Nordregio 03/2005
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JOURNAL OF NORDREGIO 5 – 2005 • Volume 3 September No. DANISHDANISH MINISTER:MINISTER: IntendingIntending toto ChangeChange DanishDanish GeopgraphyGeopgraphy p. 12 THE SELECT FEW p. 4 - urban concentration in the Baltic Sea Region THE THEMING OF URBAN LANDSCAPES p. 18 CONTENTS No. 3 September • Volume 5 – 2005 3 EDITORIAL NORDEN 4 THE SELECT FEW 9 IN SHORT RIGHT NOW 10 RHETORIC AND SUBSTANCE IN SWEDEN’S NEW REGIONAL POLICY FEATURE 12 INTENDING TO CHANGE DANISH GEOGRAPHY 14 NO WHIPS IN THE TOOLBOX 16 MUNICIPAL JOY AHEAD 18 THE THEMING OF URBAN LANDSCAPE BOOK REVIEW 22 SJÄLVSTYRELSE PÅ LOKAL OCH REGIONAL NIVÅ. PERSPEKTIV PÅ DET LOKALA OCH REGIONALA ANSVARET FÖR FRAMTIDSFRÅGORNA JOURNAL OF Journal of Nordregio is owned and distributed by the NORDREGIO Nordic Centre for Spatial Development (NORDREGIO). The journal appears quarterly and is distributed free of OLE DAMSGAARD Director charge. All articles express the views of their authors. JON P. KNUDSEN Editor Subscription: [email protected] CHRIS SMITH Language Editor Copyright © Journal of Nordregio MARGARETA DAHLSTRÖM Book Reviews Editor ISSN 1650–5891 ADRESSES: NORDREGIO JON P. KNUDSEN MARGARETA DAHLSTRÖM Box 1658 Espevik Nordregio SE-111 86 Stockholm NO-4780 Brekkestø Box 1658 Sweden Norway SE-111 86 Stockholm Tel. +46 8 463 54 00 Tel. +47 37 27 56 90 Sweden Fax +46 8 463 54 01 E-mail [email protected] Tel. +46 8 463 54 00 www.nordregio.se Fax +46 8 463 54 01 NORDIC COUNCIL OF MINISTERS Nordregio is a centre for research, education and documentation on spatial development, established by the Nordic Council of Ministers. JOURNAL OF NORDREGIO EDITORIAL 3 Diving into the report “ På väg mot may be difficult to move from a stra- hållbar tillväxt? Regionala tillväxtpro- tegic to an operational level in the grammen 2004” published by NUTEK, field of regional growth politics, this ON TRACK, and cited as the reference document for becomes even more difficult when the rosy statements on the web site, a the strategic goals remains unspeci- OR JUST feeling of uncertainty immediately takes fied. hold. The main reason for this is that a • NUTEK refrains from providing even number of the conclusions in the report WALKING an estimate of the economic effects point in a rather different direction to of the work undertaken thus far. the one presented in the headline state- AROUND? More importantly, NUTEK also ment offered up in the Government. refrains from evaluating the effects of the growth agreement process on the conditions for future economic To cite some of them: growth. • The conclusion that the growth pro- For anyone familiar with regional grammes emanate from the needs of growth policies the complexity surroun- the business community is conte- ding these policy fields is well known. sted, predominantly by the represen- On the other hand, these are also policy tatives of the business community fields strongly embedded in popular themselves, as well as from the orga- imagination, while expectations remain nisations representing it. eeking regional economic growth that such politics can make a difference Sand development is paramount to • Several public authorities describe in respect of regional economic and most countries, and the prestige taken the mandate for the growth agree- living conditions. Therefore regional in finding good procedures and prac- ment processes as unclear and growth policies are at the forefront of tices to accomplish it can hardly be hence chose to give low priority to the political debate with both politicians underestimated. Not surprisingly there- participation in these processes. and the electorate alike. fore the Swedish government takes great pride in its growth agreements policy and also in their performance. According to the text displayed on the Thus to postulate that Swedish growth policy Ministry of Industry, Employment and is on track has been reduced to a question of Communication website the Swedish growth agreement concept is a success. specifying the track. The Ministry states that the pro- grammes are firmly rooted in the respective regions and in the needs of • Many participants in the relevant NUTEK’s double role as governmental their business communities. partnership processes point to a policy agency and evaluator of govern- Furthermore, the participants of the general incapacity to proceed from a mental policy success however offers a various regional partnerships see great general strategy to the operational difficult point of departure when evalua- value in having a common programme policy level. ting the success (or otherwise) of guiding their work and agree that they Swedish regional growth policy and its • National sector authorities mostly bring value added both to private enter- prime instruments, namely, the growth seem to ignore the growth agree- prise and to the region more generally. agreements and their related partners- ment agendas, this particularly hips. The responsible body for scrutinising seems to be the case with such the growth agreements and their conco- important sectors as those relating When evaluating, the terms of refe- mitant work in regional partnerships is to infrastructure, internationalisation rence will often serve as a means of NUTEK, the Swedish Agency for and finance. These are however the measurement. In this case this neces- Economic and Regional Growth. The sectors that could make the diffe- sary point de repère seems to be mis- agency’s own website proclaims that rence when reshaping regional sing. This is strange as we do have the growth agreement processes remain policy agendas. some evidence of how Swedish part- on track. The work carried out is charac- nerships compare to partnership perfor- • The reciprocal influence on coordina- terised by high intensity and a positive mances in other countries. Thus to post- ting the various sectoral policies and ambiance. No major change of direction ulate that Swedish growth policy is on on coordinating overall national and is needed; the growth agreement pro- track has been reduced to a question of regional policies remains week. cesses should rather seek to strengthen specifying the track. As such, the tacit themselves within the existing frame- • There is widespread uncertainty as to definition of track in this case must refer works. the concrete outcome of the work to any kind of ground found under one’s performed within the regional part- feet when walking. One potential improvement is cited nerships. however as the involvement of the nati- onal sector authorities is judged as • More than half of the regions being unsatisfactory in meeting the regi- involved do not have a common stra- onal coordination requirements within tegic document that gives guidelines the processes. for their work. Considering that it JOURNAL OF NORDREGIO NORDEN 4 The Select Few – Urban Concentration in the Baltic Sea Region stantial. For example, the nine capital eastern parts of the region manufactu- regions of the BSR (plus Hamburg and ring constitutes the main source of eco- St Petersburg) account for more than a nomic activity, the most extreme case third of the region’s entire production being Belarus, where in the 24 main value, although they contain only a fifth urban centres of the country more than of its population on a mere 3% of its two thirds of the workforce is employed land area. In 2002 the GDP per capita in in manufacturing. However, cities such these metropolitan regions was 1.6 times as Tampere and Lahti in Finland or higher than in the rest of the BSR and Bremen in Germany demonstrate that this gap is steadily widening. this is not exclusively an eastern affair. The question however remains whether By Tomas Hanell & Jörg Neubauer Corporate decision-making in the these cities will in the long run maintain region is also very concentrated. More Research Fellows, Nordregio this structure, or whether the economy than 90% of the HQ’s of the largest BSR will be transformed in favour of non- enterprises are located in metropolitan material production. Current trends in areas, primarily in the western BSR. In Although lying largely outside the most eastern BSR countries indicate that the eastern BSR the concentration to European Pentagon, the Baltic Sea the latter seems to be the case. Region (BSR) nonetheless constitutes a these cities is not as marked, as 60% of part of the European urban system the 40 largest eastern BSR HQ’s are The metropolitan cities are also centres acting as the main transport gateway bet- located in metropolitan areas, most of for most traffic. An estimated two thirds ween continental Europe and northern the remaining ones are however also in of all passenger air traffic in the BSR is Eurasia. The BSR contains a significant large Polish cities (e.g. Krakow and channelled through the metropolitan proportion of the total number of Wroclaw). Furthermore, of the BSR areas alone. Moreover, rail and road European cities, mainly due to the dense offices of the 46 most global producer transport networks in most cases also network of cities existent in Poland. Even service firms, more than 90% are located converge in metropolitan areas. In so, the density of cities is nearly three in only eight metropolitan cities of the respect of sea transport however the times higher in the EU than in the BSR. region. situation is not as polarised, as many BSR metropoles are either land- locked The entire population of the BSR is less The demographic magnetism of larger or do not have significant port functions. than a quarter that of the EU25, although cities in general and metropolitan areas its area corresponds to more than 60% in particular is also strong. The migra- Depending on the varying historical of the equivalent EU one. tion surplus to the twelve metropolitan processes when it comes to the founding Taken as a single economic meso- cities during the period 1995-2001 was and location of universities and other region the BSR is neither large nor pro- on average 0.2% each year.