Jörg Meyer-Stamer

Jörg Meyer-Stamer was a German political scientist and economic development practitioner. He was passionate about developing economic development frameworks and methods that enabled stakeholders in developing countries to diagnose and improve their contexts. He developed methods and frameworks that enabled stakeholders to diagnose and improve local economic development, clusters, value chains and innovation systems. He also wrote several papers on structural change, technology, innovation and industrial policy.

He worked in many developing countries to build local capacity, support local economic development and advise governments and international development organisations like the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit, International Labour Organization and Inter-American Development Bank. He was passionate about the industrial heritage and structural change programmes in Germany. He frequently hosted tour groups of decision-makers from developing countries in Germany to explore structural change, industrial heritage and local development issues.

He was born on 30 October 1958 in Germany and he died on the 1st of May, 2009.

Early life and education

He was born as Jörg Meyer, but he changed his surname to Meyer-Stamer during his early adulthood.

He completed a masters degree (Diplom-Politologue) in Political Science at the University of Hamburg between 1979-1986. He completed a doctoral degree in 1995 at the University of Hamburg, Faculty of Social Sciences.

Career

He started his career in 1987 with the Hamburg University Computer Science Department as a research officer studying the impact of office automation systems on white-collar workers.

In 1988 he joined the German Development Institute/Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE/GDI) in Berlin as a fellow. He worked on industrial competitiveness, technological change, and private sector development. He had several research projects focused on Latin America. During this time he co-developed the framework of Systemic Competitiveness with Klaus Esser, Wolfgang Hillebrand and Dirk Messner. Following his death, the German Development Institute described Jörg as one of Germanys most creative and productive development researchers

In 1998, he joined the Institute for Development and Peace (INEF) at the University of Duisburg. He led a project to assess and evaluate the overall performance of structural policy in North Rhine-Westphalia. During this time, he represented Germany on the United Nations Commission on Science and Technology for Development (UNCSTD).

In 2003, he was a founding partner of the consultancy firm Mesopartner. Although he became a consultant, he continued to publish academic and research papers. As a consultant, his attention shifted more towards capacity building on experts and decision-makers in developing countries, especially on topics like local economic development, cluster promotion and innovation systems promotion.

Work

Jorg worked in many developing countries to build local capacity, support local economic development and to advise governments and international development organisations like the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit, International Labour Organization and Inter-American Development Bank.

Systemic Competitiveness

Together with Klaus Esser, Wolfgang Hillebrand, and Dirk Messner, Jörg Meyer-Stamer developed the concept of “systemic competitiveness”. The DIE-GDI described the concept of Systemic Competitiveness as having a key impact on the discussion, both in Germany and internationally, on strategies suited to integrating developing countries into the world economy.

Local Economic Development

Jörg was a strong proponent of Local Economic Development. He was a vocal critic of planning driven Local Economic Development (LED) approaches. He argued that a planning driven approach would sideline local stakeholders, and put the responsibility on the shoulder of local government. He claimed that LED is a learning approach and that this learning takes place as local stakeholders from different spheres work together to address local problems and opportunities. The strengthening of local trust and a focus on addressing local market failures was a theme throughout his work. He also suggested that a light touch approach focused on quick win activities is more suitable to start a local economic development process, and once the process is more mature and established a more planning driven approach involving more project management could be introduced.

The concepts Jörg developed have strongly influenced the work of international development organisations such as the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit and the Inter American Development Bank (IADB).

Participatory Appraisal of Competitive Advantage (PACA)

Jörg developed the Participatory Appraisal of Competitive Advantage (PACA) methodology. It is a participatory process methodology that enables local stakeholders to jointly diagnose and improve their local economy. A typical PACA exercise could be undertaken within a week or two. A PACA exercise combines interviews with local stakeholders and analytical workshops, and it aims to mobilise or draw in a diverse range of local stakeholders in the diagnosis. The exercise is concluded with a way-forward workshop where local stakeholders commit to implementing quick win activities to improve the local economy. The PACA methodology has been used in more than 30 countries including South Africa, Sri Lanka, Namibia, Ghana, Argentina, Vietnam, Indonesia and Thailand.

Rapid Appraisal of Local Innovation Systems (RALIS)

Jörg developed the RALIS methodology based on material developed for his doctoral thesis and his earlier work at the German Development Institute. He combined insights from the study of technological capability, the emerging field of innovation systems and his experience in local economic development. Whereas innovation systems are typically studied in an ex-post manner by scholars, RALIS was a participatory method that enabled stakeholders or champions within an innovation system to diagnose and improve their system in an ex-ante approach.

In 2005 Jörg co-authored a working paper

Meyer-Stamer, Jörg., Maggi, Claudio. and Giese, Martin. 2004. Die Strukturkrise der Strukturpolitik : Tendenzen der Mesopolitik in Nordrhein-Westfalen. 1. Aufl. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften.

Cunningham, Shawn. and Meyer-Stamer, Jörg. 2005. Planning or doing local economic development? Problems with the orthodox approach to LED. Africa Insight, 35(1).

Meyer-Stamer, Jörg. 2009. Modern industrial policy or postmodern industrial policy. Duisburg: Mesopartner and Freidrich Ebert Foundation.

Working papers, reports and other publications

A list of his academic papers and books can be found on Researchgate.

A list of his working papers and concepts notes are available for free on the Mesopartner website