OECD Regional Outlook 2011
Building Resilient Regions for Stronger Economies
The OECD Regional Outlook 2011 provides an overview of the main developments in performance among OECD regions and the challenges for regional policy after the crisis. The first two chapters present fresh analysis of regional growth and labour-market trends, exploring their implications for policy. This is followed by three chapters offering focused analyses of key policy issues. The first, and most immediate, concerns the state of sub-national government finances in the wake of the crisis and its implications for managing public investment, in particular, during a period of austerity. The next two chapters are concerned with the potential contribution of regions and regional policies to addressing the longer-term challenges of innovation and green growth. Part 3 of the Outlook presents a "policy forum", a wide-ranging debate on the role of regional policy today involving experts and officials from within and outside the OECD. Finally, the Outlook includes individual country pages providing detailed quantitative and qualitative information on regional performance, institutions and policy settings in OECD members.
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Improving Regional Development Policies
This chapter begins with an essentially sceptical critique of the case for “placebased” policies, presenting “a rule of thumb for calibrating regional development policies” that specifies those circumstances in which a place-based approach might make sense. It then compares the Irish, Iberian and Italian approaches to regional policy over the last few decades, concluding that there is a strong association between growth and agglomeration and arguing that regional policies should facilitate agglomeration, migration and specialisation rather than resisting them. The chapter then looks at the implications of this view for public policy in the current tight fiscal environment, with particular emphasis on social policy and connectivity.
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