A new perspective on metropolization in the Paris Region. Firm functions and sustainable development

Lise BOURDEAU-LEPAGE & Elisabeth TOVAR Université Paris 11-Sud, ADIS, [email protected] Université Paris Ouest Nanterre La Défense, EconomiX & CEE, [email protected]

Abstract The article deals with the question of sustainability of metropolization as seen through the location of firm functions. This functions’ location is put forward from a sustainable development perspective. What is at stake here is to highlight whether the economic agents take into account the question of sustainable development or not in the decision making process of localization. It is therefore important to see if the spatial disparities of firm functions reproduce territorial disparities related to sustainable value or not. The Paris Region is chosen because it is a global metropolis in Europe and it concentrates the global decision, control and creation functions. The paper is built up around two questions: Are there specific spatial structures related to the functional distribution of jobs in the Paris region? Does the sustainable value, observed in the social, environmental and economic dimensions of amenities of the Paris Region towns, account for the observed functional distribution of jobs? The paper is organized as follows. First, the spatial evolution of the functions related to economic activity in the Paris Region is analyzed between 1982 and 2006. Then, the specific spatial structure of firm functions in the Paris Region is underlined thanks to a clustering analysis. Secondly, a town indicator of sustainable value, which is composed of the social, environmental and economic dimensions of amenities, is used in order to measure the sustainability of the 1300 towns in the Paris Region. To conclude, the link between firm functional disparities and sustainable disparities of towns hosting firm functions is put forward to see if high-order functions are inclined to prefer a location with high sustainable value while low functions are relegated to lower sustainable value areas.