Research

His main research interests are in the global economic, regional and urban geography and development. His research has focused on inequality and social cohesion in Europe (east and west) and its Mediterranean neighbours, in China and in the wider world. Thematic interests are in the role of corporate strategies, market forces and regulatory regimes at scales from the local to the global in shaping comparative economic development.

Much of his research is predicated on a political economy approach, with a strong interest in theories of regulation, though he also has research skills in econometrics, the use of relational databases and GIS.

His most recent publications arise out of two ESRC-funded projects in which he was Principal Researcher on 'Regional Economic Performance, Governance and Cohesion in an Enlarged Europe' and 'Economic Inter-dependence and Comparative Regional Dynamics in Developed and Developing Economies: Trade and Regional Trajectories in China and the European Union', as well as recent research in China. At present he holds a Leverhulme Emeritus Fellowship for a project on 'Cities, regions and the sustainable transformation of the Chinese earth, and since 2010 has been a Visiting Professor at the Chinese cademy of Sciences in beijing.

Alongside a volume written with Lidia Greco entitled After the three Italies: creating wealth and inequality (Oxford: Blackwell, 2006), and a recent edited volume (with Liu Weidong) on The geographical transformation of China (London and New Your: Routledge, 2015) he has recently published papers on regional dynamics, urban-rural integration and the evolution of the laptop manufacturing, solar energy, motor vehicle, steel and textile and clothing industries.

In the recent past he has was a Director of the EU-funded Rives Manche Economic Observatory. He also worked with a team of economists from Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, Portugal and the UK on a major EU research contract to examine the effects on social cohesion of EU industrial, agricultural, research and other policies. Another project concerned the impact of the ESPRIT programme on cohesion.

In the last five years he took part in a Policy Dialogue between the European Union and the Chinese National Development and Reform Commission and in three projects involving GIZ and the Chinese State Council Leading Group on Poverty Alleviation and Development dealing with sustainable regional development and poverty alleviation in China after the Wenchuan and Yushu earthquakes and in the Wuling Mountain Area.