Narratives as a coordinating device for reversing regional disequilibrium
Substantial differences in productivity, accompanied by growing social and political discontent, have widened across UK regions in the last 40 years, creating a dysfunctional spatial equilibrium; a coordination failure that has so far proved resistant to change. In this paper, we link such persisten...
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Format: | Journal article |
Language: | English |
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Oxford University Press
2021
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author | Collier, P Tuckett, D |
author_facet | Collier, P Tuckett, D |
author_sort | Collier, P |
collection | OXFORD |
description | Substantial differences in productivity, accompanied by growing social and political discontent, have widened across UK regions in the last 40 years, creating a dysfunctional spatial equilibrium; a coordination failure that has so far proved resistant to change. In this paper, we link such persistent regional disequilibria with current socio-psychological theories about the role of narrative in decision-making under radical uncertainty to explore how and why ideas held collectively within a social network can become the coordinating device for a range of decisions within networked communities that have extra-market effects (externalities), analogous to the role that prices play within markets. Drawing on findings from a pilot interview study in two UK regions, we show the potential for local leadership to use well-constructed narratives to coordinate fragmented agents to cooperate on a common purpose and more generally propose a framework to understand how low-income equilibria become stable but might be re-set. In this way we bring new insights into the need for an expanded economic theory of knowledge applicable to expectation and preference formation in conditions of radical uncertainty. |
first_indexed | 2024-03-07T07:38:47Z |
format | Journal article |
id | oxford-uuid:00d1bfef-0cb5-4be8-9572-dbf0f9104dad |
institution | University of Oxford |
language | English |
last_indexed | 2024-03-07T07:38:47Z |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | Oxford University Press |
record_format | dspace |
spelling | oxford-uuid:00d1bfef-0cb5-4be8-9572-dbf0f9104dad2023-04-05T08:21:51ZNarratives as a coordinating device for reversing regional disequilibriumJournal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:00d1bfef-0cb5-4be8-9572-dbf0f9104dadEnglishSymplectic ElementsOxford University Press2021Collier, PTuckett, DSubstantial differences in productivity, accompanied by growing social and political discontent, have widened across UK regions in the last 40 years, creating a dysfunctional spatial equilibrium; a coordination failure that has so far proved resistant to change. In this paper, we link such persistent regional disequilibria with current socio-psychological theories about the role of narrative in decision-making under radical uncertainty to explore how and why ideas held collectively within a social network can become the coordinating device for a range of decisions within networked communities that have extra-market effects (externalities), analogous to the role that prices play within markets. Drawing on findings from a pilot interview study in two UK regions, we show the potential for local leadership to use well-constructed narratives to coordinate fragmented agents to cooperate on a common purpose and more generally propose a framework to understand how low-income equilibria become stable but might be re-set. In this way we bring new insights into the need for an expanded economic theory of knowledge applicable to expectation and preference formation in conditions of radical uncertainty. |
spellingShingle | Collier, P Tuckett, D Narratives as a coordinating device for reversing regional disequilibrium |
title | Narratives as a coordinating device for reversing regional disequilibrium |
title_full | Narratives as a coordinating device for reversing regional disequilibrium |
title_fullStr | Narratives as a coordinating device for reversing regional disequilibrium |
title_full_unstemmed | Narratives as a coordinating device for reversing regional disequilibrium |
title_short | Narratives as a coordinating device for reversing regional disequilibrium |
title_sort | narratives as a coordinating device for reversing regional disequilibrium |
work_keys_str_mv | AT collierp narrativesasacoordinatingdeviceforreversingregionaldisequilibrium AT tuckettd narrativesasacoordinatingdeviceforreversingregionaldisequilibrium |