Rethinking clusters and the paradox of sustainability innovation: local or global

This Special Issue reports findings from the ‘Rethinking Clusters’ conference held in Valencia in the latter part of November 2023. At the time no-one dreamt that an important part of its thematic – sustainability – in the context of innovation would, within a year, loom so fatally large by the experience of global heating in the form of catastrophic floods which so badly affected the lives of communities in the wider Valencia city and region at that time leaving more than 200 dead. Now other changes are affecting the fates of neighbourhoods, communities, towns, cities, regions and countries as the populist wave in the USA floods the assumptions, beliefs and life plans of people affected by the election of a true autocrat in the former functional democracy in the USA. Three global autocrats now rule in China, Russia and the US and with different leanings – China aids Russian belligerence; the US bullies China which usurps the US in return, in a mutual trade war; while the US cosies up to Russia by disdaining Russia’s would-be client state, the Ukraine. Rethinking clusters as armaments, military logistics and digital control supplier ecosystems for corporate defence clients were yet to be envisaged in, for example, the European space-economy. But most of these collected papers speak to some of the structural patterns of related businesses and their chosen forms. Showcased are infrastructure and transportation logistics agglomerations especially at ports, with all animated by the ‘Autocratic Triad’. There are studies of cluster practices in Europe where clusters are seen to be more innovative than their countries as a whole. Some evidence of the virtues of collaboration over arm’s length exchange may explain these characteristics. Clusters may even be seen assisting sustainability by undermining ‘fast fashion’ in attacking it with ‘slow fashion’