Author: Aniello Inverso – 21/04/2026
SPECIAL ECONOMIC ZONES. Challenges and Opportunities for Territorial Development
edited by Michele PIgliucci
Collana Geographies of the Anthropocene, Vol. 8, n. 1 – Il Sileno Edizioni, Lago (CS), 2025 – (ISBN 979-12-80064-80-6)
Special Economic Zones: Challenges and Opportunities for Territorial Development, edited by Michele Pigliucci, was published in 2025 as part of the open access and peer-reviewed series Geographies of the Anthropocene by Il Sileno Edizioni.
This volume joins an international scientific debate about Special Economic Zones (SEZs) as tools for regional development. It includes ten contributions from Italian and international researchers: Michele Pigliucci, Shweta Dwivedi, Tamali Chakraborty, Maurizio Scaini, Sergey Sosnovskikh, Giovanni Zanaroli, Andrea Perrone, Vincenzo Esposito, Luigi Valanzano, Giuseppe Borruso, Massimiliano Bencardino, Gianni Petino, Maria Prezioso, and Irina Di Ruocco.
Organized into three main sections, it guides the reader from the theoretical foundations of SEZs to comparative case studies, and finally to tools for measuring territorial impact. The preface is written by Ugo Patroni Griffi, Full Professor of Commercial Law at the University of Bari Aldo Moro and President of SUM – School of Urban Management.
The first section of the volume, Theoretical Foundations and Conceptual Approaches, contains two contributions that introduce and prepare the reader for the rest of the work.
The opening essay, written by Michele Pigliucci, “Special Economic Zones as a tool for territorial development: a literature review,” offers a systematic review of scientific literature on the role of SEZs in regional development. It traces the historical evolution of this instrument, starting from the first special economic zone established in Shannon, Ireland, in the 1950s, through the export processing zones (EPZs) of later decades, up to modern third-generation zones focused on technological innovation and sustainable development goals. From an economic geography perspective, SEZs are interpreted as competitive enclaves capable of generating agglomeration economies, reducing transaction costs, and stimulating spillover effects on surrounding areas, functioning as true growth poles in the Perroux sense. Pigliucci identifies infrastructure quality, policy coherence, strong governance, and place-based territorial planning as key conditions for an SEZ to become a genuine engine of growth for disadvantaged regions. The essay also raises critical concerns: the risk of enclavism, where zones become isolated from the local productive fabric without generating wider benefits, as well as growing social inequalities and environmental degradation, particularly in less successful experiences across Africa and Latin America. Three structural variables are identified as crucial: the duration of tax incentives (at least five to ten years), sustained public investment in infrastructure, and place-based territorial delimitation to avoid both benefit dispersion and excessive sectoral concentration. The essay closes by calling on SEZs to evolve toward more adaptive models capable of integrating advanced technologies, social inclusion, and territorial justice, especially given the current pressures of deglobalization, digital transition, and sustainability governance.
The second contribution, by Shweta Dwivedi (IIM Bodh Gaya) and Tamali Chakraborty (IIM Visakhapatnam), “Exploring the SEZs from the perspective of Environmental and Social Sustainability,” shifts attention to the environmental and social costs associated with SEZ development, with a focus on developing countries. The analysis unfolds across three interconnected dimensions. The first examines the economic advantages of SEZs as catalysts for growth: through agglomeration and spillover effects, they promote industrialization, job creation, foreign direct investment, and technology transfer, as illustrated by Costa Rica’s high-tech sector, South Korea’s Saemangeum industrial complex, and free trade zones across Sub-Saharan Africa. The second dimension addresses environmental costs, documenting how SEZ expansion frequently leads to overuse of natural resources, industrial pollution, waste management problems, and significant carbon emissions, with striking examples such as Myanmar’s BRI-linked zones, where deforestation reached 12% of forest cover and 35% of mangrove areas. The third dimension tackles social costs: in many developing countries, SEZ implementation results in forced displacement of local communities, loss of agricultural land and livelihoods, inadequate compensation, and the marginalization of vulnerable populations, producing paradoxical impoverishment in the very areas these zones were meant to revitalize. The authors conclude that sustainability cannot be treated as a secondary concern. Instead, it must be embedded from the outset into governance and spatial planning frameworks, through stronger environmental, social, and corporate governance standards, and a deeper understanding of local and regional contexts.
The second section of the volume, SEZs in Practice: Comparative Territorial Experiences, represents the empirical core of the work. It brings together six contributions examining SEZ implementation across deeply different geographic, institutional, and socioeconomic contexts, ranging from China to Russia, Morocco to Poland, South Africa to Sicily.
The third contribution, by Maurizio Scaini of the Department of Political Sciences at the University of Trieste, “The Evolution of Special Economic Zones in China and the Possible Global Geopolitical Perspectives,” examines the Chinese case as a reference paradigm for understanding the global evolution of SEZs. The essay reconstructs the historical and geographical roots of the Chinese model, tracing in the uneven demographic distribution and structural territorial disparities between coastal and inland regions the premises that shaped the location of the first four SEZs, established in Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Shantou, and Xiamen from 1979 onward, as part of Deng Xiaoping’s reform agenda. The contribution maps the expansion of the model across four distinct phases: from the pioneering stage of 1984–1991, characterized by extension along coastal cities, to the current phase launched in 2013 with the Shanghai Free Trade Zone, marking a shift toward sustainability-oriented models and the gradual reduction of preferential policies. Scaini highlights how Chinese SEZs progressively assumed a far broader function than their original purpose of attracting foreign investment, evolving into laboratories for economic reform experimentation, hubs of accelerated urban development, and, more recently, instruments of the Belt and Road Initiative, projecting the Chinese model on a global scale. The essay also acknowledges the internal contradictions of the phenomenon, as noted in World Bank (2017) and ILO (2020) reports: the difficulty of replicating the model in other emerging contexts, the persistence of regional imbalances, and environmental and social costs that have not always been adequately addressed.
The fourth contribution, by Sergey Sosnovskikh of Manchester Metropolitan University, “Strategic Site Selection for Special Economic Zones and Industrial Parks: Insights from Russia,” introduces an original and underexplored perspective in SEZ literature, namely the investor-side decision-making process for site selection, with specific reference to the Russian context. Building on an adaptation of Glatte’s site selection model, the essay proposes a four-stage framework covering regional selection, political assessment, zone or industrial park analysis, and business environment analysis. This framework incorporates the structural features of the Russian context, marked by a highly centralized system, significant regional asymmetries, an opaque regulatory environment, and the decisive role played by regional administrations in investment outcomes. The contribution draws on 37 interviews conducted with SEZ and industrial park managers, resident companies, and institutional representatives, covering six active industrial SEZs in Russia in 2015, including the Alabuga SEZ in Tatarstan, one of the largest industrial zones in Europe. The findings reveal that the success factors most frequently cited by respondents, such as a favorable investment climate, proximity to key markets, availability of skilled labor, and currency stability, must contend with regulatory uncertainty, the risk of political interference, corruption, and bureaucratic complexity that characterize the Russian institutional setting.
The fifth contribution, by Giovanni Zanaroli, “The touch of Tangier. Free zones as globalised islands in a saturated region,” turns its focus to the Moroccan city of Tangier, examining its free zones as globalized enclaves embedded in one of the Mediterranean’s most strategically significant and densely layered geographic contexts. The essay begins from Tangier’s exceptional position at the Strait of Gibraltar, a crossroads between Europe and Africa, between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, asking how this location has fostered the construction of a free zone system that functions as an archipelago of globalized islands: territories highly connected to international economic networks, yet potentially disconnected from their surrounding territorial fabric. Zanaroli analyzes the asymmetric development dynamics generated by this condition, showing how Tangier’s free zones have attracted massive investment and created jobs in manufacturing and logistics, while simultaneously fueling tensions with local communities, widening disparities between zones and their hinterlands, and producing a form of development that tends to reinforce dependence on external demand rather than stimulating local productive diversification. The contribution introduces the analytical category of the “saturated region” to describe a territory where the overlapping of trade flows, migration, and international investment has reached a density that makes managing the induced effects of free zones increasingly complex, raising important questions about the governance of these spaces and their actual contribution to integrated territorial development.
The sixth contribution, by Andrea Perrone of the Università degli Studi Link in Rome, “Special Economic Zones as a policy tool for the promotion of economic and occupational development in Poland,” examines the evolution of Polish SEZs from their establishment in 1994 to their transformation into the Polish Investment Zone (PIZ) in 2018. The essay reconstructs the historical and institutional context in which Polish SEZs were born, namely the post-socialist transition of the 1990s, when the need to restructure post-industrial areas, attract foreign investment, and create jobs in structurally disadvantaged regions pushed the government to establish zones with differentiated fiscal and administrative regimes, including corporate income tax exemptions on productive activities carried out within designated perimeters. The contribution examines in detail the reasons behind the 2018 introduction of the PIZ as a structural reform of the model: the main innovation lies in moving beyond fixed geographical delimitation, which had historically constrained SEZ effectiveness, and transitioning to a nationwide incentive scheme applicable across the entire Polish territory, with the aim of stimulating both domestic and international investment in areas previously excluded from such benefits. Perrone situates this transition within the theoretical framework of the place-based paradigm, highlighting how the shift from SEZ to PIZ represents a move away from interventions deeply rooted in territorial specificities toward a more uniform model, with significant implications for territorial cohesion, the reduction of spatial disparities between regions, and the system’s capacity to respond in a differentiated way to the needs of individual local contexts.
The seventh contribution, co-authored by Vincenzo Esposito, Luigi Valanzano, Giuseppe Borruso, and Massimiliano Bencardino, “Spatial transformation and industrial diversification through Special Economic Zones: a look at South Africa,” tackles the South African case as a privileged laboratory for understanding the potential of SEZs as instruments of spatial rebalancing in contexts marked by deep historical inequalities. The essay traces the long trajectory of South African spatial policies, from the Regional Industrial Decentralisation Programme of 1960, through the Spatial Development Initiatives of 1996 and the Industrial Development Zones of 2000, to the SEZ Act of 2014, which represented a qualitative leap from previous models by introducing greater typological flexibility, more systematic involvement of provinces and municipalities in zone governance, and a more articulated framework of both fiscal and non-fiscal incentives. Through a spatial overlay analysis integrating data from 20 currently designated or proposed SEZs with socioeconomic, demographic, and infrastructural variables collected at provincial and municipal level, the contribution offers a comparative assessment of the zones in terms of geographical distribution, performance, and alignment with development priorities defined at different levels of government. The findings reveal a mixed picture: the COEGA SEZ emerges as the most relatively successful case, with a local SME procurement rate close to 35% and a capacity to attract foreign investment oriented toward both regional and local markets, while zones located in provinces with lower contributions to national GDP and in rural municipalities show more limited absorption capacity and require deeper assessment of their medium- and long-term territorial impact prospects. The essay concludes that South Africa’s SEZ policy responds to a precise geopolitical rationale, connected to the country’s role within the BRICS bloc, its wealth of mineral resources, and the strategic position offered by its long coastline and the Cape of Good Hope maritime route, but that its ultimate success depends on the ability to integrate zones into multilevel territorial strategies that prevent them from drifting toward enclavism.
The eighth contribution, by Gianni Petino of the Department of Political and Social Sciences at the University of Catania, “Special Economic Zones as a tool for relaunching marginal territories: the Sicilian case study,” closes the section with an analysis of the Sicilian case, positioning itself explicitly within the debate on cohesion policies for southern Italy. The essay opens with a review of the main SEZ models at the international level, from Asian to Latin American and African cases, asking under what conditions this instrument can be effectively applied in a context of territorial marginality such as Sicily’s, characterized by longstanding infrastructure deficits, a fragmented productive structure, the pervasive presence of organized crime, and low attractiveness for foreign investment. Petino examines the opportunities that the ZES Unica del Mezzogiorno, established in 2023 as an industrial policy instrument for the entire South of Italy, could offer to Sicily, highlighting how administrative simplification, fiscal incentives, and strengthened infrastructure provision represent necessary but not sufficient conditions to reverse ongoing marginalization trends. The contribution argues that the success of the SEZ in Sicily will depend to a decisive extent on the capacity of local and national institutions to build a cohesive and transparent governance model, to select with place-based criteria the productive sectors to be incentivized, and to guarantee a benefit duration sufficient to consolidate investor confidence and produce lasting territorial development effects.
The third section of the volume, Efficiency and Sustainability of SEZs: The Role of Territorial Impact Assessment, is entirely dedicated to the evaluative and methodological dimension of SEZ planning, proposing Territorial Impact Assessment (TIA) as a strategic instrument for combining economic competitiveness, territorial cohesion, and sustainability.
The ninth contribution, by Maria Prezioso of the Department of Management and Law at the University of Rome Tor Vergata, “Territorial Impact Assessment for SEZs. A possible alliance between two policy-decision tools,” proposes the integration of TIA into the evaluation and strategic planning mechanisms of the ZES Unica del Mezzogiorno, using the STeMA framework (Sustainable Territorial Economic/Environmental Management Approach), developed by the author since 2006, as its reference model. The starting point is the 2024 Strategic Plan of the ZES, which Prezioso critically reads as a tool still predominantly oriented toward economic and financial aspects, lacking adequate spatial planning capable of respecting the geographical diversity of the eight regions involved: Abruzzo, Molise, Campania, Puglia, Basilicata, Calabria, Sicily, and Sardinia. The essay illustrates how the STeMA-TIA 3.0 model structures the evaluation process through 73 indicators organized into seven systemic-functional territorial typologies (STFTs) at NUTS 2 and NUTS 3 scale, ensuring compatibility with cost-benefit analysis (CBA) and the “do no significant harm” (DNSH) principle, and enabling both ex ante and ex post assessments of cohesion policies and strategic territorial plans. The application to the ZES Unica context reveals significant structural shortcomings: a dramatic brain drain from southern provinces, the absence of any city in the SEZ areas from the European list of Functional Urban Areas, and the failure to integrate the four dimensions of territorial cohesion outlined in the Europe 2020 Strategy. On the governance front, the contribution proposes the adoption of the European Group of Territorial Cooperation (EGTC) model as an institutional architecture for managing the ZES Unica in its Mediterranean macroregional dimension, drawing on established experiences such as the VASAB plan for the Baltic and the Central European Great Region. It concludes that the main obstacle to the success of the ZES Unica is not fiscal in nature, but lies in the absence of a unified strategic vision capable of articulating macroregional planning with local political practices.
The tenth contribution, by Irina Di Ruocco of the Department of Economics, Mathematics and Statistics at the University of Trieste, “Special Economic Zones and Territorial Cohesion: a TIA-Based Approach to Sustainable Development,” broadens and deepens the perspective of the preceding essay, reconceptualizing SEZs not as simple economic enclaves but as dynamic territorial ecosystems requiring integrated and adaptive governance, in which TIA must be embedded as a continuous management instrument rather than a merely retrospective evaluative exercise. The essay makes a threefold contribution: it redefines TIA as a structural component of SEZ governance capable of dynamically adapting to territorial transformations; it clarifies the conceptual distinction, often overlooked in the literature, between types of TIA (ex ante, ex post, strategic, cross-border) which define when and why to evaluate, and operational methodologies (TEQUILA, TARGET_TIA, STeMA) which define how to measure and interpret impacts; and it proposes a structured system of territorial indicators for adaptive monitoring, organized around eight dimensions: governance, territorial cohesion, land use, environmental sustainability, circular economy, social inclusion, economic integration, and urban pressure. Through a comparative analysis spanning southern Italy, the Global South, and other international contexts, from China to the United Arab Emirates, from India to Kenya, from Vietnam to Colombia, the contribution documents how governance fragmentation, socio-spatial inequalities, and ecological vulnerabilities represent recurring challenges, against which TIA proves a flexible instrument capable of adapting to deeply different institutional settings: from southern Italy, where the European regulatory framework ensures institutional coordination and structured resources, to the Global South, where regulatory weakness makes TIA both more urgent and more difficult to institutionalize. The essay closes with a warning that resonates throughout the entire section: the success of SEZs can no longer be measured solely in terms of GDP generated or investment attracted, but in the capacity to redefine sustainable development for the territories they inhabit, demonstrating that economic ambition and territorial justice can coexist and mutually reinforce one another.
In conclusion, the contributions gathered in this volume offer a coherent and articulated vision of Special Economic Zones as one of the most dynamic and potentially transformative territorial policy instruments available to contemporary governments. Their effectiveness, however, is not automatic: it is the result of deliberate choices in design, governance, and evaluation.
The analytical richness of these pages reflects a deep maturation of the scientific debate. The question is no longer simply about quantifying attracted investment or jobs created, but about understanding how SEZs integrate into the territorial systems that host them, how they engage with local communities, and how they can contribute to the goals of cohesion, sustainability, and equitable development that international agendas place at the heart of public policy.
From China to South Africa, from Russia to Poland, from Morocco to southern Italy, every experience analyzed in this volume confirms a fundamental lesson. SEZs express their full potential when they are deeply rooted in their territory, supported by solid institutions, and guided by a strategic vision capable of looking beyond the horizon of fiscal incentives. This is the direction toward which SEZ research, planning, and governance are called to move: toward increasingly integrated and adaptive models that treat sustainability not as an external constraint, but as the very foundation of their design.
Michele Pigliucci, PhD, is Professor of Economic and Political Geography at Link Campus University in Rome, where he also serves as the Rector’s Delegate for Internationalization Policies and Programs, and as a Member of the University’s Quality Assurance Committee. Since January 2024, he has been appointed by the Minister for European Affairs and Cohesion Policies as an expert for the Task Force for the management of the Special Economic Zone (SEZ) for Southern Italy. He is the author of over 45 publications on the topic of SEZs, territorial cohesion, European energy policy and regional development policies. He conducts research on geopolitics, with particular focus on Central Europe and strategic autonomy of the European Union.
Review author: Aniello Inverso – Master’s degree in “Investigation, Crime and International Security” from the University of International Studies of Rome. Bachelor’s degree in “Political Science and International Relations” from the University of Naples “Federico II”. Analyst at Vision & Global Trends – International Institute for Global Analyses, within the framework of the Italian Society of Geopolitics project. His latest essay is: “Geopolitica vettore dell’ordine globale. Dinamiche spaziali e attori strategici nella trasformazione del sistema internazionale” (preface by Stefano de Falco – Callive, 2025 – ISBN 9791281485310 – Heartland Series ISSN 3035-322X Series directed by Tiberio Graziani).