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This paper aims to review the evidence on Europe’s economic performance and on the role played by policies pursued at the European Union (EU) level, using the competitiveness framework as the conceptual lens.

Why has Europe not made more progress on upgrading its competitiveness over the past few decades, despite the many initiatives that the EU has launched?

It finds Europe’s sluggish performance to be driven by a failure to adjust the EU’s policy approach to fundamental changes in the competitiveness context and challenges faced by European economies.

Based on this analysis, the paper suggests a new role for the EU in supporting EU member countries and regions in achieving higher levels of competitiveness.

This paper aims to contribute to understanding regional competitiveness policy-making and the role academic organisations can play in that process. Competitiveness policies have evolved in the past decades from a single to a multiple-domain field, which has made the policy-making process more complex by adding more actors with their particular experience and view. This complexity, together with the relevance of overcoming traditional policy implementation failures, pleads for a new approach to competitiveness policy-making, in which academic organisations can act as “anchor institutions”. This framework is based on the adaptive implementation concept.

The paper uses the Basque case to analyse the role of universities in competitiveness policy-making and focuses on a specific academic organisation, which has contributed through different projects to regional policy-making. Evidences from those projects through different policy phases are included in the case.

The case shows how academic organisations might play a key role in fostering an adaptive implementation approach in competitiveness policy-making at the regional level and which specific characteristics these organisations should develop to fulfil this role.

This paper brings together two important issues for regional competitiveness: the importance of policy implementation and the particular role of engaged universities in such a process.

This research aims to examine the smelter industry’s investment competitiveness in Indonesia as well as to find solutions to improve its competitive advantage for the nation.

This research applies a sequential mixed-methods approach with a second quantitative phase building on an initial first qualitative phase. The qualitative phase is conducted by interviews to find the root causes of problems as well as solutions to gain smelter industries’ competitiveness. The quantitative phase is conducted by a system dynamics model. A descriptive causal loop diagram is created based on interviews and focus group discussions to describe the problems. The concept of competitive advantage of a nation from Porter’s diamond model is applied in this research.

The results reveal the complexity of smelter industries in Indonesia. The paper also addresses the causes of problems and interaction of variables using a causal loop diagram. To gain the smelter industry’s competitiveness, this paper suggests the potential policy development to increase competitiveness of the smelter industry such as policy for different fiscal incentives to each different mineral, effective export duty and exploration obligation.

The result of this study provides a good basis for government in making policy to improve the competitive advantage of the smelter industry investment in Indonesia.

This is the first research on smelter industry competitiveness that applies Porter’s diamond model and system dynamics model to find solutions in designing appropriate policy to gain competitiveness.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the link between collaborative governance arrangements for place-based competitiveness and public innovation.

The paper combines a conceptual discussion of the links between collaborative governance, competitiveness policy and public innovation with a case study analysis of a specific governance process that aims at adapting policy to respond to local competitiveness challenges in the Basque province of Biscay.

The conceptual discussion leads to the hypothesis of a new distinction with respect to how governance relates to public innovation. Innovation can occur in governance, through governance or with governance. The analysis of the case supports this distinction. Multi-actor collaboration for competitiveness policymaking (innovation in governance) has led to policy innovation (innovation through governance). This has also promoted emerging administrative changes that could be conducive to a more innovative public sector in general (innovation with governance). These findings validate arguments posed by proponents of collaborative innovation that suggest that multi-actor collaboration is a driver for public sector innovation.

The value of the paper rests on linking theoretically and empirically two relevant and currently popular phenomena: networked governance for place-based competitiveness policymaking and public sector innovation. The paper provides original insights from the practice of building a process for context-sensitive policymaking that can inspire practitioners with similar problems.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of Government via its industrial policy aimed at building competitiveness in apparel manufacturing in a developing country.

A conceptual framework that proposes the causal relationships between policies and competitiveness is applied to the apparel manufacturing sector in Trinidad and Tobago. The study utilises primary data from interviews and observations, and secondary data sources inclusive of industry and fashion companies reports. Data analysis of four vertical policies is performed via the use of system dynamics modelling and simulation.

The four vertical policies were found to impact three interrelated elements in the apparel manufacturing sector: the market, apparel products and productive resources. Policies that intentionally focussed on improving market attractiveness benefited wide segments of the industry. However, policies that focussed on product and resource attractiveness that were designed as direct support for selected firms had a lower impact on overall industry competitiveness than those that had an industry-wide focus.

A single industry in a small developing island state limits the generalisability of the research findings. Additionally, non-reporting of export data and aggregation of industry data limits the conclusions that can be drawn regarding the impact of the vertical policies on the apparel industry. 10; 10;

Policy-makers should consider the scope of the vertical policies in terms of the number of firms in the industry to benefit, and the need for complementary horizontal policies for creating enabling environments for competitiveness.

The paper proposes a conceptual framework to capture relationships between vertical policy and competitiveness.

This paper aims to investigate the moderation effect of welding technology on the relationship between government policy and quality human resources and workforce competitiveness.

The research is quantitative in nature, i.e. it aims to explain the causality relationship between variables. This research is quantitative research, it aims to explain the causality relationship between variables. The analysis tool was generalized structure component analysis.

First, government policy has a significant and positive effect on workforce competitiveness, indicating that higher government policy will result in higher workforce competitiveness. Welding technology is the moderating variable in the relationship between government policy and workforce competitiveness. Higher implementation of welding technology will strengthen the relationship between government policy and workforce competitiveness. Second, quality of human resources has a significant and positive effect on workforce competitiveness; higher quality of human resources will therefore result in higher workforce competitiveness. Welding technology is the moderating variable in the relationship between quality of human resources and workforce competitiveness. Higher implementation of welding technology will therefore strengthen the relationship between quality of human resources and workforce competitiveness.

The moderating effect of welding technology in the relationships between government policy and quality of human resources and workforce competitiveness has not been comprehensively studied yet; the present study fills this gap.

Exploration of the policy reforms necessary to strengthen Canada's competitiveness among world trading economies. The paper aims to compare Canada's competitiveness with two economic partners, the USA and the UK, and two emerging economies, China and India.

Data from the annual Global Competitiveness Reports (GCRs) were used to compare Canada with the other countries.

Canada requires a national strategy to create a generation of Canadian innovators, entrepreneurs and executives with a global mindset.

Although Canada has many global trading partners, the paper compares Canadian competitiveness with only two economic partners and two emerging economics. Also, only data from the GCRs are used. Other measures of competitiveness need to be taken into consideration to better understand Canada's global and business competitiveness.

This paper provides new insights into Canada's lack of global competitiveness. The main reasons for this lack of competitiveness are analysed and recommendations are provided for Canadian policy makers to enhance competitiveness.

This paper aims to examine and analyze the effects of government policy, quality of human resources and professional institutions on workforce competitiveness using welding technology variable as a mediating variable.

This study used quantitative research by using partial least square – structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to analyze the collected data.

Based on the results of the analysis, it was noted that there was a significant influence between government policy, quality of human resources and professional institutions on welding technology. The coefficients are characterized by a positive direct relationship, which means that the higher the quality of government policy and human resources professionals variables, the higher the value of the institute of welding technology.

This study recommends that government should create policies that have benefits to competitiveness of Indonesian workforce. Implications from this study support government to use the model to determine and initiate policies in the field of welding as well as establish clear and standardized operating standards and recruitment process (government apparatus) that can accommodate the competitiveness of welding workers in Indonesia.

The originality of this paper is that the participatory approach was adopted in this study using PLS-SEM. In addition, this study was one of the first studies to carry out research at the BNSP office, BLK-Bandung-Jakarta, Makassar, B4T and dismiss the Ministry of Manpower and the Ministry of Industry in Jakarta, Indonesia, where there was no research in this location. Previous studies conducted research in various case studies.

This chapter aims to conceptualize the general framework of policies to support entrepreneurship and competitiveness by indicating a move from a dispersive comprehension of competitiveness towards an integrated macro-meso-micro perspective, by taking as a case study the European South. First, it presents theoretical contributions to entrepreneurship enhancement policies, which mostly suggest that intervention can be effective in a fragmentary and relatively incoherent way. Then, it counter-proposes the ‘competitiveness web’ approach, which gives an integrated policy framework for the competitive strengthening and evolution of a socioeconomic system. In the framework of competitiveness web, we analyze and propose a meso-micro level policy via the Institutes of Local Development and Innovation (ILDI), which is a policy for empowering the local and regional business ecosystems through the enhancement of business innovation. Finally, by using the competitiveness web filter, we propose the structuration of a mechanism that could identify the level at which the socioeconomic entities in different spatial levels can articulate their policies for entrepreneurship enhancement in the macro-meso-micro integrated approach.

The purpose of this paper is to extend the theory of services‐led industrial policy in services dominated but industrially lagging developing Asian economies and discuss its implications for employment, competitiveness, and diversification.

An inductive approach using qualitative methodology is adopted reviewing the available literature and evidence from Pakistan. The critical synthesis of the history of economic growth and industrial policy has followed Kuhn's paradigm approach.

Focusing on Pakistan, the paper synthesizes the history of industrial policy to identify the major paradigm shifts, especially the structural reforms era of the 1990s. The evidence suggests that the reforms under the structural adjustment program (SAP) have proved to be the necessary but not sufficient conditions for inclusive growth and industrial competitiveness in services dominated economies. Services‐led growth without an integrated and competitive industrial sector can lead to severe external accounts deficits and unemployment. The traditional role of services as “driver of demand/growth” is extended as “driver of productivity/competitiveness” through forward linkages with other sectors of the economy. The services sector's enabling role as the “software” of the economy and its impact on total factor productivity growth, diversification, and inclusive growth is postulated.

A quantification of forward and backward linkages is needed to identify the potential of services sub‐sectors in driving growth and productivity, respectively.

The paper identifies the need to match the existing industrial policy regimes with the economic structures in services‐dominated developing economies. The role of forward linkages in the productivity growth has implications for measurement of services output in national accounts in order to fully capture the contribution of this sector.