33 GROWTH POLES AND NATIONAL COMPETITIVNESS Popa Ioan Bucharest Academy of Economic Studies, Faculty of International Business and Economics, Mihai Eminescu 13-15, Chamber 1203, Sector 1, Bucharest, e-mail: ioan.popa.rei@gmail.com telephone: 0213191990 Belu Mihaela Gabriela Bucharest Academy of Economic Studies, Faculty of International Business and Economics, Mihai Eminescu 13-15, Chamber 1203, Sector 1, Bucharest, e-mail: mihaelabelu2000@yahoo.com, telephone: 0213191990 The mainstream approach of international trade (Smith, Ricardo, Heckscher- Ohlin etc.) envisages the national economy as an heterogeneous space of resources and factors and the competitiveness depends upon right chosen industrial and trade policies . This approach centres to the State, the nominal holder of power, but takes little account of the Company, the actual holder of the economic power. At the limit State is considered a large company where decisions are taken centrally and can be implemented directly and fully. The paper aims to differentiate between the virtual advantages of national economies and the real factors of growth and competitiveness in the globalization era. In this respect a new approach is imperative, one that emphasizes the structures that promote the competitive advantages (cf. M. Porter) of a nation. The major companies and their surrounding networks should be seen as poles of growth (cf. Fr. Perroux) which promote a specific economic area. Gravity models can serve to analyze their role in the economic integration process through efficient structures. Keywords: national competitiveness, competitive advantage, growth poles Cod JEL: O40, O41, F10 The paper intends to make a distinction between the virtual advantages of a national economy (that is those perceived and static) and its real advantages (that is those capitalised, dynamic). In this view, it is required a new approach – which is imperative in the conditions of globalization – the one that emphasises the structures – “the growth poles” – which promotes the competitive advantages of a nation. The gravitational models may serve to the analysis of their role, in the process of integrating the economic spaces through performant structures. 1. Competitiveness – between concept and slogan Paul Krugman considers the notion of competitiveness a dangerous obsession 3 . Nations do not compete one against the other, like the corporations (the author refers here to the “world’s leading nations” and to the “big corporations”). That is why, “the doctrine of competitiveness is flatly wrong”. The statement is shocking: it seems to invalidate an entire direction of economic thinking and political action. In fact, it is about a necessary distinction operated above concerning the notion of competitiveness: that between the concept and the slogan. According to a well spread and easily accessible definition, competitiveness is a comparative concept of the ability and performance of a firm, sub-sector or country to sell and supply goods and/or services in a given market 4 . Therefore, competitiveness means: - an approach in comparative, relative terms: a country is or not comparative with another market in a certain field, on a certain market - competitiveness is based on natural factors (resources) and artificial factors (institutions, competences) 3 Krugman, Paul, Competitiveness: A Dangerous Obsession, Foreign Affairs, March/April, 1994 4 Cf. Wikipedia