Local Institutional Mechanisms in Knowledge Creation and Diffusion: Case Studies of Video Game Clusters
Bibiana Pulido Ph.D. Candidate - University of Montréal- School of Industrial Relations
Interuniversity Research Centre on Globalization and Work (CRIMT)
- Keywords: local institutions, knowledge development, creative clusters
The video game industry is known to cluster in specific geographical locations where it can thrive on diverse resources such as qualified labour, tax benefits, complementary institutions and related industries. Quebec and Sweden video game clusters have benefited on some of these resources and the local institutions of these geographic spaces. Thus local institutions, institutional arrangements and cultural practices have an importance on the development, growth and knowledge creation in both of these video game clusters. Therefore knowledge creation and diffusion is not essentially the result of a concentration of firms and workers but rather the product of cultural and institutional factors (Boschma, 2005; Felstein, 2012).
Regional literature on knowledge development usually refers to the externalities of a system as if the emergence of relations of exchange and cooperation function naturally due to geographical proximity. On the contrary we prefer to refer to knowledge as the production of a “collective good” that is not necessarily natural but rather strongly linked to the role of institutional mechanisms. The creation of “collective goods” is generated by mechanisms of regulation from a diversity of actors such as firms, academic institutions, professional organizations, incubators, etc. Thus knowledge production is not necessarily automatic and natural but is related to complex phenomena that are embedded in local institutional mechanisms that regulate the behaviour of different actors. Actors are constrained in their actions by institutions but they are also the creators of new institutions. In sum they contribute to create new institutional mechanisms in terms of the resources and the constraints linked to the types of relations they build.
This communication aims to have a better understanding on the mechanisms and dynamics that enhance knowledge development and diffusion in Quebec and Sweden’s video game clusters. It also looks at how actors structure their system and build relationships in different ways in both of these clusters. For this purpose preliminary results of a qualitative study in both of these institutional environments will be presented.