Geography 352

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• Geography 352
• Urbanization in the Global South
• Jim Glassman
• Lecture 15, March 3

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Problems for growth pole approaches

• Evidence regarding industrial districts suggests
  limited ability of Global South states to
  generate egalitarian social and industrial
  structures in peripheral areas of country
• Predominance of satellite platform district types
• Even where decentralization occurs, as in Mexico,
  this may or may not meet the equity objectives of
  growth pole planning

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Problems(cont.)

• Primacy can be a misleading indicator, so if
  attacking primacy is the objective, growth pole
  strategies may have inappropriate target
• Patterns of urban growth may be deeply historical
  and difficult to alter through planning

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Agglomeration economies (external scale economies)

• Localization (or industry) economies
• Urbanization economies

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Localization economies

• Declining average costs for firms as the output
  of the industries of which they are a part
  increases, stemming from benefits that industries
  derive within restricted geographic areas, such
  as development of a large, appropriately skilled
  labor pool

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Urbanization economies

• Declining average costs for firms as cities
  increase their scales of activity, stemming
  mainly from technologies that stimulate
  production on a scale that can be achieved only
  with firm specialization. (Geographic clustering
  of specialized firms because of transportation
  costs leads to more geographic specialization and
  concentration.)

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Implications of agglomeration economies

• Existence of agglomeration economies may support
  neo-liberal critiques of growth pole or
  decentralization strategies
• It may also support a Marxist analysis, a world
  cities approach, and/or McGees desakota
  hypothesis

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Ayals criticism of Thailands decentralization
planning

• Bangkoks existing agglomeration economies
  impossible to overcome
• Bangkok not parasitic
• If city were parasitic, people would not keep
  moving to it
• Assumption rational economic actors with perfect
  information
• Appropriate policy is to allow Bangkoks
  agglomeration economies to spill over into
  surrounding region (BMA)

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Neo-liberal dimensions of Ayals analysis

• Infrastructure provision seems to be the key to
  expanding Bangkoks generative role
• No emphasis on class struggle or political
  conflict in analysis
• Growth pole strategy seen as ineffective and
  inappropriate against the backdrop of these forces

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• Thailands decentralization planning
• the case of Chiang Mai-Lamphun

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Critiquing the Thai states project

• Was it really a decentralization project or only
  a deconcentration project?
• Was the Thai state following more of a
  modernization theory or a neo-liberal policy?
• Is the issue really the form of industrial policy
  (ISI, EOI) or the degree to which the state
  actually wants to promote decentralization?
• Is the issue really the states policies or the
  geographical weight of particular agglomerations?
• Is the issue really the states policies or is it
  the class forces that underlie state policies?