The Performance of Seaport Clusters - RePub - Erasmus Universiteit ...

Chapter 2 - Clusters as Unit of Analysis 15
2.3.3 The relevant cluster region
All clusters have ‘geographical borders’, even though in many cases these are not well
defined. Many cluster studies simply take regions, provinces or states as relevant cluster
region (Van Klink and De Langen, 2001). The tool of a localization analysis can be used to
create a detailed geographical cluster delimitation. By dividing the number of firms active in
cluster activities in a municipality (in most cases the most detailed statistical unit) by the
overall number of firms in the municipality, the relative share of cluster activities in the
municipality is obtained. Areas with a relatively high share of cluster activities are included in
the ‘relevant cluster region’ 8 . This method to delimit the relevant cluster region is relatively
precise. However, the minimum share of cluster activities required for municipalities to be
included in the cluster region is arbitrary and varies case by case. Figure 3 shows the
method to delimit the relevant cluster region.
8 This concept is similar to the construct of a ‘local labor market area’ (LLMA) that Paniccia (1999)
uses to geographically delimit clusters and similar to the analysis of the ‘functional urban region’
(Van den Berg, 1987). The latter is defined on the basis of commuter flows.