Abstract To understand how global firm networks operate, we need consistent information on their activities, unbiased by their reporting choices. In this paper, we collect a novel dataset on the light factories emit at night for a large sample of car manufacturing plants. We show that nightlight data can measure activity at such a granular level, using annual firm financial data and high-frequency data related to Covid-19 pandemic production shocks.

Abstract This study distinguishes cluster resilience from regional economic resilience, which often overlooks heterogeneous mechanisms within clusters. Drawing on a two-decade comparison of two Chinese furniture clusters, it shows how adaptive capacities are shaped by dual embeddedness in territorial contexts and wider industrial networks. One cluster, located in an underdeveloped region with a simple industrial network, relies on direct government intervention to remain resilient. The other, embedded in a diversified and advanced economy, draws resilience from market dynamics and cross-industry synergies. The study demonstrates how institutional and industrial network contexts interact to produce distinct adaptive pathways during periods of polycrisis.

Abstract Due diligence regulations (DDR) are emerging across the global North to govern social and environmental conditions in global value chains (GVCs). Despite DDR’s regulatory significance, we know little about whether it can enhance worker power in GVCs. Based on analysis of South African wine, we ask: To what extent does DDR enhance worker power in South African wine value chains? We reveal that labour organizations and civil society organizations are using DDR as a discursive power source, whilst strategizing how to leverage DDR as an institutional power source. We suggest ways to enhance worker leveraging of DDR, and future research avenues.

Abstract We examine the effects of a large-scale administrative reorganization in China, where counties are annexed into cities to accommodate urban spatial expansion. We present a simple model to illustrate how this government-directed urban growth via annexation may affect firm entry decisions and in turn land market outcomes. The key idea is that annexation indicates the direction of future urban expansion and helps coordinate expectation. Using nationwide data on land-lease transactions, we find that annexation raises industrial land prices in the annexed counties by 7% but does not reduce land prices in neighboring counties and central cities. We show that the annexed counties experienced increases in firm entry and investment, offering a plausible mechanism for the effect on industrial land prices.

Abstract This commentary reflects on the past, present, and future of financial geography in its relationship with economic geography. It discusses how financial geography of the present decade continues and changes research trends and patterns of the past two decades and outlines how financial geography could address global financial questions of the future, including the very nature of money. I argue that financial geography is now mature to address big questions on where money comes from and where it is going and that Journal of Economic Geography has a special role to play in this shared project.

Abstract The mechanisms through which voluntary sustainability standards (VSS) become effective as means of private governance and how they influence power relations in global production networks (GPNs) of certified goods are not well understood. Focussing on the last mile of VSS’ travel, we scrutinize the discursive dimension of power as it operates through the translation of Fairtrade in a local contact zone, namely Fairtrade trainings with workers at Indian tea plantations. Drawing on insights from postcolonial translation studies and actor-network-theory we show that the ways in which VSS are translated by cultural brokers are critical to processes of (dis)empowerment of workers. By showing how translation informs discursive power, our research offers a novel framework to unpack the power structures associated with private regulation as set within the context of multi-polar governance structures and the postcolonial legacies of places.

Abstract Digital business-to-business (B2B) platforms have become essential components of today's economy. However, the impact of digital B2B platforms on global production networks has not yet been sufficiently conceptualized and empirically examined. This article proposes an analytical framework to theorize platform-based reconfigurations of global production networks. By using the case of digital logistics platforms, the article illustrates that service-centred platforms, in particular, have a major impact on global production networks, as they are able to position themselves as lead firms and to utilize data to shape the organizational and spatial composition of global production networks.

Abstract Economic geography data are typically reported using political units, such as counties, which often do not match economic units. Commuting zones (CZs) group counties into labor markets. However, CZs are not the most appropriate grouping for other economic activities. We introduce consumption zones (ConZs), groupings of counties appropriate for the analysis of consumption. We apply CZ methodology to payment card data, which report spending flows across US counties for fifteen industries. We find that different industries have different market sizes. Grocery stores have more than five times the number of ConZs as entertainment. We apply ConZs to measuring industry concentration.

Abstract This article analyzes the role of production factor land in the production process. Using a novel dataset of 20,205 newly established firms in the Chinese manufacturing sector from 2007 to 2014, our production function estimates suggest the existence of a sizable gap (averaging 50 USD/m2) between the marginal productivity of land and its user cost. Basic economic theory suggests a possible relationship with China’s minimum investment intensity (MII) regulation. An analysis using changes in MII limits over time and the resulting discontinuities at county borders confirms that larger gaps are significantly associated with increases in MII limits. Thus, the results of this study suggest that MII regulation leads to allocative inefficiency of land.