IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wiw/wiwrsa/ersa04p455.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Business networking for SMEs as a means to promote regional competitiveness: A Theoretical Framework

Author

Listed:
  • Vitor Braga

Abstract

The competitiveness of regions, as a means of promoting the competitiveness of a country as a whole, has been one of the main topics on the agenda of policy makers over the last decades. Several attempts at promoting competitiveness have been made with different degrees of success. In most cases, public investment in the regions was perceived as the solution to promote regional competitiveness and top-down policies were implemented. However, competitiveness also has an important dimension that is not related to public investment and depends instead on the cultural and institutional norms of a region. These regional characteristics are not easily addressed by traditional regional policies and require the study of cognitive processes and sociological and anthropological issues. Over recent years regional development has emphasised the importance of endogenous development. From this point of view, national or local governmentsÂ’ policies must recognise that competitiveness not only comes from public investment in physical infrastructures but also depends on the behaviour, attitudes and capabilities of local entrepreneurs within the business environment. The scientific literature has been unanimous in showing that business networks carry advantages for regional competitiveness. Several key issues are raised regarding this issue including trust, local culture, and transaction costs. The networking of activities gains special emphasis with respect to SMEs. In most cases the regional economy depends on these firms and they are frequently seen as a key element within regional development. Also these firms depend much more on potential networks to gain advantages in information and expertise and often require joint ventures with respect to R&D activities. This paper will address the advantages of networking and its contribution to regional development as a way of promoting competitiveness. In so doing it will analyse the factors that lead entrepreneurs to co-operate and apply these findings in the context of regional and national economic development. Keywords: Network form of organisation, Local development, Trust, Co-operation.

Suggested Citation

  • Vitor Braga, 2004. "Business networking for SMEs as a means to promote regional competitiveness: A Theoretical Framework," ERSA conference papers ersa04p455, European Regional Science Association.
    • Handle: RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p455
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www-sre.wu.ac.at/ersa/ersaconfs/ersa04/PDF/455.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bruce Kogut & Udo Zander, 1992. "Knowledge of the Firm, Combinative Capabilities, and the Replication of Technology," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 3(3), pages 383-397, August.
    2. Elina VaramÄki & Jukka Vesalainen, 2003. "Modelling different types of multilateral co-operation between SMEs," Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(1), pages 27-47, January.
    3. Jan Inge Jenssen & Harold F. Koenig, 2002. "The Effect of Social Networks on Resource Access and Business Start-ups," European Planning Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 10(8), pages 1039-1046, December.
    4. Geoffrey M. Hodgson & Thorbjørn Knudsen, 2007. "Firm-Specific Learning and the Nature of the Firm. Why Transaction Costs May Provide an Incomplete Explanation," Revue économique, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 58(2), pages 331-350.
    5. Nicolai Foss, 2002. "'Coase vs Hayek': Economic Organization and the Knowledge Economy," International Journal of the Economics of Business, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 9(1), pages 9-35.
    6. Hans B. Thorelli, 1986. "Networks: Between markets and hierarchies," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 7(1), pages 37-51, January.
    7. Bruce Kogut & Udo Zander, 1996. "What Firms Do? Coordination, Identity, and Learning," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 7(5), pages 502-518, October.
    8. Oecd, 2002. "Access for Business," OECD Digital Economy Papers 67, OECD Publishing.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sullivan, Diane M. & Marvel, Matthew R. & Wolfe, Marcus T., 2021. "With a little help from my friends? How learning activities and network ties impact performance for high tech startups in incubators," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    2. Oded Shenkar & Jiatao Li, 1999. "Knowledge Search in International Cooperative Ventures," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 10(2), pages 134-143, April.
    3. Soufiane Mezzourh & Walid A Nakara, 2009. "Governance and innovation : A Knowledge-based approach [La gouvernance de l'innovation : une approche par la connaissance]," Post-Print halshs-01955966, HAL.
    4. Junfu Zhang, 2011. "The advantage of experienced start-up founders in venture capital acquisition: evidence from serial entrepreneurs," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 36(2), pages 187-208, February.
    5. Rogerio S. Victer, 2020. "Connectivity knowledge and the degree of structural formalization: a contribution to a contingency theory of organizational capability," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 9(1), pages 1-22, December.
    6. Tammy L. Madsen & Elaine Mosakowski & Srilata Zaheer, 2003. "Knowledge Retention and Personnel Mobility: The Nondisruptive Effects of Inflows of Experience," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 14(2), pages 173-191, April.
    7. Sharon Novak & Scott Stern, 2008. "How Does Outsourcing Affect Performance Dynamics? Evidence from the Automobile Industry," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 54(12), pages 1963-1979, December.
    8. Jacobs, Mark A. & Yu, Wantao & Chavez, Roberto, 2016. "The effect of internal communication and employee satisfaction on supply chain integration," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 171(P1), pages 60-70.
    9. Laurence Capron & Will Mitchell, 2009. "Selection Capability: How Capability Gaps and Internal Social Frictions Affect Internal and External Strategic Renewal," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 20(2), pages 294-312, April.
    10. Peng, George Z. & Beamish, Paul W., 2019. "Subnational FDI Legitimacy and Foreign Subsidiary Survival," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 25(3), pages 1-1.
    11. Frank T. Rothaermel & Maria Tereza Alexandre, 2009. "Ambidexterity in Technology Sourcing: The Moderating Role of Absorptive Capacity," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 20(4), pages 759-780, August.
    12. Der-Fang Hung, 2015. "Sustained Competitive Advantage and Organizational Inertia: The Cost Perspective of Knowledge Management," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 6(4), pages 769-789, December.
    13. Nicolai J. Foss, 2002. "The Strategy and Transaction Cost Nexus Past Debates, Central Questions, and Future Research Possibilities," DRUID Working Papers 02-04, DRUID, Copenhagen Business School, Department of Industrial Economics and Strategy/Aalborg University, Department of Business Studies.
    14. Li, Haiyan, 2020. "Role of overseas ethnic and non-ethnic ties and firm activity in the home country in the internationalization of returnee entrepreneurial firms," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 26(1).
    15. Fornoni, Mariel & Arribas, Iván & Vila, José E., 2012. "An entrepreneur's social capital and performance: the role of access to information in the Argentinean case," Nülan. Deposited Documents 1881, Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata, Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y Sociales, Centro de Documentación.
    16. Li, Shenxue & Clark, Timothy & Sillince, John, 2018. "Constructing a strategy on the creation of core competencies for African companies," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 204-213.
    17. Mehmet Ali Köseoglu & John A. Parnell & Melissa Yan Yee Yick, 2021. "Identifying influential studies and maturity level in intellectual structure of fields: evidence from strategic management," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(2), pages 1271-1309, February.
    18. Bi-Juan Zhong & Yaping Gong & Oded Shenkar & Yadong Luo & Zhixing Xiao & Shuming Zhao, 2023. "Managing the hearts of boundary spanners: CEO organizational identification and international joint venture performance," Asia Pacific Journal of Management, Springer, vol. 40(1), pages 87-119, March.
    19. Sebastian Martin & Birgit Grüb, 0. "Intensive WOM-behavior in the healthcare sector – the case of an Austrian hospital’s Facebook site," International Review on Public and Nonprofit Marketing, Springer;International Association of Public and Non-Profit Marketing, vol. 0, pages 1-22.
    20. Camisón, César & Forés, Beatriz, 2011. "Knowledge creation and absorptive capacity: The effect of intra-district shared competences," Scandinavian Journal of Management, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 66-86, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    network form of organisation; local development; trust; co-operation.;
    All these keywords.

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p455. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Gunther Maier (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.ersa.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.