Introduction

The development of combining new theories and approaches to regional and local development based upon the principles of sustainability has made important advances in the last decade.

Several instruments have been experimented through innovative local initiatives (bottom-up processes) and by means of supporting measures (top-down processes).

Research plays a crucial and catalytic role for stimulating further development of such approaches, methods and tools.

Presently, different policy making levels (from the European Union to the national, regional and local dimensions) face an important challenge: how to combine an increasing number of approaches and tools in order to foster new paths of development that forge environmental, economic and socio-cultural sustainability.

It is not easy to give an exhaustive answer to this need.

Just navigating in the CORDIS system, nearly 1,600 projects can be found which relate to local and regional development, more than 700 regard sustainable development, 21% of them explicitly devoted to regional (and local) development.

Many sources are available to get a general idea of the effort that has been dedicated to meeting the regional and local development challenge:

• summary reports elaborated by various EC DGs regarding results of projects in basic research fields developed by the EU Fourth RTD Programme
• a recent review of EU projects (Graz Symposium - October 1998)
• summary reports of research, case studies, good practices, courses, seminars, workshops, newsletters, guides, articles, on-line databases, etc. provided by EC DGs, international networks, sustainable development institutes and scientific journals, many documents accessible by Internet
• specific research updates and final reports

A basic common factor is present in this very large amount of theories, approaches, methods and tools. This key component is a research foundation based on the analysis and comparison of several different "local contexts".

  Main topics considered by pilot projects and research

Topics can be roughly summarised in four headlines: conceptual framework; development process; local and regional dynamics; performance evaluation

Conceptual framework

• theories and approaches of sustainability
• moral values, ethical behaviours, lifestyles and attitudes, socio-cultural identities, economic interests, environmental awareness

Development processes

• Sequences and stages of regional development planning and their interaction
• Decision-making processes, role of different political levels, local actors and stakeholders, including public and private institutions
• Interaction between objective setting, resource availability and actors
• Change, conflict and participation dynamics
• Capacity and consensus building
• Interrelationships between top-down and bottom-up dynamics
• Mobilisation of knowledge (including scientific results) and its translation into action (including understandable and usable devices for policy makers and the general public)
• Role of intermediaries to operationalise translation, to foster animation and participation, as well as to produce agreements
• Role, scope and assessment of campaigns for increasing public awareness

Local and regional dynamics

• Social interaction
• Local actors perception, interrelationships and networks
• Institutional contexts and arrangements, work organisation
• Environmental, economic and socio-cultural features
• Interrelationships between different local / regional contexts and their comparison
• Development of shared visions, missions and objectives of development, through the participation of local actors

Performance evaluation

• Identification of objectives and priority setting
• Impacts of policies, regulations and legal instruments, programmes, measures and projects
• Sustainable indicators
• Sustainable production systems, eco-efficiency, extended producer responsibility, cleaner technology, eco-services
• EIA and SEIA

  Main methods and techniques adopted

Methods and techniques can be roughly distinguished in three main tasks-support: assessment, strategy planning, implementation

Assessment

• Integrated assessment of environmental, economic and socio-cultural issues (general, sectoral and territorial) through data collections, harmonisation and benchmarking
• Transect approach to evaluate the state of ecosystems and to generate predictions concerning policy sectors
• Preliminary and advanced evaluation (e.g. through SWOT analysis) of regional-local profile and potentials in order to identify local key factors, critical sectors and paths
• Procedures and structures of participation in regional / local planning
• Environmental assessment of regional development plans and EU programmes
• Cross-national assessment of initiatives (e.g. LA 21)
• Organisational analysis, including innovation of technology, process, product, corporate culture and management
• Resource assessment, including materials use and flow accounting, Life Cycle Analysis, green accounting
• Impacts forecasting through e.g. analysis of Uncertainty, Cost-Effectiveness, MultiCriteria, Social Networking, Spatial planning and management, land-use, landscape, infrastructure planning and management

Strategy planning

• Strategic thinking (long-term) through guidance and motivation (orientation) for local / regional dynamics of change
• Orientation and motivation of regional - local actors, examining local profile and potentials in order to improve their capacity for change
• Scenarios elaboration (scope, options, alternatives and the related paths)
• Selection of preferred alternatives and paths
• Elaboration of regional and local programmes
• Elaboration of community and business initiatives

Implementation of programmes and plans (projects)

• Periodic evaluation of effects (monitoring), ex-ante, during the programme/project, ex-post, follow-up and feedback
• Transfer of knowledge and good practices, through e.g. collaborative systems (networks, forums, partnerships, twinning, etc.), professional structures (change and development agencies and agents) and devices (information and communication channels, data-banks, technical and learning materials)

  Main types of tool-boxes

Often, the above methods are combined and supported by combination and integration of different disciplines, approaches and techniques.

They supply a set of instruments that can be summarised in the following main typologies of tool-boxes:

• Guidelines for regional / local programming and planning, as well as for community and business initiatives

• Quantitative and qualitative modelling referred referring to a description of actual performances or states, prediction of alternative scenarios, comparison of particular characteristics, identification of focal interdependencies, often based on measurement and mathematical techniques, as well as on combined with expert judgement

• Management frameworks which basically include guidance for contexts and programme appraisal, programme and project elaboration and monitoring, alternative paths elaboration, objectives selection, step-by-step procedures, check lists (key-criteria, orientation principles, qualitative parameters and quantitative indicators), field works techniques (e.g. questionnaires), reporting support

The above toolboxes are often supported by handbooks and, in a limited number of cases, by software.

  Main lessons from pilot projects and research

Some basic lessons seem to meet a common understanding and agreement. They pinpoint how:

• sustainability should be considered as a process
• diversity is a catalyst for innovation
• change in values and perceptions of actors and researchers constitutes a permanent starting point for innovating concepts and actions
• learning and transfer of experience contribute to the capitalisation of knowledge
• interaction of bottom-up and top-down processes is a development facilitator
• connection between specialist and generalist knowledge is a key driving factor

These lessons are of a paramount significance not only for theoretical and methodological issues, but also for the practical aspect of the role of "tools" in terms of accessibility and applicability on the part of the "end-users" (public and private actors at local and regional levels).

To this end, it is useful and necessary to specify in a general and exemplified manner:

• who are the main actors, because of their different roles in local / regional development
• what are the main stages of regional programmes and local plans of development
• what are the basic steps of project planning and management
• what are the main actors’ needs in order to deal with the development stages and project steps
• what are the basic services to be provided in order to meet the actors’ needs

More sophisticated analysis can be made to identify needs and services according to individual actors, stages and steps, by means of appropriate matrices.

(adapted from "Lessons form LEDA programme", LRDP, London, 1995)

A long series of studies, enquiries and empirical analysis demonstrate that:

• "conventional" development paths require time, more or less five years from a stage to another

• paths more orientated towards sustainable development required more time, twelve / fifteen years to reach and work out the "incubator stage", while the third stage is not yet fully developed as a general attitude

  Coming back to the results of research on SRD, we can discover that different tools address different services

It seems that a the more complete set of services is provided by tools for "management frameworks".

Maybe "management frameworks" constitute a way to connect theory, scientific elaboration and various types of modelling with praxis. They seem to be more appropriate for a direct utilisation in the field, by many practitioners. But they need to be supported, in any case, by specific training and learning.

In fact, "management frameworks" are not "ready-made" instruments at all and imply different degrees of knowledge, multidisciplinary integration and, in some case, very specialised know-how and skills. Just to give some examples, there are management tools based on:

• analytical modelling (e.g. SPARTACUS) to plan and evaluate long term strategies, combining specialised instruments (e.g. GIS, urban planning methods, etc.) with a set of sustainable indicators

• spatial decision support for negotiation and conflict resolution (e.g. DTCS), which utilise Multi-Criteria analysis (based on measurement, mathematical model and expert judgements) to structure objectives and concerns of policy units (from national communities to local communities), to assess the consequences of policies, to analyse values and preferences of the actors involved, to evaluate the sensitivity of the results to various sources of uncertainty

• analytical planning instruments (e.g. SUDECIR) to identify potential benefits at regional level and options of action, including vision-creation (sustainability criteria), assessment (sustainable indicators), implementation and monitoring (priorities, targets, actions, responsibilities, resources, scheduling, etc.)

• elaboration, monitoring and assessment of regional situations, programmes and projects, by means of an integrated economic-environment SWOT analysis, a development path analysis (six potentials development paths from "business as usual" to new types of economic activity and behaviour), a check against key criteria and indicators (i.e. ECOTEC)

• sustainable quality management (SQM, as a further elaboration of the INSURED results) by means of the combination of 10 components of orientation, 16 key factors of local potentials and 6 dynamics levers for stimulating change, "step by step" SWOT analysis in order to assess regional / local situations, develop strategies, ex-ante and ex-post evaluation, monitoring and support, transfer of experiences from one context to another

Additionally, if we compare the services provided by other potential tools, other important observations can be made, those being that networks and dissemination materials have an important role in meeting needed services in the regional and local development struggle. This is particularly important regarding the creation of networks.

  Some conclusions

As a general conclusion, "cognitive democracy" (E. Morin, 1999) is needed in order to empower individuals and communities, as a means of opening open options for "self-organisation" and "self-management":

• understanding unity within and between diverse situations as well as diversity within what is unite and within a specific context
• developing the capacity to contextualise and to globalise knowledge and actions
• acknowledging that the comprehension of individual parts depends upon the comprehension of the whole, as well as the comprehension of the whole depends upon the comprehension of individual parts
• understanding that knowing and reasoning are not aimed at meeting an absolute certain verity, but at conversing with uncertainty, recognising and utilising the dialogical relation between concepts and notions which seem to be contradictory or opposite
• being aware of the necessity of coping with complexity and uncertainty, avoiding the tendency towards reductionism which limits the knowledge to quantifiable, measurable and formalisable phenomena

In other words, research and day-by-day operational sides must interact and co-operate.

Some specific suggestions can be made:

1. A more systematic translation from knowledge to action

2. A more systematic capitalisation of the main research results

3. A more systematic relationship between research arena and existing networks involved in sustainable local and regional development

4. A systematic series of local consultations on sustainable regional and local development

5. A systematic activity of open-distance and inside learning and training

6. A more systematic support to create and develop local agency for sustainability (Sustainable Development Agencies, SDA)

This frame of suggestions links courses of action to be carried out at different levels and dimensions of issues, problems and responsibility to solve them.