Partner projects
Structural Policy Space and Global Value Chain Position- A Framework for Industrial Policy in the Critical Minerals Boom
Team
Research Assistant:
Project Description
The global green transition has intensified demand for critical raw materials, creating new strategic opportunities for resource-rich economies in the Global South. For many experts, this moment represents a “green window of opportunity”: a chance for mineral-producing countries to move beyond raw material extraction and capture higher-value activities within global value chains.
This has renewed interest in industrial policy as a tool for economic upgrading in mineral-based global value chains. Indonesia’s nickel sector, in particular, is often presented as a successful case of state-led upgrading, with export restrictions, and downstream processing policies helping the country expand into higher-value segments of the stainless steel supply chain. As a result, international organizations, policy analysts, and governments have increasingly looked to the Indonesian experience as a potential model for other critical-mineral producers.
This research project asks, however, why in practice such strategies succeed in some cases but prove difficult to replicate elsewhere. We argue that successful upgrading depends on the alignment of two distinct dimensions. The first is what we call structural policy space: the extent to which governments possess the macroeconomic autonomy and state capacity necessary to formulate and enforce industrial policy. This includes, for example, a diversified export base, relative independence from commodity revenues, external financing, and investor claims, as well as the institutional capacity to act upon interests concentrated in the resource sector.
The second dimension is a country’s position within the global value chain. This determines what kinds of upgrading are feasible within the chain itself. Key factors include the technological reachability of the next stage of processing and the presence or absence of dominant downstream actors that control access to higher-value activities.
Through comparative case studies of Indonesia’s nickel sector, Chile’s lithium sector, Zambia’s copper sector, and Brazil’s broader critical minerals strategy, the project shows that functional upgrading requires both structural policy space and a favorable value-chain position. Where either dimension is absent, industrial policy may still generate positive outcomes, but is unlikely to produce sustained functional upgrading within global value chains.
The theoretical foundations of the project draws on developmentalism, Global Value Chain research, industrial policy, and comparative political economy literature. Methodologically, this project relies on descriptive statistics, document analysis, secondary literature review, and will be complemented by insights from expert interviews.
Digitalisation of Value Chains in the Retail Sector
Research project funded by Hans-Böckler-Stiftung, 05/2023 – 04/2026
Project lead: Prof. Dr. Martina Sproll
Project description
The growth of online retail, digital supply chain management systems and new production technologies are transforming the structure and management of global retail value chains. This has implications for the relationships between companies at the various stages of the value chains, as well as their geographical configuration. As digital technologies contribute to a new form of integration within value chains, trade union and workplace advocacy must increasingly take into account restructuring across the entire value chain (i.e. the production, logistics and retail stages) in order to understand the impact of digital technologies on work and production processes and the associated inequalities, including Germany. This raises fundamental questions regarding a cross-border reorientation of workplace and trade union advocacy in order to help shape the digital transformation.
Publications
López, Tatiana, Martina Sproll, Michael Fütterer und Maria del Carmen Mayer, 2025. Vom stationären zum Omni-Channel-Händler. Digitale Transformation in IKEA#s Einzelhandels- und Logistiknetzwerk und Auswirkungen auf Arbeit, Standort, S. 1-8.
Sproll, Martina, 2025. F:10 Globale Arbeitswelt Einzelhandel. Warum Digitalisierung und Mitbestimmung zusammengehören sollten, In: Gemeinsam weiterdenken, 25.03.2025, [online] https://gemeinsam-weiterdenken.letscast.fm/episode/f-10-globale-arbeitswelt-einzelhandel, zuletzt abgerufen am 23.05.2025. Ein Podcast der HWR Berlin.