The Role of Technical Change in International Competitiveness: The Case of the Textile Machinery Industry

Introduction A recent paper in Omega has suggested that one of the prime reasons for the catastrophic decline in the UK's share of world ship building during the twentieth century has been a laggardness in innovation on the part of the UK industry. This raises the question of the importance of technical change in export competitiveness in other industry sectors. Indeed, in the light of the UK Government's recently stated industrial strategy which, under the auspices of an overall industry plan, is designed to operate on a sectoral basis, the determination of the relative importance of the technical sophistication of a good in that good's competitiveness, and the determination of how this factor varies between sectors, would appear to be of prime importance in formulating practical policies for the different sectors.