Making the connections: Bringing skill formation into global value chain analysis

Abstract

The concept of global value chains (GVCs) has been developed to explore the changing nature of the insertion of economies in global production and distribution processes. This literature contributes to the understanding of how globalisation can lead to the upgrading of capabilities of firms and countries as a result of knowledge flows within global networks but does not provide insights into processes of skill formation that to a large degree determine how firms and countries are inserted into the global economy. The authors argue that perspectives on national social institutional systems need to be incorporated into the analysis of GVCs so that their implications for upgrading and skills development in different economies and nodes of the value chain can be understood, making connections across these discrete areas of debate and analysis, across disciplinary boundaries, and with research conducted in different parts of the world. © The Author(s) 2010.