Understanding Local Economic Resilience

Karen Chapple, PhDProfessor, City & Regional Planning

Notions of resilience• Psychology• Ecology• Planning• Regional economics

Source: Pendall, Foster, & Cowell 2009

The role of time

Source: Foster 2010

Regional trajectoriesSource: Foster 2010

Resilience =f (assets and endowments

+ response)

e.g., natural features, human capital, industry mix, political structure, social capital, legal context, demographics… e.g., actors, policies, institutions, culture

Adding in governance…

Measurement issues• Outcomes or capacity?• Regional economic performance: employment,

earnings, income, upward mobility, inequality, or…?

• Governance: networks, institutions, culture, or…?

• Relative or absolute growth/change?• Timeframe

Example from “The Resilient Regional Labour Market?”Resilience in earnings: Achieving a new equilibrium

End status Start status

 Below average

 Above average

Below average Stagnant Transformative

Above average Faltering Thriving

Source: Chapple and Lester 2010

Austin = +42%Lubbock = -2%• Immigration• Patents• Manufacturing

Resilience in earnings: Reversing path dependency

Change in   decade 2Change in decade 1

 Below average

 Above average

Below average Stagnant Transformative

Above average Faltering Thriving

Source: Chapple and Lester 2010

1980s 1990sPhoenix -5% +18%Detroit -9% +14%• Immigration• Patents

For further reading:• Chapple, Karen, and T. William Lester. "The resilient regional labour

market? The US case." Cambridge journal of regions, economy and society 3.1 (2010): 85-104.

• Foster, A. K. "Regional Resilience. How Do We Know It When We See It." Unpublished paper (2010).

• Hill, Edward, Howard Wial, and Harold Wolman. Exploring regional economic resilience. No. 2008, 04. Working Paper, Institute of Urban and Regional Development, UC-Berkeley, 2008.

• Pendall, Rolf, Kathryn A. Foster, and Margaret Cowell. "Resilience and regions: building understanding of the metaphor." Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society (2009): 1-13.

• Simmie, James, and Ron Martin. "The economic resilience of regions: towards an evolutionary approach." Cambridge journal of regions, economy and society3.1 (2010): 27-43.