A huge range of economic literature is assessing the impact of agglomeration economies and the resulting knowledge externalities on industrial growth but neglects the intermediary link, namely knowledge creation capacity. This paper aims at filling the gap and studies the impact of urbanization...

We proceed from the hypothesis that organisational factors are more cogent in comparatively peripheral rural areas, away from the more immediate effects of the selective slackening of population and activities, than in other types of area. We propose a framework within which to analyse the...

The author highlights the fact that the rationalist paradigm which initiated the social construction of the normative character of the town and country planning issue, is not valid. This leads to one?s wondering about the presuppositions inherent in both research and town and country planning...

Classification JEL : R00, R1.<np pagenum="004"/>

This paper gives the reasons for a regional approach of the IDI (International Direct Investments) and is based on an empirical analysis on the level of French regions over the period 1989-98. The results obtained suggest against any waiting the contribution of the IDI to the rebalancing of the...

From Karl POLANYI and New Economic Sociology studies about the concept of embeddedness, this paper suggests that reality of entrepreneurship does not correspond to the atomized representation offered by the standard economic. Contrary to this approach, the heroic contractor leaves room to the...

The aim of this article is to analyse the relation between the scientific density of a region with the firm?s competencies to innovate. This study permits to provide some empirical lights of the learning region concept. We propose an econometric model based on individuals data of French...

The issue of the spatial ecological disparities is a relatively little treated problem. In this article, we suggest to consider an economic analysis of environmental disparities by using data related to the French departments (EIDER data from IFEN). After a treatment by principal component...

This paper deals with the intrametropolitan location strategies of business services. These activities are traditionnaly highly concentrated in the centre. Recent studies show however that they tend to peripherise and that they can be part of the multipolarisation process. The empirical work...

The analysis of the elementary process of euro coins diffusion indicates that networks of individuals play a major role in the international circulation of coins. Through regular surveys realised on representative samples of French population since beginning of 2002, the Euro Spatial Diffusion...