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MORGAN K. (1997) The learning region: institutions, innovation and regional renewal, Reg. Studies 31, 491-503. A potentially significant theoretical convergence is underway between the two hitherto distinct fields of innovation studies and economic geography. Through the prism of the `learning region' this paper examines some of the theoretical and policy implications of this convergence. Drawing on the work of evolutionary politicial economy, it highlights the significance for regional development of the interactive model of innovation. The paper then proceeds to examine the policy implication of this model by focusing, first, on a new generation of EU regional policy measures and, second, on a case study of regional innovation strategy in Wales. Finally, the paper offers a critical assessment of the distributional consequences of this strategy, posing the question: is regional innovation policy enough to address the socio-economic problems of old industrial regions? Innovation Learning Evolutionary political economy Old industrial areas Wales
INTRODUCTION
As we prepare to enter a new millennium the classical paradigms of social and economic development seem to have exhausted themselves. The paradigms of the Left, ranging from neo-Keynesian to Marxist, are impared by an exaggerated and naive faith in the capacity of the state. Less credible still is the neo-liberal paradigm of the Right, whose adherents are unable or unwilling to recognize the shortcomings of the market as a mechanism for promoting economic development and social welfare. For all their differences the classical paradigms are afflicted by dualisms -state versus market, public versus private, etc. - which need to be transcended rather than affirmed in a one-sided fashion. In contrast some of the more eclectic `third wave' conceptions of development consciously try to eschew such binary thinking so as to open up to inquiry regional processes and intermediate institutions that were marginalized by the inordinate attention devoted to 'state' and 'market'.
Over the past few years in particular we have witnessed the spread of a new paradigm, variously referred to as the network or associational paradigm. Whatever the shortcomings of this new paradigm, it is clearly fuelled by the pervasive belief that 'markets' and `hierarchies' do not exhaust the menu of organizational forms for mobilizing resources for innovation and economic development (ILLERIS and JAKOBSEN, 1990; POWELL, 1990; CAMAGNI, 1991; OECD, 1992;...