Title:
Foreign direct investment and the ICT cluster In Costa Rica: chronicle of a death foretold?

dc.contributor.author Mata, Francisco J.
dc.contributor.author Mata Marín, Gabriela
dc.contributor.corporatename Universidad Nacional (Costa Rica). Escuela de Informática
dc.contributor.corporatename Universidad de Costa Rica. Observatorio del Desarrollo
dc.date.accessioned 2011-02-15T20:00:28Z
dc.date.available 2011-02-15T20:00:28Z
dc.date.issued 2008-09
dc.description Presented at the GLOBELICS 6th International Conference 2008 22-24 September, Mexico City, Mexico. en_US
dc.description.abstract Costa Rica has been successful in attracting high-tech foreign direct investment (FDI). An aggressive FDI-assisted development strategy was pursued by the country in the 1980s as a response to the economic crisis; yet there are serious concerns about the effectiveness of such strategy from a development point of view. In this paper, we focus on the effects of the FDI-assisted development strategy on the Costa Rican ICT companies. We present such strategy since the decade of the 1990s and the characteristics of the companies in the ICT sector. Based on this presentation, we discuss the positive and negative effects of the FDI strategy on local software firms, which are the majority of the indigenous ICT firms. A balance of the situation shows that the current FDI-assisted development strategy presents more negative effects than positive ones to local ICT companies. By large, this is due to the lack of spillover effects from MNCs to indigenous ICT firms. We present factors able to explain the existence of few spillover effects and provide recommendations for public policy to increase the possibilities for obtaining more positive benefits from a high-tech FDI-assisted development strategy. The understanding of such factors and the articulation of effective policies capitalizing on them are fundamental to avoid Costa Rica falling victim of its own success. en_US
dc.identifier.uri http://hdl.handle.net/1853/36914
dc.language.iso en_US en_US
dc.publisher Georgia Institute of Technology en_US
dc.relation.ispartofseries GLOBELICS06. ICT development, determinants, patterns and impacts: The role of knowledge networks en_US
dc.subject Costa Rica en_US
dc.subject Foreign direct investment en_US
dc.subject Economic development en_US
dc.subject Costa Rican ICT companies en_US
dc.subject Information and communications technology en_US
dc.subject Wage disadvantages en_US
dc.subject Cost and infrastructure disadvantages en_US
dc.title Foreign direct investment and the ICT cluster In Costa Rica: chronicle of a death foretold? en_US
dc.type Text
dc.type.genre Proceedings
dspace.entity.type Publication
local.contributor.corporatename School of Public Policy
local.contributor.corporatename Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts
local.relation.ispartofseries Globelics Conference
relation.isOrgUnitOfPublication a3789037-aec2-41bb-9888-1a95104b7f8c
relation.isOrgUnitOfPublication b1049ff1-5166-442c-9e14-ad804b064e38
relation.isSeriesOfPublication 9bcdf48e-4586-4550-b033-2063df2fe342
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