DEVELOPMENT REGIONS - AN AMBIVALENT PERSPECTIVE?

Abstract

Premises of the problem: Regional development policy emerged in Romania out of the need to correct existing regional disparities and to align with the main regionalisation trends, currently unfolding at European level. At the same time, it should be viewed as a prerequisite for the integration into European structures, in terms of better management of the Structural Funds allocated for the purposes of achieving balanced overall development. The aim of the qualitative research was to identify the views of the members of the North- East Regional Development Council, on the existence of regions and on the administrative and territorial reorganisation of Romania. For this purpose, we considered it was necessary to include as many diverse voices as possible, at different organisation levels: county-level and local-level respectively. The data collection method was the in-depth interview. Findings: The solutions proposed by respondents revolve around the idea of development by linking with metropolitan areas, by creating such areas around urban agglomerations. As such, regional development is achieved both through development regions and through local action groups (LAGs) or through growth poles. The conclusions of this research emphasise primarily that, learning from the experience of other European countries, the keys to institutional change should be communication, information, constant interaction between social, economic, and political stakeholders, civil society, etc. This could be one of the optimal strategies at the present stage.