus vaikutus sekä alueen kykyyn luoda innovaatioita että taloudelliseen kehittyneisyyteen. Sen sijaan innovaatioiden ja taloudellisen kehittyneisyyden suhde on molemmin suuntainen ja toisiaan vahvistava. Paikallisella tasolla voidaan todeta, että yliopistojen vaikutus paikallistalouteen ei ole välttämättä yksioikoisen selkeä. Tapaustutkimus Joensuusta osoittaa, että paikallisen yliopiston kampuksen tutkimus- ja koulutus suuntausten sekä yritysmaailman tarpeiden välillä on selkeitä yhteensopimattomuuksia. Lisäksi yliopiston opiskelijoiden ja henkilökunnan yrittäjyyttä tulisi kannustaa. Onnistuessaan yliopisto-yritys yhteistyö tuottaa huomattavia etuja molemmille osapuolille sekä paikallistaloudelle. Tie hyvistä ideoista ja keksinnöistä aidoksi markkinoilla kysyntää omaavaksi tuotteeksi tai palveluksi ei ole suoraviivainen. Kehityssuunnitelmat, jotka luottavat täysin alueellisen tutkimus- ja kehittämistoiminnan lisäämiseen eivät takaa menestystä. Koulutus ja osaava työvoima korotetaan tutkimuksen tulosten pohjalta tärkeimmiksi taustatekijöiksi innovaatioiden luonnissa ja taloudellisen kasvun edistämisessä