Rebalancing the geographies of financial services power : the role of sovereign wealth funds.

As part of debates about the causes, consequences and political ramifications of the credit crisis and ensuing recession (for a summary of which see Engelen and Faulconbridge, 2009), questions about the changing geographies of power in the financial services sector have elicited interest both in academic and media circles in recent years. Aalbers (2009, 39) suggests that we are witnessing a change in the powerfulness of incumbent financial centres such as London and New York as a multi-polar world emerges in which the Middle East – the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Qatar etc. – and Asia – China in particular – and their respective financial centres increasingly play bigger and bigger roles in financial services activities. Similarly the newspaper of the City of London – City AM – reported that a shifting balance of power as a result of the financial crisis and the simultaneous growth of new financial centres means the City can no-longer be sure that its preeminent position in the global ‘pecking order’ is secure (see Hazelhurst, 2009). Indeed, in the 2009 edition of the annual Global Financial Centres Report (see City of London Corporation, 2009) it was reported that, whilst London remained atop of the rankings of financial centres, new challengers had quickly risen up the table in the period 2008 to 2009. Challengers include Singapore (32 places rise in ranking), Shanghai (117 places rise), Beijing (135 places rise), Dubai (37 places rise), Seoul (114 places rise) and Qatar (51 places rise) alongside some significant new entries into the top 75 including Riyadh. In this context, studying sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) can tell us a lot about the financial services sector. Specifically, in this commentary I suggest that studying the reactions of financial service providers, such as asset managers but also the broader complex of professional services such as accounting and law that ‘lubricate’ (Dicken, 2007) the financial system, to the growing importance of SWFs reveals much about the dynamics of the changing geographies of power in the financial services sector and the implications for incumbent financial centres such as London and New York. I make two main points. First, I suggest that the growing importance of SWFs does indeed mean that financial centres such as Doha, Dubai and Shanghai will become increasingly powerful over the coming years, in particular as financial service providers such as asset managers and related professional service firms such as law race to establish new and grow existing operations in these centres. Second, however, I also contend that this rebalancing of power relations will not be a zero sum game that necessarily leads to the erosion of the power and importance of incumbent centres such as London and New York. By taking a relational approach to understanding the geography of financial centres (on which see Beaverstock et al., 2006; Faulconbridge, 2004) that recognises the complementary nature of coexisting centres (on which see Clark, 2002) I illustrate the way that incumbent centres are actually likely to benefit from the activities of SWFs and the growing importance and power of centres such as Doha, Dubai and Shanghai

Institutional legacies in TNCs and their management through training academies: the case of transnational law firms in Italy

This paper highlights the effects of heterogeneous institutional contexts on transnational professional service firms, a relatively understudied issue. Specifically the paper provides empirical analysis of how the specificities of the Italian institutional context affect the activities of English legal professional service firms in Milan. This reveals the intimate connection between varieties of capitalisms, place-specific workplace cultures and practices, and the institution-related challenges transnational professional service firms and all transnational corporations (TNCs) face. The paper also reveals the way institutionally generated differences at the level of work practices are managed in transnational law firms through worldwide training programmes designed to ‘govern’ the practices of workers in different parts of the TNC’s network. This highlights the importance of studying attempts to manage institutional heterogeneity at the level of workplace practices, something often missed in existing meso-scale studies of TNCs’ governance structures. Consequently, detailed empirical archaeologies exploring the direct links between institutions and practices are highlighted as being an important as part of future research analysing the effects of institutions on TNCs

Introduction : Financial geographies — the credit crisis as an opportunity to catch economic geography’s next boat?

The story of the financial turmoil that swept the world in 2007 and 2008 has proven to be geographical to the bone. In this introduction to the special issue on ‘financial geographies’ we express concerns that the financial crisis and all it has showcased is going to be economic geography's ‘next missed boat’. We derive three problematics from the crisis—productivism, epochal thinking and rationality—and discuss the extent financial geography is positioned to address them. The second aim of the introduction is to present an overview of the papers in this special issue and the ways in which they take up the issues raised in this introduction

Systems approach to engineering education design

[Abstract]: The design and delivery of effective engineering education to diverse cohorts of adult learners is challenging. The sheer volume and diversity of published literature relating to the scholarship of teaching and learning presents a challenge to educational designers and teaching practitioners alike. A systems approach to design and development, incorporating key principles from the literature, can assist practitioners (particularly those new to teaching) in the effective design and delivery of technical courses. This paper presents a research-based educational lifecycle model to support the design of engineering education. The paper then describes a requirements-driven development methodology that has been applied successfully to the design and delivery of a number of technical courses involving different cohorts of adult learners. The application of the methodology to development of an introductory radar systems course is used as a case study throughout the paper

Satisfying everyday mobility

This paper engages with theoretical insights on understanding everyday travel (from the mobility turn and theories of social practice) in an analysis of everyday mobility using data from ethnographic research. The analysis of mobile performances draws attention to how travellers incorporate valued dispersed practices into mobility. We argue that incorporating such contingent practices into travel generates affective satisfactions consistently sought across transport mode changes through the life-course. These findings complement existing abstract analyses of modal choice and are explored to draw out the implications for the attractiveness of different modes and the potential for broader transitions to lower carbon mobility

Transnational building practices:knowledge mobility and the inescapable market

Architecture and urban planning have always been subject to, and affected by, processes of transnational cultural exchange and professional networking. Yet, the modes and geographies of knowledge mobility in urban development have matured in the last two decades, with various forces resulting in forms of transnational learning that are faster, more frequent and have more impact. The articles in this special issue provide an important contribution to understanding this maturation, and highlight the particular ways in which knowledge and practice relating to building design move from place to place. In this introductory article, we develop an analysis of how transnational building practices come to be. We highlight the way that transnational building practices can both deepen our knowledge of the constitution of knowledge mobility, and exemplify the profound tensions that result from the clash between the structuring logic of international markets and the need to adapt global ideas to local contexts. Thus, in addition to de-naturalizing mobility and teasing out how movement is manufactured, we draw attention to the way that the inescapable relationships between buildings and markets determine the trajectories and effects of transnational knowledge networks. This opening up of the political economy of mobility, we believe, is one of the most pertinent issues in relation to considerations of mobility more broadly

New insights into the internationalization of producer services:Organizational strategies and spatial economies for global headhunting firms

This paper uses the exemplar of global headhunting firms to provide new insights into the intricacies of internationalization and related ‘spatial economies’ of producer services in the world economy. In particular, we unpack the complex relationships between the organisational rationale for, the selected mode of, and future benefits gained by internationalization, as headhunting firms seek and create new geographical markets. We achieve this through an analysis of headhunting firm-specific case study data that details the evolving way such firms organize their differential strategic growth (organic, merger and acquisition, and alliances/network) and forms (wholly-owned, networked or hybrid). We also highlight how, as elite labour market intermediaries, headhunters are important, yet understudied, actors within the (re)production of a ‘softer’, ‘knowledgeable’ capitalism. Our argument, exemplified through detailed mapping of the changing geographies of headhunting firms between 1992 and 2005, demonstrates the need for complex and blurred typologies of internationalization and similarly complex internationalization theory

The work of global professional service firms

In this chapter, we consider their work, both in terms of their activities and internal organization as ‘global’ firms and in terms of their impacts on economies and ultimately societies worldwide. In doing this, we follow on from those who have highlighted the work GPSFs do for capitalism and elites (Morgan, 2006) and for the institutions of the economy (Muzio et al., 2013; Boussebaa, 2015b forthcoming; Muzio et al., 2013), by drawing attention to the intimate connections between the firms’ mode of organizing, their activities in markets throughout the world, and the structures of the global economy. In particular, we highlight five research agendas which, we believe, relate to a pressing series of questions about the powe

Transnational corporations shaping institutional change:the case of English law firms in Germany

Questions remain about the factors that influence the ability of transnational corporations (TNCs) to shape processes of institutional change. In particular, questions about power relations need more attention. To address such questions, this article develops a neo-institutional theory-inspired analysis of the case of English law firms and their impacts on institutional change in Germany. The article shows that the shaping of the direction of institutional change by English legal TNCs was a product of conjunctural moments in which local institutional instability combined with the presence, resources and strategies of the TNCs to redirect the path of institutional evolution. This draws attention to the need to go beyond the TNC and its resources and to consider the way a diverse array of local actors and their generating of instability in existing institutional structures influence the ability of TNCs to become involved in processes of institutional change in particular, conjunctural moments in tim