Paper info

The Division of Labour and Industrial Networks

Luis Araujo and Søren Kerndrup

The paper was published at the 17th IMP-conference in Oslo, Norway in 2001.

This paper deals with the problem of division of labour and industrial developmentfrom a network perspective. Our starting point is Young's (1928) seminal insightsinto how the process of the division of labour creates a series of connected qualitativeand quantitative changes in industrial structures. Our main argument is that thesequalitative and quantitative changes can be reframed as a cascade of connectedlearning processes that take place inside as well as across firm boundaries. Inparticular, we stress how business relationships create a useful platform for teachingand learning different sets of complementary capabilities. We illustrate thesearguments with a case study of the introduction of new technology in the Danishprinting industry and how one company took advantage of this technology torestructure its internal processes and business relationships.