ABSTRACT
Any serious study of how firms make location decisions and their consequences must take into account the economy in which they operate. Corporations and decision makers do not exist in a vacuum. They are produced by, and in turn produce, a set of social and economic relations that constrains their options at every turn. Thus, the industrial landscape is not simply the summation of individual location decisions; it is the consequence of historical processes that transcend the ability (and often the perception) of any individual firm. Thus, to appreciate the complexity of industrial location, it is necessary to understand the contextual background of the environment in which firms operate.
