Rikard Eriksson

Presentation

I obtained my PhD (economic geography) in 2010 on the thesis "Labour mobility and plant performance: The influence of proximity, relatedness and agglomeration". In 2012 I became senior lecturer in Human geography and associate professor in 2014. In 2016 I became full professor of economic geography. I am currently Associate head of department (Geography) and also serves as research co-ordinator at CERUM (Center for regional science).

Research

My research interests include evolutionary notions of regional economic transformation, regional development, agglomeration economies and the evolving geography of work and employment. I have written theoretically informed empirical articles on the role of labour mobility in agglomerations, the role of knowledge flows for firm performance, and on the significance for firms and regions to match new skills with existing competences in different parts of the space economy. I have also contributed with critical appraisals of recent amenity driven approaches to regional and urban development and its relevance in various spatial contexts.

Currently, my research focus is mainly on how the agglomeration and composition of skills and industries shapes labour market matching and the evolution of job creation and destruction in different parts of the Swedish economy. This work is part of two different projects aiming to gain further knowledge on processes influencing the access to jobs and how individuals, firms and regions adapt to chocks (for example, major plant closures and structural change). I am also developing large-scale social networks to unravel the micro-mechansisms of industry agglomerations. For a more detailed description of current research projects, see "Research projects".

I am editor for Geografiska Annaler B and serves as member in the editorial board of Geography Compass (Economic geography section)

I am a frequent reviewer on topics such as agglomeration economies, regional development, knowledge flows and plant performance for journals like Economic Geography, Journal of Economic Geography, Regional Studies, Progress in Human Geography, European Urban and Regional Studies, European Planning Studies.

Scientific awards and honours

• 2020. Recipient of Nordea´s scientific prize for outstanding contributions to social sciences, law or computer sciences. 
• 2017. Best paper award in Regional Studies, Regional Science during 2016 (with Evans Korang Adjei and Urban Lindgren). Read abstract here
• 2016. Kungliga Skytteanska Samfundets prize to a young outstanding scholar in social science at Umeå University 
• 2013. One of five top cited papers in Journal of Economic Geography during 2011 "How does labour mobility affect the performance of plants?" (Co-written with Ron Boschma & Urban Lindgren). Read abstract here
• 2010. Winner of the Regional Studies Association's 'Early Career Award' for the paper "Localized Spillovers and Knowlegde Flows: How Does Proximity Influence the Performance of Plants?" Read abstract of published paper here
• 2009. Selected as one of eight 'Editors' key 2009 articles' in Journal of Economic Geography for the article "Localized Mobility Clusters: Impacts of Labour Market Externalities on Firm Performance" (co-written with Urban Lindgren). Read abstract here
• 2009. Awarded second best paper at the DRUID-DIME Academy Winter PhD Conference in competition with 50 other PhD-students for the paper "Localised Spillovers or Knowledge Flows? A study on the effect of proximity and labour mobility on plant performance"
• 2008. Nominated for the 'DRUID best paper award' at The 25th DRUID Celebration Conference 2008 on Entrepreneurship and Innovation for the paper "Labour mobility, related variety and the performance of plants: a Swedish study". (co-written with Ron Boschma and Urban Lindgren) 

Most of my teaching concerns courses in economic geography at both undergraduate and master level as well as quantitative methods at advanced level. I am also involved in supervising both PhD-candidates as well as master and bachelor theses.