Workshop 11:
Regional Possibilities in Economic Development
Friday 9 June at 13.15-14.45
Chair: Kari Liuhto
EU-Russian relations at the regional level: A case of the Kaliningrad region
Kari Liuhto (Pan-European Institute, Turku School of Economics, Finland)
The rapid economic transition of the Baltic States and Poland along with their recent EU memberships raises the question, has the Kaliningrad region benefited from the EU coming to its borders or has the region suffered from the EU enlargement? The aim of this presentation is to answer the question, what is the socio-economic impact of the EU’s latest enlargement upon the Kaliningrad region? Secondly, one may ask what are the possible economic consequences of the legislative change concerning the special economic zone to the Kaliningrad economy?
The study focuses on analysing change in the region’s foreign trade and foreign investment; due to the fact that the region’s external economic relations are likely to experience changes earlier than the rest of the economy. Here, one should keep in mind that major changes in economic behaviour do not occur overnight, and hence, one is only able to analyse the immediate impact of the Union’s expansion on Kaliningrad. One should not forget that some immediate reactions to the enlargement are probably only temporary ones. Furthermore, it is extremely important to keep in mind that just a year has passed since the enlargement occurred, and therefore, all the necessary statistical data is not available yet.
In a nutshell this study shows that the immediate economic impact of the EU enlargement on Kaliningrad is relatively modest, though still a positive one. The new special economic zone will play an important role in the future development of the Kaliningrad economy. Similarly, the Kaliningrad region will play a special role in the future development of EU-Russian relations. It has been said that St. Petersburg is Russia’s window towards Europe. Similarly, one may conclude that Kaliningrad is Europe’s window toward Russia. Open windows are needed for creating a true partnership between Russia and the EU.
The Discourse of Competitive Region and its Place-Specific Outcomes in the European North
Sami Moisio (Department of Geography, University of Turku, Finland)
During the past ten to fifteen years, competition has not only remained one of the catchwords among global business elites but has also penetrated into the vocabulary of politicians, administrators and regional planners all over the world. Not surprisingly, the concept of competition has also surfaced in the political debates dealing with the future of the European Union, for example, concerning the Lisbon Strategy and the reform of the structural and cohesion policies. In the process which aims to develop a new competitive EU, the concept of competitive region has emerged as a discursive tool which structures and in fact constitutes and reorganizes the practices of regional planning in Europe. The discourse of regional competition has therefore caused specific spatial outcomes and some of these outcomes and processes have been carefully analyzed from spatial perspective. However, most of the studies dealing with, for example, urbanization of neo-liberalism, differentiation/specialization of regions, or the impacts of the EU membership into the practices of regional planning have mainly focused on core areas of the EU. European peripheries have therefore remained rather untouched areas in research. The aim of this paper is to focus on the embeddedness of the discourse of competition in the regional practices in the European North. To illustrate, the paper deals with the current regional policies within Finland which clearly unfold the discursive power of competition when legitimating various spatially sensitive political practices.
Keywords: Competition, regional policies, globalization, urbanization
The Development of North-West Russia and Delphi-Method -Evaluation of the Industrial, Social and Logistical Developments in the Murmansk Oblast
Yrjö Myllylä (Oy Aluekehitys RD and Department of Geography, University of Joensuu, Finland)
The aim of the research project is to assess the future development of economic and social conditions and structures in Murmansk Oblast.
The study uses theoretical starting points especially strong prospective trend-approach (Toivonen, 2004, p 10) from futures studies and applies a clusterbased approach (Porter, 1990) in conceptualising industrial development. Clusters manifest themselves and materialise in geographical spaces, which requires analysis of transport infrastructure.
The Delphi method is the methodologigal tool in this research (Kuusi, 1999). A so-called Delphi panel will be set up during the research process, and it will be involved in at least two rounds of interviews. The final composition of the panel consisting of approximately 50 persons. The main actors of Murmansk Oblast and other actors, for instance, Moscow, Finland and Norway, will be chosen to join the panel as experts.
According to prelimary results of the Murmansk panel the most important trends influencing the development of the Murmansk Oblast area are the main trend of logistical flows and the main trend of the technological development and globalisation based on the preliminary results from the Delphi-panel´s second round. By estimating the continuation of the trends until 2025, it can be stated that the main trend of globalisation would be strengthen in the first place then the main trend of the logistical flow and technological development which all would be strengthened or would have a slight increase.