Economic Hubs and the Domination of Inter-Regional Ties in World City Networks

TL;DR

This study analyzes global city networks formed by multinational corporations' inter-city ties, revealing a dominance of inter-regional connections that influence regional integration and economic growth from 2010 to 2019.

Contribution

It introduces a network analysis of city ties based on multinational firms, highlighting the prominence of inter-regional motifs in global economic integration.

Findings

Inter-regional ties dominate over national and regional ones.

Global cities facilitate regional integration and economic expansion.

Patterns of city networks evolve over the studied decade.

Abstract

Cities are widely considered the lifeblood of a nations economy housing the bulk of industries, commercial and trade activities, and employment opportunities. Within this economic context, multinational corporations play an important role in this economic development of cities in particular, and subsequently the countries and regions they belong to, in general. As multinational companies are spread throughout the world by virtue of ownership-subsidiary relationship, these ties create complex inter-dependent networks of cities that shape and define socio-economic status, as well as macro-regional influences impacting the world economy. In this paper, we study these networks of cities formed as a result of ties between multinational firms. We analyze these networks using intra-regional, inter-regional and hybrid ties (conglomerate integration) as spatial motifs defined by geographic delineation of world's economic regions. We attempt to understand how global cities position themselves in spatial and economic geographies and how their ties promote regional integration along with global expansion for sustainable growth and economic development. We study these networks over four time periods from 2010 to 2019 and discover interesting trends and patterns. The most significant result is the domination of inter-regional motifs representing cross regional ties among cities rather than national and regional integration.