Sistemas productivos locales y bienes públicos específicos

Among the various interpretations of the «cluster» concept, we select one that overlaps with the concept of «local production system», found in the literature on industrial districts. Here, the distinctive character is given by the existence and reproduction of a co-operative nexus tying together a set of specialised competitive producers. This nexus supports producers’ market and productive strategies both directly, enlarging the scope for contractual teams and networks, and indirectly, allowing the constitution and adaptation of a rich set of specific public goods. In industrial districts, the co-operative nexus is typically combined with the accumulation of local experiences and experiments, the district being a locality shaped, economically and socially, by the presence of the local production system itself. Clusters as local production systems present a rich typology, and they may be found also outside classical district conditions. In this paper we introduce explicitly the possibility of relevant relations between types of clusters and types of specific public goods. We illustrate this relation with some examples and apply it to shed light on the differences in approaches and objects of local development policies.