Localisation Patterns of Knowledge-Creating Services in Paris Metropolitan Region

Based upon an hermeneutic approach, which explicitly takes into account therole space plays within the knowledge economy, the article is aimed at providingthe geography of knowledge-based activities in the Paris metropolitan area andat depicting the shape of their external economies and agglomeration forces. Theadded value supplied by this paper consists in: a) the spatial extent covered (theParis Metropolitan Region), in order to consider the role that the pivot city andthe surrounding towns/cities jointly play within the urban regional structure; andb) the improved explicative capability of a hermeneutic approach descendingfrom its cross-fertilisation with the “knowledge source-based approach”, whichdistinguishes between analytic, synthetic and symbolic services according totheir prevailing source of knowledge. The proposed methodology makes itpossible to depict the spatial relationships both within KCS and between KCSand manufacturing activities in a more appropriate manner.