A Practical Guide To Rural, Cluster-Based Economic Development Strategies

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  • February 28, 2019
Creator
  • Brown, Rebecca
    • Affiliation: College of Arts and Sciences, Department of City and Regional Planning
Abstract
  • The North Carolina map on the cover conjures memories of primary school essays investigating state commodities, when students are asked to identify what the people of a certain state make and to whom they export it. The cartoon-like state maps may be outdated, but what they represent still holds meaning, especially for rural areas that specialize in one or a few products or services, where one or two pictures can say much about an area's economic activity. Policy makers, economic developers, planners, business associations, and others who hear about industry clusters may benefit from remembering the colorful map and what pictures they would draw to represent their region to the world. Touted as an economic development focus useful for everyone, industry clusters have received a lot of attention by academics, economic developers, chambers of commerce officials, and others in recent years. This guide is written for rural economic development practitioners and policy officials interested in understanding industry clusters. While the main purpose is to provide specific guidance to rural economic developers on identifying their area's industry cluster(s), readers are also provided with a framework for understanding clusters, whether a cluster-based economic development approach is a good idea, and what cluster strategies might be. An example from coastal North Carolina, where there is a marine trades cluster, is used throughout the guide to help place concepts in the context of a real rural place. This guide is not a comprehensive review of clusters, cluster theory, or statistical methods of cluster identification and analysis. The References section is a good starting point for readers interested in expanding their cluster research beyond these pages Cortright (2006) wrote a piece for the Brookings Institute, which is referenced throughout the guide and which goes into great detail about clusters, but less detail about conducting a cluster study. Lastly, this guide is written specifically on industry clusters, but it is increasingly common to see other nouns preceding the word cluster, such as knowledge cluster, labor skills cluster, and innovation cluster. There are significant similarities in how different clusters are treated, but significant differences as well.
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Rights statement
  • In Copyright
Advisor
  • Goldstein, Harvey A.
Degree
  • Master of City and Regional Planning
Degree granting institution
  • University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
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Location
  • Carteret, North Carolina, United States
Extent
  • 61 p.
Access right
  • Open access
Date uploaded
  • December 10, 2010

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