Networks and geography in the economics

of knowledge flows

Mario A. Maggioni & Teodora Erika

Uberti

Quality & Quantity

International Journal of Methodology

ISSN 0033-5177
Volume 45
Number 5

Qual Quant (2011) 45:1065-1066

DOI 10.1007/s11135-011-9491-4

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 Author's personal copy
Qual Quant (2011) 45:1065–1066
DOI 10.1007/s11135-011-9491-4

Networks and geography in the economics of knowledge

flows
A rejoinder

Mario A. Maggioni · Teodora Erika Uberti

Published online: 30 March 2011

© Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011

Both comments by Anne ter Val and Nadine Massard add useful insights and add complemen-
tary perspective to the multifaceted issue we addressed in our paper and they demonstrated
that, at least in part, we achieve our stated aim of “ Demonstrate that networks and geogra-
phy are the necessary ingredients for every study of the innovative process at any level of
analysis: from individual agents, to institution/organization, from the regional to the national
and international level”.
In this rejoinder we will mainly focus on what we regard as the main issues raised in the
comments trying to expand our intuition on this complex matter.

Geographical versus network positioning

We are convinced that further efforts should be put in the attempt to disentangle the relational
and the geographical positioning effects on both the level of knowledge flows and the effect
of innovative performance of emitting and receiving nodes.
On the one hand, this can be empirically implemented through the use of a group of control
variables for any level of analysis and this process could be definitely be more effective if the
network analysis is performed at the individual institution level rather than at a geographical
aggregated one.
On the other hand, we still have doubts on the possibility of a total identification and
correction of both the endogeneity (as suggested by Anne ter Val) and selection bias prob-
lems (as suggested by Nadine Massard) in this kind of analyses.
As far as the endogeneity is concerned, whether the characteristics of a given node are
determined by the existing relations with other nodes, or whether the existing relations of a

M. A. Maggioni (B) · T. E. Uberti

CSCC, DISEIS, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milano, Italy
e-mail: mario.maggioni@unicatt.it
T. E. Uberti
e-mail: erika.uberti@unicatt.it

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given node are determined by its own characteristics cannot be determined in advance and,
in our opinion, it is a matter that should be determined case by case.
As far as the selection bias is concerned, the problem is even stronger. Even at individual
level, it may be really difficult for the analyst to be aware of all the potential “partners” which
may be available to a given actor for establishing a link.
Thus we are convinced that suspicious endogenecity and selection bios will even be present
in any empirical analysis dealing with NA.

Intended versus unintended knowledge flows

While we are still convinced that the issue of explicit knowledge barter exchange vs. unin-
tended informational spillovers raised in Maggioni et al. (2007 and 2011) is relevant, we
also agree with Anne when he stresses that “informal” does not necessarily mean “unin-
tended” and that labour mobility and social networks within “communities of practice” are
relevant channels for intentional knowledge exchanges which run the risk of being identified
as unintended spillovers simply because of the regional level of the performed analysis.
One possible solution to this problem may be found by performing a NA of innovation
activity at the individual level. However we would like to add few words of caution by stress-
ing the fact that, while regional data are often available from secondary sources, individual
level must be often collected with extremely extensive and time consuming procedures of
direct data-collection which always run the risk of not cover the entire extension of the net-
work under study (with the utmost serious consequences in terms of low significance of the
results already highlighted in section 3 of the paper). In addition, as already stressed, in these
studies the identification of the boundaries of the network could be very complex.

Final methodological remarks

If we may use this rejoinder to add few details to the final section of the paper “Conclusion
and research agenda”, for sure we consider Anne’s remarks on the need of more carefully
selected indexes for comparative analysis which do depend on the size of the network and to
re-enforce our original final statement that the development of network longitudinal analyses
(on the “pure SNA” side) together with advances coming from the behavioural and the stra-
tegic approach to networks (on the “pure economics” side) are the main signposts for future
analysis.

References

Maggioni, M.A., Nosvelli, M., Uberti, T.E.: Space versus networks in the geography of innovation: A
European analysis. Pop. Reg. Sci. 86, 471–493 (2007)
Maggioni, M.A., Nosvelli, M., Uberti, T.E.: Does intentional means hierarchical? Knowledge flows and
innovative performance of European regions, invited paper at EMAEE 2011, pp. 14–16 February

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