The impact of locational strategies of advanced producer service firms on the metropole cities’ economic positions in Central Europe

The paper focuses on the interrelatedness of the location strategies of the advanced producer services and the urban hierarchies in the Central European countries based on the 36 metropole cities of the region (9 countries), and focuses on how far the Central European metropolises are integrated int...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Katalin Döbrönte
Format: Article
Language:ces
Published: University of South Bohemia 2018-12-01
Series:DETUROPE
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Online Access:http://www.deturope.eu/img/upload/content_18654895.pdf
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Summary:The paper focuses on the interrelatedness of the location strategies of the advanced producer services and the urban hierarchies in the Central European countries based on the 36 metropole cities of the region (9 countries), and focuses on how far the Central European metropolises are integrated into the international networks of the advanced producer service firms (APS firms). Along with the globalization process a transnational urban network is developing in the last few decades, the international flows of networks, information, labour and capital are getting more intense, and the global service sector tends to locate offices where a critical mass of highly skilled labour force and economic performance is present with high level physical and digital accessibility. This strategy favours the capital cities and metropole cities which are in the focus of my study. Which metropole cities can be more attractive for APSs and what are the underlying factors is the main question of my paper. The first part of the paper focuses on the location strategy of APS firms based on three aspects: the service value of a city that identifies the size of the nodal point in the network; the quantity of flows measured by the number of interactions among city-pairs among offices of a certain APS, and the measurement of network relations pointing out the ratio of all APS business interactions in the macro region appearing in a city. A complex APS location index is developed that sets up a hierarchy among the metropole cities of the sample. The second part of the paper searches for justification on the hierarchy set up, and on the underlying factors by analyzing several aspects influencing the position of a city. These aspects include the economic power of the city, the role of the city in business decisions measured by locations of production type of multinational companies, the role of the city in the administrative structure, the accessibility of the city, and other social factors, like knowledge. The paper offers answer on how the location strategies of APS firms affect the position of the metropole cities in the region, whether new division lines or peripheries occur in the macro-region.
ISSN:1821-2506