Knowledge-based Economy

Artykuł przedstawia analizę genezy i funkcji szerokiego spektrum dyskursów modernizacyjnych odnoszących się do takich pojęć, jak „gospodarka oparta na wiedzy/gospodarka napędzana wiedzą”, „gospodarka innowacyjna” czy też „społeczeństwo informacyjne/innowacyjne”. Odwołując się do metod krytycznej analizy dyskursu, pokazuje podstawowe mechanizmy legitymizacji nierówności społecznych i reprodukcji hierarchii we współczesnym świecie przy użyciu wspomnianych dyskursów nazywanych tu – ze względu na silny komponent wizji zmian społeczno-kulturowych – „dyskursami nowego społeczeństwa”. W artykule szczególnie podkreślono rolę omawianych dyskursów w legitymizowaniu zależności krajów peryferyjnych i półperyferyjnych w rozumieniu teorii systemu światowego Wallersteina.

This paper evaluates the role of universities in the formation of technological competences and entrepreneurship centres. Australia, Russia and Peru, which possess different resources to adapt their university systems to the globalized world’s conditions,
are compared along the lines of innovation, competitiveness, accessibility and attractiveness to international students. Through statistical analysis we test the connection between the innovative capacity of these countries’ economies and their educational
policies.

Europe 2020 Strategy was adopted in 2010 as key strategy for boosting the potential of European ‘smart, sustainable and inclusive economy’ in the global multi-polar world. The adoption of this strategy acknowledged the limitations of the EU Lisbon Treaty in addressing the challenges of the knowledge-based economies and the lack of political support for delivering productivity, economic growth, jobs supply, competiveness and social inclusion. In line with the key goals of the European Union’s growth strategy “Europe 2020,” the Western Balkan states faced their need of national and regional strategies for research and innovation, aiming to increase the impact of research and innovation on economic growth and employment opportunities. However, there are several key challenges which remain to be tackled such as: low business expenditures on R&D, outdated research infrastructure etc. In this regard, this paper aims to address the key inhibitors of the progress of the knowledge-based economies and the economic growth of the three Western Balkans and EU candidate countries, Macedonia, Bosnia & Herzegovina and Serbia.

In the future, the economies that perform the best will be those whose governments help develop and manage their knowledge assets most effectively for innovation. Technology policy will thus need to revert to innovation policy that will be much more technology-user centered and demand based than technology policy has been until now. As such, innovation policy must also be better integrated with general economic policies that affect incentives to innovate, policies that shape the regulatory and institutional environment in which innovation takes place, and policies that provide appropriate safety nets for the parts of the population that fail to follow the ever increasing pace of change.

Abstract: This paper proposes a model approach of contemporary conditions related to a knowledge-based economy (KBE) of the development of industrial enterprises and fundamental implications of their functioning for the formation of this type of economy, in respect of the geographical space. As a result, the article aims to determine the impact of socio-economic, cultural and natural conditions associated to the KBE on the functioning of industrial enterprises, and on the other hand, to determine
to what extent these companies affect the development of the individual elements of geographical space, which are components of KBE. Proposal of the model is shown in the background analysis of the essential features of KBE and available data of Eurostat and Polish Central Statistical Office (GUS) on Poland’s position in the European innovation space. Finally, the paper attempts to identify to what extent empirical verification of the proposed model was carried out or whether it is possible to do so during further research. The conducted study has shown that there is a need of empirical verification of
some of the model elements, which can be an interesting new field of research in industrial geography.

The interplay between place, individuals and creativity has, in recent years, received much attention. National differences of how capitalism is organized can be drawn into this discussion, but they are seldom examined systematically. By investigating data from the UK as a liberal market economy and Sweden as a coordinated market economy, this paper develops and tests a set of hypotheses to analyse the role of ‘varieties of capitalism’ in relation to the location dynamics of the creative class. Results confirm the effect of the coordinated market economy in flattening the distribution of the creative class, tempered by the Swedish urban hierarchy which acts to concentrate it in a smaller number of (larger) locations. Through combining both contextual and spatial elements, this approach generates new insights into observed variations between the coordinated market economy and the liberal market economy around mobility, adjustment and quality of place, but it also serves to highlight where other additional factors may be influential.

The movement of many Arab countries toward knowledge-based economic development requires the transition to more effective skills formation systems. This paper proposes an institutionalist approach to national skills development systems in the advancement toward knowledge-based economic development. There is currently no accepted general framework to analyze national skills development systems, and this has resulted in countries adopting reactive approaches to skills development problems. The conceptual framework advanced is an integrated, systemic view of national skills formation systems guided by government intervention in light of rampant failures of skills formation approaches that rely exclusively upon market mechanisms. The framework contributes to the skills formation literature by reviewing, synthesizing, and building on the literature from a multidisciplinary perspective. It considers the relevant institutions and interests of key stakeholders as highly interrelated in the context of knowledge-based economic development and achievement of accompanying economic, political, and social objectives in the Arab World.

For the webinar please visit: http://www.tahseen.ae/r&iskillsforknowledgeeconomies.html#header