1、中文 2320 字， 1670 单词 原文 Producer services: growth and roles in long-term economic development Material Source: The Service Industries Journal Vol. 28, No. 4, May 2008, 463-477 Author: Karl-Johan Lundquist, Lars-OlofOlander and Martin Svensson Henning. This new interest in services is spurred by the fa
2、ct that research has shown that producer services perform increasingly important functions in advanced capitalist economies. Phenomena are appearing, such as servicefication of the manufacturing sector, reflecting, for example, the internal growth of service functions within traditional manufacturin
3、g firms. The fact that this process is paralleled by an externalisation and outsourcing of service functions from manufacturing firms is another example, as is the notion that goods to an increasing degree are carriers of services, and that the manufacture and service sectorsin interaction generate
4、new types of products and services. The aim of this paper is therefore, with a background in Schumpeterian economics and evolutionary economic geography, to analyse the anatomy of the dramatic restructuring process that has been taking place in Sweden since the late 1970s, with a special focus on th
5、e roles and growth patterns of producer services. We will thereby show a new and more complete picture of the transformation process in Sweden, including also producer services. Such analyses could be performed by merging the aggregated theories of technology shifts and long waves with the now emerg
6、ing framework of evolutionary economic geography. Previously, we have analysed the transformation of the Swedish economy from along-term manufacturing perspective.This paper marks the first step in an integrative analysis of the Swedish technology shift that started in the mid-1970s. The analysis co
7、vers both manufacturing and service sectors. In our research efforts, we largely agree with the arguments made by Wood 2005 on the merits of a service informed approach to economic transformation and growth. This paper will show why such an approach is increasingly relevant in the wake of the third
8、industrial revolution. Historical data ongrowth in producer services is not easily obtainable. Even if the roles of producer services have been much researched inrecent years, we lack detailed longitudinal accounts of their growth over longer periods of time. In the empirical analysis, we use unique
9、 and recently constructed consistent time series obtained from the DEVIL databases Databases of Evolutionary EconomicGeography in Lund on the longitudinal transformation of different producer service sectors since the end of the 1970s. We will however begin this paper by exploringthe theoretical fou
10、ndations of anevolutionary long-term approach to economic development. Accounts of technology shifts or long waves are often focused on manufacturing sectors. This naturally has to do with the focus of this approach on technology and manufacture tangible product, but also on the limited availability
11、 of time series describing producerervices growth over time. However, in the present technology shift process, producer services could be assumed to play increasingly important roles. The term producer services is used here to denote advanced, specialised and knowledge-intensive service industries o
12、perating in a market consisting of other firms Bryson, Daniels, & Warf, 2004. There is a slight conceptual overlap between this definition and the one commonly used in the literature about,knowledge-intensive business services KIBS, although usually the term producer services includes also a more va
13、ried spectrum of services directed towards firms see discussion inAslesen&Isaksen, 2007. In this paper, we concentrate on a quite broad range of services, and we include also producerservices of a more simple character for example security services. The dominating part of the analysis is however dev
14、oted to the more advanced producer service sectors, which could be considered as being parts of the KIBS sector. Numerous scholars have noted the extensive growth of services in general during the past decade or so. For example, Beyers 2003 analyses the extensivegrowth of IT-using industries duringt
15、he1990s in theUSA, and notes especially the dramatic growth of producer services andhealth services. During the last few decades, especially in the USA, the service industries have accounted for the lions share of thegrowth in employment, and in many regional economies today services play a more cen
16、tral role in economic growth than was previously the case Beyers, 2005. Empirical evidence also indicates an increase of persons working with creative tasks within traditional industries, but primarily as a growth in the number of employees within creative industries, such as Information andCommunic
17、ationTechnologyICT, advertising, marketing, music/film and design/fashion. Studies in the UK show an aggregated increase in these categories of 35% during the period 1994?2001 Bryson et al., 2004, p. 72. The important role of business andprofessional services also goes for regional European economie
18、s outside the traditional service hot-spots such as London Daniels & Bryson, 2005； Lundquist, Olander, &Svensson Henning, 2006. As we will see, this discussion could also be extended to the case of Sweden during recent decades. Thedifferent sub-sectors of producer services play different roles in th
19、e restructuring andrenewal of the economy. For example, consultants engaged in the areas of management, organisation and purchasing contribute indirectly to the economic restructuring by supplying specialised and independent professional knowledge, changing the routines of firms and consequently the
20、ir productivity and profit. Other sub-sectors, such as R&D, product development, design and market research may play a more direct role due to their capacity to contribute to innovations and the development of new services, products and industries. Explanations for the extensive growth of producer s
21、ervices and KIBS could therefore be of both statistical and functional natures. Statistically, some of the growth could be attributed to outsourcing of previously internalised service functions in manufacturing companies. During the Fordist crisis, down-sizing and outsourcing were important means to
22、 achieve lowered costs, increasing productivity and flexibility and meeting increasing international competition. The rapid development of microelectronics and ICT opened up new ways of organizing production as well as different kinds of new control systems, administration and service functions. The
23、se features can be regarded as central in the emerging post-Fordistcapitalism,and the process resulted in a growth of companies specialised in handling the increasing technological and administrative complexity characterising a growing number of firms and industries. The externalisation resulted in
24、a situation where many functions previously performed within the firm especially manufacturing companies were contracted to small independent firms. Bryson et al. 2004, p. 14 however underline that similar strategies are adopted by larger service firms, and that the externalisation wave therefore is
25、 not restricted to manufacturing firms only. Functionally, scholars have emphasised the changing nature of the economy toward a knowledge-intensive learning economy Archibugi&Lundvall, 2001 or new economy Beyers, 2002, a transformation that whatever it is called has increased the demand for qualifie
26、d services Wood, 2002. Theoretically, the role of producer services in the first part of the technology shift process will be to contribute to the diffusion of new generic technologies. The first new services of the technology shift, developed in close association with new production, most likely ha
27、ve broad application areas. As the key technology is developed and as the economy advances further into the technology shift, service transforms and becomes increasingly advanced. Depending on their functional linkages to other different industries in the technology shift process, and on the state o
28、f complementarities and development blocks, the different sectors of producer services can be expected to expand at different points in time. Our next challenge concerns the measuring of this longitudinal process. The service encapsulation concept Bryson et al., 2004； Howells, 2004 illuminates the i
29、ncreasing interdependence between different sectors of theeconomy andstresses that the boundaries between different industries become increasingly blurred. New service types are developed to increase the profit of manufactured products at the same time as many tangible products, to an increased exte
30、nt, are delivered andconsumed only together with accompanying services. All forms of encapsulation include producer services, other services, intermediary services and manufacturing companies. These actors create, in different constellations and through complex interaction, the knowledge and renewal
31、 propelling the long-term transformation of the economy. Explanations of externalisation, flexible specialization and outsourcing on the one hand, and explanations of the increased demand that caused the growth of independent and creative producer services on the other hand, are of similar character
32、. The point is that outsourcing and vertical disintegration of large firms is an important source inflating the growth of producer service firms. However, this must not overshadow the fact that the most important source of growth in producer services is accelerating demand. At the same time as this
33、proceeds, an internal growth of service-related tasks and knowledge has taken place within other types of companies. Theroles of producer services in contemporaryprocesses of economic transformation and growth are thus complex, overlapping,and therefore theoretically not easily specified. However in
34、 this context most importantly, the KIBS provide specialist services to a range of industries. Bryson et al. 2004 argue that the traditional way of looking at innovations as primarily manufacturing based where service is only assumed to play a supporting role is erroneous. Rather, the concentration
35、of knowledge and expertise found in someproducer service sectors should be looked upon as having altered the balance of power in the economy, and that producerservices has come to strongly influence other sectors of the economy. Wood 2006 argues that KIBS facilitate innovation in client companies th
36、rough at least three related areas； organisational and managerial change, technical innovation, and market intelligence. Through this, they facilitate adaptation of new technologies in firms, but this could be generalised to a perspective where KIBS offer opportunities for client firms to increase their adaptability to external changes Wood, 2005. From a technology shift perspective, the KIBS facilitates adaptation of the broad generic technologies to concrete application in manufacturing or other service firms. Inrapidly changing phases of economic development, access to
