This research involves the development of global value chain ideas to examine industrial restructuring and the geographies of industrial change in a range of industries. It draws on comparative studies of the electronics sector in France and the UK that involved consideration of the role of different varieties of capitalism in shaping industrial trajectories, and a longer-standing interest in industrial change and regional development. More recently this research was extended to deal with value chain ideas. Work published so far has dealt with value chain concepts and with four industries: motor vehicles, chemicals, steel and textiles and clothing mainly in Italy. In the years to come this work will be extended to examine the nature of the changing global divisions of labour in textiles and clothing, motor vehicles and electronics.
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Publications include:
Smith, A, Rainnie, A; Dunford, M; Hardy, J; Hudson, R; and Sadler, D. 'Networks of value, commodities and regions: reworking divisions of labour in macro-regional economies', Progress in Human Geography (2002) 26 (1) 41-63
Dunford, Michael (2003) 'Theorising regional economic performance and the changing territorial division of labour', Regional Studies, 37(8): 839-854 (2003)
Dunford, Michael (2006) Industrial districts, magic circles and the restructuring of the Italian textiles and clothing chain, Economic Geography, 82(1): 27-59
Dunford, Michael and Greco, Lidia (2007) 'Geographies of growth, decline and restructuring: the rise and fall (privatization) of the state-owned steel sector and the trajectories of steel localities in the Italian Mezzogiorno', European Urban and Regional Studies, 14(1): 27-53
Dunford, Michael and Greco, Lidia (forthcoming) 'Sviluppo economico e divisione territoriale del lavoro: il caso FIAT', Quaderni di Sociologia
See also: http://www.globalvaluechains.org/