Collective learning and path plasticity as means to regional economic resilience: the case of Stuttgart

摘要

This paper links two strands of literature (collective learning and resilience) by looking at experiences with collective learning as precondition of regional economic resilience. Based on a qualitative empirical study, the emergence of collective learning structures in the Stuttgart region after a macroeconomic and structural crisis at the beginning of the 1990s is investigated. This process of building up adaptive capabilities in the region follows a pattern of institutional path plasticity. The relevance of these experiences with adjustment processes and adaptive capabilities for the economic performance during the great recession in 2008-2009 is finally shown by following episodic narratives of interview partners and secondary firm panel results.