The Spatial Economy of the EU: Patterns and Trends

Abstract: This paper uses a New Economic Geography and Complex Systems framework to explore the nature of agglomeration economies on a sector by sector basis, as well as dropping many of the assumptions that are present with many mainstream schools of thought. By drawing upon a model of self-reinforcing behaviour, and examining the effects of self-organisation, path dependence, and discontinuous change, the trends of each sector are compared by using a spatial lag model. Causes of such trends are then inferred.