{"id":24540,"date":"2025-06-18T15:06:03","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T19:06:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/?post_type=story&p=24540"},"modified":"2025-07-09T10:34:55","modified_gmt":"2025-07-09T14:34:55","slug":"clark-is-first-u-s-host-for-global-economic-geography-conference","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2025\/06\/18\/clark-is-first-u-s-host-for-global-economic-geography-conference\/","title":{"rendered":"Clark is first U.S. host for global economic geography conference"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n

Clark Geography Professor Yuko Aoyama, center, organizer of the 7th Global Economic Geography Conference, is flanked by keynote speakers Beverley Mullings, professor of political economy at the University of Toronto, and Ron Boschma, professor of regional economics at Utrecht University in the Netherlands. (All photos by Nathan Fiske)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2018Economic geography is all about networks\u2019<\/h2>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Clark University has long been known as the site of Sigmund Freud\u2019s only visit to the United States, in 1909. Now the University can lay claim to be the first place in America to host the Global Conference on Economic Geography, which has been held in far-flung cities, from Singapore to Dublin, every several years since 2000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More than 400 economic geographers from around the world gathered on campus June 4-8 to present papers, attend roundtables, and network with colleagues for the 7th<\/sup> Global Conference on Economic Geography<\/a>. Roundtable topics included the impacts of artificial intelligence<\/a>, Indigenous self-determination, U.S.-China technology competition, sustainable futures<\/a>, economic injustice and the law, and more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Economic geographers regard the Clark campus as a \u201cpilgrimage site,\u201d with a century-old Graduate School of Geography, and the place where Clark President Wallace Atwood, in 1925, founded the esteemed Economic Geography<\/em> journal<\/a>, according to conference organizer and Geography Professor Yuko Aoyama<\/a>. The conference marked the celebration of the centennial anniversary of the journal, which is still owned by Clark. Furthermore, as a key player in America\u2019s 19th-century Industrial Revolution, Worcester\u2019s history and development is of great interest to many of the participants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor those reasons, it was important to host the conference on this campus,\u201d said Aoyama, who chose historic Mechanics Hall for the conference\u2019s keynote lectures. The downtown venue was built by Worcester\u2019s Mechanics Association in 1857 to provide cultural and educational activities for members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A subfield of geography, \u201ceconomic geography is all about networks,\u201d she explained. \u201cEconomic geographers study where the economic activities are occurring, which is important because we need to understand where the future jobs will be located and where regional development will occur. And where the future jobs are located will determine where the people will be.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How and why regions grow economies<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"Clark
Clark Geography Professor Yuko Aoyama, center, organizer of the 7th Global Economic Geography Conference, left, and keynote speaker Ron Boschma, professor of regional economics at Utrecht University in the Netherlands.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ron Boschma, one of two keynote speakers opening the conference at Mechanics Hall on June 4, explained how, historically, regions that are home to \u201cinstitutional complementaries\u201d have seen more successful development and diversification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat enabled this institutional change? Why are some regions more capable of inducing institutional change?\u201d asked Boschma, professor of regional economics at Utrecht University in the Netherlands in his keynote, \u201cInstitutional Complementaries and Long-Term Evolution of Regions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One example, he said, is \u00cele-de-France, the political and economic center of France. The country\u2019s wealthiest region is densely populated, with numerous residents possessing specialized skills in finance, IT, optics, electronics, aerospace, and other high-tech manufacturing. These interconnected sectors have brought the region much economic success, Boschma said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When a region has \u201clow institutional relatedness,\u201d it would be harder to achieve success, he explained. A region harboring oil and gas industries, he said, might find it hard to develop and transition to wind-power companies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Boschma suggested that his peers use a framework based on how institutions are related to each other, by which economic geographers could more precisely determine \u201cwhat type of institutional change is feasible in some regions but not in other regions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Drawing from the experiences of the 99%<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"Keynote
Keynote speaker Beverley Mullings, professor of political economy at the University of Toronto, left, answers questions from the audience. At right is moderator Siobhan McGrath, associate professor of geography at Clark.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In the second keynote, Beverley Mullings, professor of political economy at the University of Toronto, explored how her peers might \u201cbuild an economic geography rooted in the experiences of \u2018the rest,\u2019 the 99%, and those at the bottom of global hierarchies\u201d to confront what the 2023 World Economic Forum called an \u201cera of polycrisis.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOverlapping crises linked to economic insecurity, climate catastrophe, geopolitical conflict, pandemics, food and water insecurity, amplify each other, creating new risks like unsustainable debt and low growth,\u201d said Mullings in her talk, \u201cTowards an Economic Geography of the 99%: Building Sustainable Futures from the Bottom Up.\u201d \u201cFor many in the majority world, these risks are not new, but the reactions to them by powerful interest groups and states are.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The impacts of climate change have led to extreme weather events \u2014 151 in 2024, according to the World Meteorological Association \u2014 \u201cthat destroyed vital crops, lives, infrastructure, and displaced over 800,000 people worldwide,\u201d she added. \u201cAs resources dwindle, promises of prosperity can no longer conceal the stark inequalities in racial capitalism, and in this moment, all strategies of colonial conflict are being revived.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Quoting Guyanese feminist activist and scholar Andaiye, who argued that \u201cThe angle you look from determines what you see,\u201d Mullings urged her peers to \u201cthink from elsewhere,\u201d drawing from the knowledge and experiences of the 99%. She provided examples of collective, community-\u00adoriented, local economies that have found success in the Caribbean, to demonstrate how many among the world\u2019s poorest have routinely challenged the dominance of the market economy as the primary means through which society takes shape.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mullings argued that in a world of growing uncertainty and global polycrises, \u201cconjunctural analysis\u201d can offer a more nuanced methodology for understanding how communities across the majority world are sustaining economies built on principles of care and reciprocity. \u201cAs economic geographers, we can begin that task of connecting the crisis of social reproduction here to the crisis there,\u201d she said, and \u201creorienting our gaze towards cooperative principle that motivates economies based on care.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The 8th Global Conference on Economic Geography is scheduled for Rome in 2028, hosted by the Italian National Research Council and Sapienza University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"The
Organizer Yuko Aoyama chose Mechanics Hall, built in 1857, for the keynote speeches.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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\"Economic
Economic geographers mingle at a reception in Mechanics Hall.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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\"Economic
The conference drew more than 400 scholars from across the world.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clark University can now lay claim to be the first place in America to host the Global Conference on Economic Geography, which has been held in far-flung cities, from Singapore to Dublin, every several years since 2000.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":24541,"template":"","meta":{"story_color":"var(--clarku-color-brand)","story_headerImg":24541,"section_label":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[239],"displayed_author":[242],"featured":[493],"topic":[165,162],"class_list":["post-24540","story","type-story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-worcester-world","displayed_author-meredith-woodward-king","featured-primary","topic-geography","topic-research"],"yoast_head":"\nClark is first U.S. host for global economic geography conference | ClarkU News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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