*** SFI Seminar Thursday, February 20, 2003, NOTE TIME: 1:00-2:00 pm ***
Location: Medium Conference Room
Title: Emergence of Social Spatial Structures
Speaker: Yuri Yegorov, SFI International Fellow
http://www.santafe.edu/sfi/education/international/intlfellows/intlfal02/fellows/yegorov.html
Affiliation: Central European University, Budapest, Hungary
*** Abstract: ***
The present research reveals the role of spatial interaction across economic and
social agents in an emergence of spatial social structures and patterns of
economic activity. Several models represent different examples of the
self-organizing role of space. The model of agglomeration shows the instability
of homogeneous space after the emergence of industrial technologies with
increasing returns. These technologies require the concentration of population
in cities, which deform space and lead to a heterogeneous pattern of
agricultural population density around them. The next model is about optimal
transport networks and the role of population density on economic growth. It is
shown that growth can be positive only in some interval of population densities.
An optimal country size is studied in the next model; it is determined by the
interplay of different scale factors in continuous space. A simple model of
optimal city size is based on interplay between scale economies and spatial
patterns of land rent. Only population size is responsible for externality
effects. There might be both stable and unstable equilibria when two cities
compete for population. A dynamic version of the model, with local migration
across a chain of cities, leads to a partial differential equation with variable
coefficients, similar to the heat equation. However, its evolution might lead
not only to diffusion but also to inverse processes. The methodological aspects
of social models with spatial structure are also discussed.
http://www.santafe.edu/sfi/events/seminarAbstracts
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