1. Studying Economic Geography2. Economic Organization and Spatial

Change- Evolution of Capitalism- Technology and economic Development3. Spatial Divisions of labor- Globalization and changing spatial divisions of

labor- Outsourcing and global commodity chains

Less developed countries (LDCs): Countries that are not fully industrialized or do not have sophisticated financial or legal systems. These countries, also called members of the Third World, typically have low levels of per-capita income, high inflation and debt, and large trade deficits.

Newly industrializing countries (NICs): Developing country whose economy is supported to a greater or lesser degree on exports from internally generated industrial production, such as Argentina, Brazil, South Korea, Mexico, and Taiwan, rather than on agricultural products or commodities.

1. Studying Economic Geography

Interrelationships surrounding economic organization and spatial change

The point emphasize at the moment is that all these direct, indirect and interaction effects are important to an understanding of spatial change. They are all implicated, in other words, in accounting for both the general and the unique.

2. ECONOMIC ORGANIZATION AND SPATIAL CHANGE

Mode of production: the way in which human societies organize their productive activities and thereby reproduce their socioeconomic life.

5 forms of economic organization:1) Subsistence2) Slavery3) Feudalism4) Capitalism5) Socialism.

Merchant capitalism (or mercantilism)

Competitive capitalismOrganized capitalismAdvanced capitalism

Factors of production: land and other natural resources, labor, physical and human capital.

Different modes of production are also characterized by different forces of production (technology, machinery, means of transportation) and by different social formations (made up of specific proportions of different social classes).

Machinofacture: industrial production that was based less on handicraft and direct labor power than on mechanization, automation and intensively used skilled labor.

Bussiness servicesTransnational corporations (TNCs)Flexible production systemsDisorganized capitalism

The most important economic sectors in this informational economy are: - High-technology manufacturing- Design-intensive consumer goods,

ranging from high-fashion footwear to entertainment products. Selling in market niches around the world.

- Financial and business services.

Technology and economic development

Geographical path independenceCreative destructionTechnology systemsInitial advantagesCompetitive advantagesDiminishing returnsIncreasing returns to scale

Once dominant technologies emerge in a region, they become progressively more “locked in”. Small initial advantages in the use the critical new technologies and subsequent refinements in them bring much larger or increasing returns to those firms (and places) that have them.

3. Spatial divisions of labor

Spatial division of labor(new) International division of laborExternal economies of scaleAgglomeration: is a major feature of

economic organization across a large number of manufacturing industries.

Components or specific services are ‘sources’ or obtained from multiple suppliers in different countries (Outsourcing) and assembled in several.

OffshoringNeoclassical economicsCaptive outsourcing Offshore outsourcingEconomic of scaleOffshore financial centres