An agency perspective of regional economic resilience during COVID-19: the role of the local state's place-based leadership in Kunshan, China

Through a case study of Kunshan, China, this paper shows how a local state utilised place-based leadership to enhance regional economic resilience under the COVID-19 pandemic crisis. It unpacks how Kunshan effectively mitigated early economic disturbances induced by the COVID-19 pandemic, by two ways of leadership actions, namely, enacting jurisdictional power (that is formal leadership), and mobilising wide official and interpersonal networks (that is network leadership). Four specific local-state-led adaptive resilience processes or strategies are identified: stabilising labour supply, mitigating supply-chain disruptions, alleviating financial strains and reconfiguring market orientations. Through these proactive endeavours, the local state played an enabling role in aligning diverse stakeholders and resources across places, scales and sectors, thereby allaying economic shocks and enhancing regional economic resilience. This study contributes to the resilience literature by developing an agency-centric perspective to understanding regional economic resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The economic resilience of a city: the effect of relatedness on the survival of amenity shops during the COVID-19 pandemic

Amenity clusters consisting of coffee shops, restaurants and other small businesses improve urban life and are a source of employment for city dwellers. Although most small business clusters were hit hard by restrictions imposed during the COVID-19 pandemic, some were able to adapt. What determines the economic resilience of amenity clusters? Using store-location data for Seoul from 2016 to 2021, we identify spatial clusters of amenities, and from that build an amenity space to examine the effect of relatedness on the resilience of each cluster. We find that businesses are more likely to survive when located in clusters of related amenities.

Towards conceptualization and quantification of the digital divide

The digital divide gained new importance since the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemics. However, the phenomenon is far from being fully conceptualized or effectively measured. The key question, whether digital divide is a mere extension of other social inequalities, or it has significant new meaning, remains largely unanswered;a reason is the lack of effective instruments of quantitative study of the phenomenon that would capture its complex nature. The present paper addresses both conceptualizing and measurement issues, suggesting that separation of supply- and demand-side considerations is crucial in understanding the digital divide and introducing a composite Digital Life Index, measures separately the digital supply and demand across seven independent dimensions. The Index is based on Internet-borne data, a distinction from traditional research approaches that rely on official statistics or surveys. Though the empiric part of the paper is focused on the sub-national digital divide in Russia we argue that its methodology can be applied on many other levels and its conceptual findings are relevant to understanding the phenomenon globally. The hierarchical regression analysis is used to determine the relative importance of factors like income, human capital, and policy in shaping the digital divide. The result of the analysis suggests that the digital divide is driven more by the differences in demand than in supply;the role of income is insignificant, and the quality of policy and human capital is the key determinant of the divide. The paper advances the existing conceptual and methodological literature on the issue and can also inform practical decision-making regarding the strategies of national and regional digital development. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Information, Communication & Society is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)