Ugo Fratesi

• PhD
• Professor at Politecnico di Milano

The paper disentangles the role of specific factors in the evolution of regional disparities within the EU. First, investigated is the role of employment and labour productivity, with particular reference to specific market-oriented sectors (manufacturing and private services). Second, studied is the role of trade linkages and proximities in the ev...

This engaging and topical book comprehensively explores the complexities surrounding the EU Cohesion Policy, which has been addressing regional and urban development across Europe since the 1980s. Adopting a multidisciplinary approach, it not only considers the goals of this long-term investment policy, which is to reduce territorial disparities be...

Border effects have long been studied and are a central element of EU regional policies. While most literature takes a macroeconomic approach, this paper adopts a microeconomic one, studying the impact on firm productivity in border areas. The empirical analysis, on Italian land borders, employs a novel two‐phases double‐matching design, which cons...

The literature on regional resilience often neglects the timing of recessions and simply uses national cycles. Region‐specific cycles and turning points might bias the results, however, and affect the choice of regions to target with policies. This paper investigates the geography and determinants of regional resilience with a regional turning poin...

The concept of competitiveness is today a central element for regional development, European cohesion policies and smart specialisation strategies. Despite being born for firm-level analyses, competitiveness is indeed commonly used at the territorial level, mainly at the regional or urban scale, normally measured with different composite structural...

Whilst the analysis of the impact of Cohesion Policy funds is well documented, little is known about the short-term consequences of Cohesion Policy during economic crises and its implications for regional resilience. To study these issues, we assemble novel, panel time-series data on Cohesion Policy covering almost four programming periods and diff...

This paper investigates whether territorial characteristics and, in particular, regional administrative capacity influence the effects of European Union (EU) Cohesion Policy support to firms. A novel two-step methodology is applied. First, the effects of Cohesion Policy on employment growth of supported manufacturing firms are estimated separately...

This paper analyses regional competitiveness at the subregional level through a novel methodological approach that adopts a matching design. By comparing the performance of similar firms in different parts of the region, it is possible to detect whether different places provide different competitive territorial assets. Using data for Lombardy, a la...

Smart specialisation strategies have been the core of regional innovation policy in Europe since 2014. They are very important also for regions at a low and intermediate level of development, since they aim at helping all regions carve their opportunities. The assessment of smart specialisation policies is made complex by the architecture of these...

Nella fase in cui vengono definiti i programmi operativi per il nuovo ciclo di programmazione regionale 2021-2027 è utile riflettere sulle lezioni apprese dal ciclo appena concluso al fine di migliorare la programmazione in avvio. Obiettivo del volume è fornire indicazioni, sia concettuali che pratiche, riguardo alle esperienze e alle lezioni, così...

Many academic papers have looked at the economic effects of the EU cohesion policy, which still remain an open empirical issue. The focus of the most recent literature has been on the heterogeneous effects of the policy and the identification of regional conditioning factors. However, most of the existing studies generally assume slope homogeneity...

The objective of this report is to provide an account of how and to what extent the Smart Specialisation approach to regional innovation policy has been implemented in practice. The analysis explores how policy measures implemented under the Thematic Objective 1 “Strengthening research, technological development and innovation” of national and regi...

A thorough investigation of the relationship between the deepening and the widening processes of EU integration and the historic evolution of regional disparities is missing in the related vast existing inductive literature. This usually focuses on EU15 countries or Central and Eastern European Countries, generally involves relatively short and rec...

We live in turbulent times, but when has this not been the case? The history of regions and the ‘regional studies project’ has always had at its core concerns relating to new and increased social and spatial inequalities resulting from economic and political change. Whatever change has occurred to cause this turbulence, some people and places have...

The present chapter reviews the recent studies of the group of regional and urban economics on the impact of the European Union regional policy on regional development. In particular, the focus of the research program is on the identification of the mechanisms through which the local territorial characteristics mediate the effect of public investme...

The presence of cycles characterizes all economic systems, but economic cycles have differentiated spatial impacts. Some regions have broader cycles with respect to the country, while others tend to be less responsive to shocks and hence have narrower cycles. Being exposed to broader cycles, that is, greater volatility, may increase the strain on a...

In a context of rising economic nationalism and Euroscepticism, the value added of a supranational Cohesion Policy of the European Union is constantly under scrutiny. In parallel, a growing body of empirical evidence uncovers a significant heterogeneity of national and regional impacts. This editorial argues that member states should take full resp...

This paper analyzes the impact of the European Union's Cohesion Policy on firm growth in the programming period 2007–13 in seven European countries. Results show that Cohesion Policy support promotes firm growth in size (value added and employment) more than in productivity. However, even when the policy is the same and similar projects and benefic...

This paper investigates the institutional and socioeconomic determinants of the location of asylum seekers in the case of Italy, where a complex multilevel system of hosting has been established to address the pressure of arrivals. In this system, asylum seekers are allocated to local communities through periodic calls (i.e., with a bottom-up proce...

The literature on borders as barriers to economic growth presents some weaknesses in conceptualizing and measuring border effects due to obstacles of different nature (e.g., physical, institutional, and social/cultural). This article aims at overcoming this limitation by demonstrating that political borders actually comprise several lines of fractu...

Recent waves of immigration flows and asylum seekers are posing serious social and political problems in European countries. Between 2009 and 2015, it has been estimated a total of 3–3.5 millions of asylum applications to national governments. This chapter discusses the geography of asylum seekers in the European Union and proposes some descriptive...

Both international and regional economics discuss borders as barriers to economic growth. They hamper trade flows between areas sharing an international border (a demand effect), as well as causing firms’ inefficiency because of the increase in production costs (supply side). In the theoretical and empirical discussions, no question has been raised...

Starting in 2007–2008, an economic crisis with no comparable precedent after WWII has affected most of the World, and Europe in particular. Yet, despite the pervasiveness of the crisis, its impact was highly differentiated across countries. The macroeconomic country-level effects are very important, but also within countries the impact on the vario...

At a time of extraordinary challenges confronting the world, this book analyses some of the profound changes occurring in the development of cities and regions. It discusses the uncertainties associated with the stalling of hyper-globalization and asks whether this creates opportunities for resurgent regional economies driven by local capabilities,...

At a time of extraordinary challenges confronting the world, this book analyses some of the profound changes occurring in the development of cities and regions. It discusses the uncertainties associated with the stalling of hyper-globalization and asks whether this creates opportunities for resurgent regional economies driven by local capabilities,...

The paper measures regional GDP growth losses that a smaller market size caused by the reintroduction of legal and administrative barriers would cause. We model augmented barriers in a Keynesian framework, pointing at four effects: a border effect, stronger for regions close to borders; an exposure effect, stronger for regions open to trade; a cent...

The economic resilience approach recently spread among regional scientists and economic geographers has provided new challenges to empirical researchers interested in studying the overall temporary and persistent consequences of the recent crisis and, more broadly, economic shocks. One of the open issues in this literature is the identification of...

The ideas put forward by Roberto Camagni are numerous and notable. They speak for themselves in the whole book therefore, in this short contribution, I prefer to narrate some facts and anecdotes on the way in which he works and on the way in which he allowed me to grow professionally in my 12 years of acquaintance with him.

This paper presents a new methodology to measure border effects from a different perspective with respect to the standard gravitational approach. The methodology proposed measures supply-side border effects by identifying two types of limits produced by the border to the productive system: inefficiency in exploiting local resources (efficiency need...

The impact of European Cohesion Policy in different contexts. Regional Studies. Cohesion Policy, an important pillar of the European Union, has always been closely scrutinized and subject to debate because of the size of the budget and supranational role of the European Commission. Recent research has acknowledged that the impact of Cohesion Policy...

The territorial capital of regions is an important determinant of growth, but also of the impact of EU Cohesion Policy. First, because it can act as a filter, enhancing the impact of regional policies. Second, the latter can help building territorial capital which, in turn, will foster regional development. This work analyses the medium and long‐ru...

In order to understand the persistent underdevelopment of many of Southern European regions it is necessary to look deeper inside their socio-economic structures and the economic base of their countries. Uneven patterns of development can lead not only to increasing polarisation and regional disparities, but give rise to a negative structural effec...

Structural upgrading has been considered in the literature as fundamental for the possibility of middle and high income regions and countries to thrive in the global economy. At the same time, most regions belonging to Southern European countries have clearly been losers facing integration/globalization processes, especially in the years of the eco...

We look at the effect of various features of EU Cohesion spending on regional growth and, in a second step, we explore the impact of these features on evaluations by local experts of the achievements of the examined policy interventions. The results all point in the same direction: concentration of funding and effective targeting are key, both for...

Regional Studies celebrates its 50th anniversary with this special issue. This introductory article reflects back on developments since the journal was started and offers signposts for urban and regional research looking ahead. It outlines the changing global context for regional studies and identifies some of the ways in which the need for regiona...

Seeks to present a new concept of regional upgrading in lagging regions and to detect a critical link between regional disparities and human capital Unique in its focus on economic geography and regional development patterns in Southern Europe Combines profound theoretical discussion with strong empirical and comparative content Offers great divers...

The book is aimed at a wide audience, including academics, economic geography, spatial planning and regional policy researchers, institutional leaders and managers, national and institutional policy makers, practitioners, administrators, master's and senior bachelor's students on related courses, general readers. A list of courses and corresponding...

This book brings together academics, members of European institutions, and regional and national level policymakers in order to assess the performance and direction of EU Cohesion policy against the background of the most significant reforms to the policy in a generation. Responding to past criticisms of the effectiveness of the policy, the policy...

In 2015, the Regional Studies Association (RSA) celebrated 50 years and one of the keywords of this (hi)story is “impactful”. Having an impact requires to be able to bring research-based knowledge to policymakers moving out of the academic ‘Ivory Tower’ and engaging in policy debate, thus acknowledging the societal role of research. Yet, this requi...

This paper exploits a unique dataset on regional interventions in 15 beneficiary regions of the European Regional Development Fund over four programming periods (1989-2013) to examine empirically the processes and conditioning factors underpinning success and failure of such interventions over time and across space. Our core results suggest an elev...

This article examines how the evolution of employment trends in the regions of Europe since the outbreak of the crisis may have been shaped by the emergence of sheltered economies in certain regions of Europe in the pre-crisis period. It uses descriptive and econometric analysis to determine the relationship between the level of protection from the...

Although the crisis is a world phenomenon, its impact is not at all spatially invariant. The aim of the article is to analyse the spatial effects of the crisis, doing so through a scenario-building exercise in which policies are kept constant, and economic growth is mainly driven by macroeconomic and supply side trends on the assumption that the cr...

Fratesi U. Regional knowledge flows and innovation policy: a dynamic representation, Regional Studies. This paper presents a tool to study ex-ante the effects of innovation policy on regional growth and income. It uses a dynamic evolutionary simulation approach and presents a model able to represent the flows of knowledge within and between regions...

In front of fiercer competition from outside (especially from emerging countries), of the contraction of the internal demand, following the crisis and the problems with public finances, and of the process of European integration that fostered increases in wages and inflation in its Eastern countries, Europe can no longer prosper without a clear lon...

When dealing with cultural built heritage, the enhancement strategies are generally rooted on the history and based on the embedded values of cultural goods themselves, rather than on the multiplicity of their tangible and intangible values. Furthermore, the current state of the art in cultural heritage management lacks of an appropriate legislatio...

This article measures the spatial heterogeneity of the costs of the economic crisis and assesses the role of cities as sources of regional resilience in Europe. Cities hosting financial activities have been severely hit during the crisis; however, they also host hard and soft territorial capital elements—high physical accessibility, access to infor...

In the knowledge era, the importance of highly-qualified human capital has been widely recognized as a key factor for local economic development, especially for those areas specialized in science and technology (S&T). Assuming a regional perspective, the capacity to attract this kind of people is both a sign of territorial competitiveness and a way...

Fratesi U. Editorial: The mobility of high-skilled workers – causes and consequences, Regional Studies. This editorial sets the context for this themed collection by identifying why the literature has increasingly explored the heterogeneous nature of labour mobility, and how the mobility of high-skilled workers has different implications for region...

Fratesi U. and Percoco M. Selective migration, regional growth and convergence: evidence from Italy, Regional Studies. This paper studies the link between regional disparities and migration flows, focusing on the skill content of migration. Disparities may lead to migration, which should reduce them; but at the same time if migration is skill-selec...

This article deals with the implementation of a new version of a macroeconometric regional growth model called MAcroeconomic, Sectoral, Social, Territorial Model (MASST). The new version presents interesting novelties with respect to the past, since it is able to embrace the two main supranational regulations with which the European Union binds dec...

Globalisation is not a state of the world but an evolutionary process, which entails the increasing planetary integration of markets for goods and services, markets of location sites for economic activities, markets of production factors as technologies and information. Regions are involved in the globalization process to a different extent dependi...

This issue marks the handover of Regional Studies to a new editorial team. Taking over the reins appeared somewhat less daunting because the journal is in robust health with a generous stock of papers and special issues in the pipeline. Special thanks go to Arnoud Lagendijk who led a group of highly committed editors and ensured a smooth transition...

On May 1st 2004, 10 Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries joined the EU and became fully eligible for communitarian financial support. While the conditions for eligibility are the same, at regional level CEE territories are characterized by very different socioeconomic settings. In particular, different regions are differently endowed with w...

Among the many roles universities can perform in regional development, this paper focuses on a less traditional one: universities can act as an instrument for brain gain, allowing regions to attract smart people who often stay after graduation. Thus, universities can also exacerbate the capability of regions with dynamic economies to attract smart...

Cities are highlighted in traditional theories to be the most efficient drivers of economic growth. Considered as sort of collective agents, implicitly or explicitly defining specific development trajectories, cities compete in the global economy for their attractiveness, building on their historical strengths and identifying opportunities for dive...

The globalization of tasks rather than sectors, the off-shoring and outsourcing of service functions, de-industrialization in favour of services, and the decentralization of intertwined functions (manufacturing and related services) are reshaping the division of labour in the sub-national economies of advanced countries, and regional economies are...

This paper presents a new version of a forecasting regional growth model called MASST (MAcroeconomic, Sectoral, Social, Territorial model). This new version is specifically designed to take account of sectoral and social (intangible) effects on the growth of regions, and it is therefore able to produce scenarios for all European regions according t...

This paper builds a taxonomy of European regions based on their integration in international markets. The classification is based on two dimensions, one structural/functional, the structural connectivity of regions, and another purely economic, their degree of specialization in open sectors. The conceptual classification is empirically applied to a...

This short paper concludes the special issue by bringing together a number of common patterns emerging from the five regions investigated. It appears that these five regions have been successful in globalization thanks to a pro-active approach which upgraded their functional specialization, making the most from their assets and being open to global...

Affuso A., Capello R. and Fratesi U. Globalization and competitive strategies in European vulnerable regions, Regional Studies. This paper highlights the role played by structural economic features and industrial competitive strategies in the performance of a group of European regions, defined as ‘vulnerable’ because of their specialization in indu...

Investigation of whether and to what extent the EU has been participating in the ongoing globalization process is not an easy task because globalization is a complex phenomenon and Europe has played a complex role in it.

As explained in the introductory chapter, the interest of this study is not only in the success factors of benefiting regions in the past, but mainly concerns what will happen to benefiting and global regions once different and alternative assumptions are made on how globalization will continue to affect international markets.

This chapter is devoted to presentation of the results for the three scenarios set out in the previous chapter: the baseline, the proactive, and the defensive scenarios. First of all, it reports aggregate results for Europe as a whole, and for Eastern and Western countries. As will be shown, the three scenarios exhibit rather different growth patte...

This chapter examines the potential new role and style of regional policies in the European Union (EU) in the context of the different globalization strategies highlighted in the previous chapters. Regional policy suggestions are derived deductively from interpretations of the results of the empirical analysis on both the past and the simulation ex...

As discussed in the previous chapter, high-quality and efficient territorial capital assets, together with high regional attractiveness, are the elements on which regional competitiveness is based. Territorial attractiveness therefore matters for regional growth, and this applies to all regions, regardless of their exposure to globalization process...

This part of the book is devoted to the creation of scenarios under different assumptions on how globalization patterns will develop in the future.

Globalization is not a state of the world but an evolutionary process which entails the increasing planetary integration of markets for goods and services, of the location sites of economic activities, and of production factors like technology and information.

The previous chapter showed that the globalization of production is not just the off-shoring and outsourcing of production phases in developing countries; it no longer simply affects the division of labor between emerging and advanced countries, developed and developing economies; and it is no longer confined to the manufacturing industries: the ma...