Rethinking Regional Skills: Place-Based Capabilities and Economic Transformation

Call for Papers

Rethinking Regional Skills: Place-Based Capabilities and Economic Transformation

Journal:Regional Studies

Manuscript deadline: 25 September 2026

This special issue reframes regional skills as place-based capabilities that emerge from interactions among people, firms, and local institutions, rather than as a simple proxy for education or human capital. It asks how skills are formed, transformed, mismatched, and mobilized across regions during digital and green transitions, and how this shapes inclusion, industrial change, and regional development.

Special Issue Editors

• David Morris, University of Nottingham

• Carlo Corradini, Henley Business School, University of Reading

• Lisa De Propris, University of Birmingham

• Duygu Buyukyazici, London School of Economics and Political Science

Main themes

• Regional skills formation, resilience, obsolescence, and disappearance.

• Education, upskilling, and job dynamics in green and digital transitions.

• Regional skill mismatch in labour markets, clusters, and open economies.

• Skills in new workspaces such as green jobs, remote work, digital platforms, and the gig economy.

• Vocational education, lifelong training, and on-the-job reskilling.

• Stranded, stressed, and low-skill-trap regions, including carbon-intensive and left-behind areas.

• Policy responses for just and inclusive growth.

• Opportunities and constraints in emerging and developing economies.

Submission process

Authors should send an extended abstract of up to 500 words plus references by email to David.Morris1@Nottingham.ac.uk by 12 June 2026. Full manuscripts are then submitted through the journal system by 25 September 2026, with the special issue title selected at submission.

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