摘要：This is the first of two books by Markusen examining regional development in the United States. The purpose of this book is to situate regional change within the dynamic of competitive capitalist economic relations. The companion study softens the broad economistic focus and details a subtler geography of cultural and political forces shaping regional devclopment. Markusen's aim in this first work is bold: "to pioneer an alternative approach to regional development studies that will enable us to cope with baffling changes in the contemporary economic viability of certain regions" (lI). She contends that regional growth theory is in a moribund state, requiring a radical reconceptualization of the causal forces driving regional economic change. Her own reconceptualization is driven by the dynamic of capitalist competition, afforded a spatial dimension by the tendencies of industries to change locations as they pass through various stages of a profit cycle. This synthetic theory "builds on Schumpeterian and Marxist work on innovation and capitalist dynamics, on the product cycle theories of business economists, and on theories of oligopolistic behavior from industrial organization"
