RSA Membership Research Grant Scheme (MeRSA)

Previous and Current Grant Holders

“Soft innovation? Towards new narratives on regional capabilities and policies”

The overall aim of the project is to investigate how the inclusion of soft innovation in theoretical, empirical and policy work at the regional level can help creating new narratives on regional capabilities. By ‘soft innovation’ one understands all forms of innovation that are not purely technological or functional. The starting point of the project is the acknowledgement that when it comes to regional capabilities and regional resilience the dominant narrative tends to center around technological capabilities and assume an underlying R&D-driven model of economic growth. Yet, there is increasing awareness that other forms of capabilities and that sectors where formal R&D is not the main source of innovation might also act as drivers of regional resilience.

Theoretically, the project aims at making space for soft innovation capabilities in models of regional resilience by investigating how existing frameworks can be adapted and/or overturned. Empirically, the project aims at developing original metrics of regional capabilities using trademarks and design rights, and linking them to indicators of regional resilience. Finally, the project aims at translating the results from theory and empirics into insights for policymakers to embrace new narratives on regional capabilities.

I am very honored to be awarded one of the MeRSA grants. The award will allow me to showcase my research to the lively RSA community, with a tremendous potential to have both academic and policy impact. I am excited by the opportunity to engage in research that can contribute to widen our perspective on which regional capabilities and innovation types matter for places to thrive.

Adriana Mihaela Soaita

Exploring the nexus between trust, corruption and anti-corruption policies in post-communist Romania

You can read more about this research here: https://ziarulargesul.ro/municipiul-pitesti-obiect-de-studiu-la-o-universitate-britanica/

THE RESEARCH PUZZLE: It is striking that a great majority of Europeans believe corruption is widespread in their countries, yet few have experienced it. In the least corrupt EU states of Denmark, Finland and Sweden, 20-44% of people thought corruption was widespread but less than 1% indicated they paid or were expected to pay a bribe. The corresponding figures for Romania were 93% and 25%. This paradoxically high difference between belief and experience shows that people’s own meanings of corruption have to be better understood. It begs not only methodological questions of validity and theoretical questions on what exactly people mean by corruption, but it draws attention to broader questions of trust and distrust. While quantitative measures of trust/corruption have become standard survey questions, I argue it is timely for in-depth qualitative examinations – – currently uncommon – – that focus on peoples’ meanings, beliefs and practices. I propose a longitudinal-qualitative study, uniquely enabled by my previous work in 2007/08 in order to unpack this puzzle.

AIMS: To identify the mechanisms ––i.e. discourses, norms, beliefs, social and institutional practices––that link concepts of trust, practices of corruption, and anti-corruption policies in Romania; and to reflect on the social and temporal dynamics of these mechanisms.

WHY ROMANIA? Since 2012 a high-level anticorruption drive has taken place in Romania; over 2,000 high-ranking public executives were convicted, including one prime-minister, 21 MPs and 30 judges. Weakened by governmental/parliamentary acts since 2017, large street protests and the results of the May 2019 referendum have demanded its continuation. These developments posit Romania as a timely and interesting social laboratory to analyse the trust/corruption nexus.

I am delighted to receive a RSA membership grant (MeRSA) for a longitudinal qualitative research on the nexus between trust and corruption. I am thrilled that this award enables me to revisit and re-interview my prior participants in the city of Pitești, Romania, and see how and why their opinions have changed. Romania constitutes a timely and interesting social laboratory given the recent high-profile anti-corruption measures, large anti-corruption street demonstrations, increasing institutional transparency, and yet practices of bribery and favoritism stubbornly persist.

Vassilis Tselios

Political decentralisation and regional poverty in the EU

There is a growing trend for central governments to transfer political authority to subnational tiers of government, known as political decentralisation, as well as a growing and widely accepted recognition of the important role of governments in reducing poverty. The purpose of this project is to examine whether and how an increase in political decentralisation (which is a regional policy instrument) reduces European regional poverty rate and social exclusion (which are regional policy aims), after controlling for some economic, social, political and geographical charactersitics of the European regions. The association between regional policy instruments and regional policy aims crucially depends on many other policies, such as policy effectiveness, policies for private development, and policies for innovation. The outcomes of this project will be of relevance to researchers and policymakers from a wide range of disciplines and who are interested in seeing whether and how political decentralisation could act as an instrument for lower regional poverty levels.

“I am very excited to be a recipient of the prestigious MeRSA grant. I am very interested in empirically examine political decentralisation outcomes. This award will help me to examine whether and how the regional government of a European country has the capacity to reduce regional poverty and social exclusion. I trust that this grant will be a stimulus and encouraging signal for the advancement of my research”.

Elisa Giuliani

Rethinking regional development agendas: Human rights and economic growth into perspective
Business-related human rights (BHR) infringements are site-specific violations of universal human rights caused by companies as they pursue their economic goals. They include cases of child labor exploitation and modern slavery in global value chains; of damages to human health and right to life following manufacturing industry’s toxic emissions; violation of indigenous communities’ right to land or water in connection with extractive industry operations, among others. Because aggregate data about BHR infringements are alarming, international organizations like the United Nations and the OECD have taken steps to make companies accountable for their negative impacts on human rights. Yet, considerations about BHR infringements seldom enter into regional economic growth agendas and policies, which are still largely influenced by the contentious idea that economic growth will eventually improve human rights. Current policies are thus largely unprepared to deal with the human suffering caused by companies as they allegedly contribute to growth and do not contemplate the prevention of, and remedy for, BHR infringements. In this project we seek to change this conversation and spark new policy thinking around these topical issues.

Heike Mayer

Slow Innovation in Europe`s Peripheral Regions

Innovation processes are often conceptualized with an urban bias and are therefore theorized solely considering the perspective of the urban environment. As a result, innovation theories do not sufficiently consider the context of the periphery and how this context may foster or hinder the development of innovative products, technologies and services. Economic geographers started to conceptualize innovation processes in peripheral locations as `slow innovation` (Shearmur, 2015, 2017; Shearmur & Doloreux, 2016), but they have neither developed clear typologies nor differentiations between different forms of innovation (social, technological, product, process, etc.). This project examines innovation processes in different types of peripheral regions in the European Alps. Of interest are the ways in which these innovators utilize different forms of knowledge, how they are connected to their immediate environments but also to urban places (urban-rural linkages), and to what extent they can be considered as `slow innovators` in the sense Shearmur et al. describe. The particular relevance of this research lies in questions regarding the development potential of peripheral regions. As especially the unsuccessful peripheral regions suffer from outmigration, ageing of the population, structural economic change, it is important to not only focus on their deficiencies but also on their potential. Knowing more about innovation in the periphery will allow European policymakers to obtain a more differentiated and place-sensitive perspective (Iammarino, Rodríguez-Pose, & Storper, 2017; Rodríguez-Pose, 2018).

Joanie Willett

Understanding Brexit and Trump in Post-Industrial, Peripheral Areas: Implications for Regional Development

The rise in anti-establishment populism across Western nations is understood to be symbolic of the gulf that has opened up between wealthy, apparently metropolitan, often urban ‘core’, regions; and peripheral localities in decline. As we have seen in recent elections in the UK, US, France, Germany, and Italy; the breadth and depth of disparities between core and peripheral regions indicates an urgent need to better understand what is going wrong, in order to figure out how to make things right. This has an important potential impact on the practice and measurement of economic development.
Current research into the efficacy of regional investment focuses on quantitative and qualitative factors around funding programmes, how they have been implemented, their impact on human capital and regional knowledge systems, and how they interact with the local environment (Rodriguez-Pose and Fratesi 2004; Rodriguez-Pose and Crescenzi, 2008; Crescenzi and Giua, 2016; Camagni and Capello, 2015; Barca et al. 2012). However to date, studies overlook how ordinary members of the public perceive, experience, and feel about the individual projects pursued under strategic development agenda’s, how these developments are fitted into local cultural schemae, and what impact this has on a general perception (and approval rating) of the funding agenda. This study aims to explore if there is a link between how development is perceived and experienced, and discontent with anti-establishment anger.
This research will explore these questions through a case study of Brexit voting Cornwall in the UK, and the Trump voting Mount Rogers area of Virginia, USA. Both are peripheral rural regions that have seen significant economic changes over recent decades, and have received development funding in order to try to help the regions mediate these changes. This study will explore the stories that are told about the case study regions, in order to understand the relationship between these stories, the intentions of strategic planners, and development policy outcomes.

Xabier Gainza

The electoral bias: distributive politics and local development in Brazil, Mexico, Chile and Colombia

This research seeks to address the existence of an electoral bias in the distribution of investment in Brazil, Mexico, Chile and Colombia, and its implications for territorial cohesion. The aim is to determine if electoral concerns drive the allocation of investment from the central or state government to the local level, rather than efficiency or spatial equity goals. My recent research has focused on this topic in Chile and now I would like to extend it to other Latin American countries. Although the importance of electoral motifs for fund allocations has been widely studied by political scientists, it has not deserved enough attention by economic geographers, despite having significant implications for local development. Investment funds are aimed to pursue spatial equity or, conversely, efficiency, but these two objectives are certainly limited if they are mediated by political favouritism. Thus, this research seeks not only to determine the existence of political distortions in these four countries, but to see their impact on local development and governance. By considering socio-demographic and economic data, I will analyze if investment is concentrated on the relatively better-off areas or, on the contrary, is a tool for spatial equity. Relatedly, one last major contribution is discussing the mechanisms to reduce the margin for arbitrary allocations of funds. The study would be based on a panel dataset from each country’s statistical office and it would consider the main investment transfer from the central to the local level along with political, socio-demographic and economic variables.

In the video below, Xabier explains his research:

Andrea Morrison

The short and long-term impact of migration on regional innovation and technological diversification: An analysis of US cities during the ages of mass migration (1870-1930)

This project contributes to the literature on migration impact by focusing on the effects of immigration on innovation at city level. The main aim is to quantitatively assess the impact of immigration on the innovation performance and technological diversification of US cities in both the short and long term. I focus on the ‘’age of mass migration’’, when about 30 million people from many different countries migrated to the USA (1870-1930). The hypothesis to be tested is that the arrival of large and diverse communities of migrants allowed US cities tap into new skills, expand their capabilities and in turn develop new technological trajectories. Therefore I posit that immigration can represent an important driver of technological change at city/State level. More in details this project will add to the existing literature by (i) showing the contribution of immigration to both the quality and quantity of innovation; (ii) unveiling the heterogeneous impact of different ethnic communities on technological diversification; (iv) providing comprehensive quantitative evidence on historical immigration and innovation in US cities.

James T. Murphy

Generative Urbanization in Emerging Africa? The Case of Konza Techno City

Africa is experiencing an urban transition that raises significant questions as to whether its economies are being transformed structurally. In Kenya, the prospects seem particularly high as the country has experienced steady growth and urbanization since the early 2000s. In response, the country’s leaders are constructing Konza Technopolis, a “smart” urban development project that aims to play a central role in Kenya’s industrial transformation (https://www.konzacity.go.ke/team/kotda/). The goal is to establish industrial clusters in the information-communication technology (ICT), life sciences, and engineering sectors that will foster innovation, attract FDI, and create knowledge spillovers and other externalities to position Kenya favorably in high-tech industries globally. The project is underway with key milestones targeted for 2020 when Phase 1 is complete. This research will examine the design and on-going development of Konza in order to assess whether such a project might spur industrial transformation in Kenya. I will examine the ideas, assumptions, models, strategies, and aspirations behind the initiative, track the project’s development (e.g., financing, media coverage, construction), identify key challenges facing its success, and assess critically whether/how the initiative might spur industrial diversification and upgrading in Kenya. Three central questions will be addressed: 1. How is the specific design of Konza meant to generate outcomes such as innovation, growth, employment, industrial diversification, and sustainability?; 2. How well does this design align with Kenya’s institutional, political, material, and socioeconomic realities and the needs/demands of relevant ICT, life science, and engineering firms/markets globally?; 3. Can, and how might, Konza spur economic transformation in Kenya through the establishment and expansion of diversified high-tech industries? To answer these questions, I deploy a socio-technical systems perspective that draws inspiration from recent calls for research on the interconnections between regional studies, economic geography, and sustainability transitions.

Judit Kalman

How well they cope? Gender Differences in Effects of Labor Market Status and Education on Subjective Well-Being across European welfare states – before and after the crisis

In high-income countries, women report a higher level of life satisfaction than men on average, but score lower on short-term positive and negative emotions and suffer from higher levels of depression – and the picture gets complicated with age, life cycle,employment, income, family status etc. This positive gender gap in subjective life satisfaction is a puzzle,as women would have several objective reasons to be less satisfied with their life and their professional situation through persistent disadvantages in the labour market (lower wages,more part-time, glass-ceiling), access to education, access to power etc. Moreover ample evidence exist about the strong role of institutions, norms, social context and thus spatial/country or region-specific differences in terms of how objective aspects of wellbeing are perceived subjectively . E.g. OECD 2015 states that, as well as having low levels of income inequality Nordic countries tend to have much smaller differences in quality of life outcomes – including gender and age-related differences .
This research will investigate what determines gender differences in subjective well-being across old and new EU member states and also across different welfare regimes. One goal is to estimate individual specific effects of labor market status, education level , family status/parenthood , household structure, work-life balance, household distribution of tasks over perceptions of their own well-being as well as trying to identify differences before and after the crisis. However, the major focus of this research is to check whether country-specificities in some macroeconomic factors and institutional arrangements( labor market/unemployment benefit, maternity leave, child care and social policy schemes) have any effect on gender aspects of subjective well-being – thereby allowing a comparison of not only countries belonging to Western and Eastern Europe (EU15 vs EU12) but also along different welfare state regimes in EU (expanded Esping-Andersen typology etc.) of Nordic, Continental EU, Southern EU, Anglo-Saxon and CEE countries.
Further details on this research can be found at: https://regions.regionalstudies.org/ezine/article/gender-in-effects-of-labor-market-status-on-subjective-wellbeing-across-european-welfare-regimes/?doi=10.1080/13673882.2018.00001027

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Grants

This grant aims to reward excellence and support outstanding individual researchers on a topic related to regional studies and regional science. It is intended primarily to provide opportunities for scholars who have already published in the field of regional studies and/or regional science and who are currently individual members of the RSA. The value of the award is up to £5,000 (c. $6,300; c. €5,600). The award has a maximum time span of 18 months and reporting conditions apply. The full Terms and Conditions governing the grant are available in the MeRSA Handbook.

Application Deadline (Expression of Interest): May 2021 (TBA)

In the video below, Sabine Dörry, RSA Ambassador to Luxembourg and previous MeRSA grant holder shares her top tips for writing grant applications.

In the video below, Xabier Gainza, one of our 2017 MeRSA Grant Holders gives his tips for grant applications:

Andrea Morrison, a MeRSA Grant holder, shares his tips for a successful grant application in the recording below:

The MeRSA Grant operates a two stage application and assessment process. In the first round, applicants are asked to submit an expression of interest. The Expression of Interest should submitted via the form – please click on the button below to apply. Shortlisted applicants from this first round will then be asked to submit a full proposal as part of the final selection round. The Expression of Interest should include the following (see details in the handbook):

Applicant information details
Title of the research project
Timings of the research
Summary including details of research and the advances it is hoped that it will make (Max 500 words)
Brief overview of costs and budget
1-3 page CV

Apply for MeRSA grant scheme

If you have any questions or need any help with the submission form, please send us an email to mersa@regionalstudies.org