Regional Development and Policy in Europe

Contributions for the debate in Latin America

Bachtler, John; Mendez, Carlos; Vironen, Heidi

European Policies Research Centre (EPRC) University of Strahclycde

Madrid, España

04/2014

Publicaciones EUROsociAL

Estudios

2

Análisis

Inglés

Descentralización

desarrollo regional; políticas regionales

The purpose of the study is to provide a review and analysis of the latest regional development policy trends in the EU countries, identifying experiences or good practice that could be useful to the Latin American countries. The study is expected to contribute to the discussion nd dialogue at a kick-off meeting of the Latin-American Network for Regional Development Policy on 2-3 December 2013. The study was carried out in three phases integrating feedback from the project coordinators/partners (EUROSOCIAL-FIAPP, CEPAL) and the discussions at the regional policy network meeting in Brazil following the presentation of the draft report. The analysis draws on a number of EPRC research projects, primarily on two long-running programmes of comparative research: one on national regional policies in Europe and the inter-relationships with EU Cohesion and Competition policies (EoRPA), and the other on specific themes relating to the design, delivery, management and evaluation of Structural Fund programmes (IQ-Net). This structure of this report is as follows. The first part provides a comparative assessment of regional development policy trends in the EU, including analysis of objectives, strategies and instruments of regional policies, as well as the impacts on regional development in the countries. It then continues to discuss how national regional policies have been influenced by policy developments at the EU level before concluding on the latest developments on the debate on territorial cohesion in Europe. A selection of key topics is examined in more detail in case study examples. A final section draws together the key conclusions and sets outs recommendations for future international knowledge exchange on regional policy.