Regional and Industrial Growth Patterns in 20th Century Western Europe

In English This thesis deals with various aspects of growth, convergence and technological change, all analysed from an empirical perspective. A common theme throughout the six chapters is the analysis of economic historical questions of productivity growth with the use of quantitative statistical techniques. An introductory chapter is followed by two chapters on the Western European regional growth and convergence process, analysed in comparison with the US, using distribution dynamics and panel-data models. Chapter 4 uses Data Envelopment Analysis to decompose the proximate sources of regional productivity growth, whereas chapters 5 and 6 use time series methods such as cointegration and Granger causality on Swedish industrial data to investigate the issue of Swedish productivity growth throughout the 20th century.

The thesis provides new knowledge about the European regional convergence process starting in 1950. It is found that Europe’s plummeting employment ratios since the 1970s and stagnating growth since the 1990s have been accompanied by similar regional divergence in these variables. Moreover, national institutions have played a significant role in the process, and the pattern of capital accumulation has slowed down productivity convergence since 1980. The thesis also points out the importance of not only understanding technical change as a process of sectoral complementarities that form development blocks, which in turn drive productivity growth, but also identifying how the dynamic effects of pervasive technologies such as electricity drive whole eras of productivity increases.