Births and Deaths of Regional Planning Agencies

Abstract

Most assessments of the poor performance of regional planning agencies have focussed on the policy problems of putting development theory into practice. This paper looks instead at the institutional aspect. Abstracting from the diversity of policy contexts, it asks whether there are common political and administrative features in the process of organizational reform which first creates and then dissolves regional planning agencies. In a broad comparative review of published case studies an intrinsic dilemma of such agencies is identified. As planning units they trespass on the jurisdictions of established departments who in the long run have the proven ability to starve them of information, effectiveness, and credibility. Their only power-base is a regional political constituency; but developing this may prove equally fatal, for reforms which amplify interregional cleavages threaten the political integration of the state, making the political cost of regional planning unacceptably high to national governments.

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