There is evidence from the literature that firms enjoy higher productivity levels when the workforce employed is culturally more diverse. It is an open question whether this gain is utilized to shift the supply curve and set lower prices, in order to achieve a higher demand and possibly higher...

This paper regards locational choice as an entrepreneurial act and seeks to identify the drivers of locational choice of SME finns. Based on a recent database on Dutch entrepreneurs, factoranalytic methods are deployed to trace three clusters of driving forces.

The paper takes for granted that urban areas - and hence the built environ­ment - may play a catalytic role for effective environmental policy. This position is based on the fact that most residential, production and transportation activities in the developed world take place in urban areas. A...

The present study addresses the relevance of geographic proximity for companies in our age of advanced ICT. Many visions of, and speculations on, an increased footlooseness of companies and a concomitant dispersal of urban economic activity have been published in recent years. To identify...

This paper addresses the local-regional-supra-regional orientation of small-scale farms and firms in rural areas. Due attention is given to the role of local centres (villages, towns) for the functioning of rural areas. With help of a quantified indicator spatial linkages related to sales and...

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is widely accepted as a potentially beneficial set of instruments, which may improve the welfare and competitiveness of nations and cities. Nowadays both public and private actors aim to exploit the expected benefits of ICT developments. This paper...

In this study we address the potential rise of innovative regions in Central and Eastern Europe by connecting the interests of foreign investors and the interests of recipient regions as learning regions. Our exploratory results give a rather pessimistic picture in that enhancing the innovative...

The aim of this paper is to review recent contributions to the study of entrepreneurship and firm dynamics from a methodological and firm demographic perspective. Understanding the contemporary changes in business life requires a thorough understanding of structural changes in entrepreneurial...

Unemployment rates appear to vary widely at the subregional (e.g. local or provincial) level. Using spatial econometric models for spatial autocorrelation, this paper focuses attention on the spatial structure of regional unemployment disparities of Italian provinces. On the basis of findings...