Prospects for Building Regional Clusters of Economic Strength in Security Technologies: The Case of New York State

Abstract

As the homeland security (HS) business sector has grown, states and cities have sought ways to take advantage of it for economic development. Also, academic institutions have sought to build research and educational niches in it. The HS sector is, however, very complex. This article provides a diagrammatic explanation of its various segments. Using data available on one important subset, security control technologies, the article shows its distribution around the United States. To build local economic development or specialized academic advancement, strategies toward the sector must be carefully devised. The article concludes with three challenges for development strategies focused on this sector. Throughout, New York State is the prime example.

KEYWORDS:

• Homeland Security Industry
• economic development
• security control industry
• security technology research and development
• Homeland Security Business Statistics
• New York State government Industry-Academic Collaboration

This project was supported by a 2008 grant from MCEER, the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering/Extreme Events Research Center at the University at Buffalo. The author is grateful to Michel Bruneau for helpful comments.