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Over the two last decades, the regional policies have increasingly met the need to foster the economic competitiveness of regional and local economies, in order to face globalisation challenges. However, these actions have privileged the direct competition, oriented to catch investment and consumption flows by improving the regional/local attractiveness, than the indirect one, which is based on the social and institutional interplay involving the regional/local actors. The increasing relevance of the indirect competition brings back on stage the public sector, namely the various levels of territorial government. Yet, the most successful experiences in Europe demonstrate that this renaissance of the public guide in spatial policies is intimately linked to the involvement of local systems of actors and implies a 'constructed' idea of territory. This paper seeks to enlighten some features of this process, introducing the concept of multilevel governance and place-based policies as the basic building blocks of the regional policies.

In recent years, the contemporary social sciences have again turned their attention to space and places. The hypothesis is that these are not accidental episodes but a full-blown revolution in the way of viewing economic processes and their links with social and cultural structures. In other words, this new sensitivity to places offers the possibility of rethinking issues typical of economics in a different perspective that might be defined as local development, one of the terms most (ab)used in the contemporary scientific and political debate. In this book the authors will thus try to support more strongly, although in a necessarily simplified manner, the possibility of constructing a theory of local development. The key idea is that there is no single development model operating at a given time and valid for all places, but that it is more correct to talk of multiple development paths that co-exist in the same place at the same time (multiplicity of development paths). The central point is not to identify the succession of distinct hegemonic models (Fordism versus post-Fordism, mass production versus lean production and so on), but to show how the complexity of the contemporary economy demands new concepts to explain its apparent contradictions. In the authors' view, the conception of a theory of local development implies radical rethinking in institutionalist terms of the way of viewing the economy and production, recognising that behind economic development lies a wealth of institutional assets that make the encounter between local and global more open and varied than ever before (institutional biodiversity)

The North without a compass: spatial dynamics and territorial strategies to a hundred and fifty years from the unification of italyThe paper examines the rise of a 'North' region within the contemporaryItaly in the light of the 'crisis' of nation-statehood experiencedthroughout Europe during the last decades. Although the idea of astate demise is questionable and, rather, definitively ascribed to the rise of apost-national state, the magmatic condition of the Italian regional entities ischallenging the old state edifice emerged from the Post-War ConstitutionalAssembly.This 'North' region is investigated according to a manifold point of view:that of a very mosaic of many local systems strongly differing from eachother – metropolitan areas, industrial districts, networks of medium-sizedcities; that of a social construct which exists under specific conditions andfor specific actors, who can change their scalar references; and finally thatof a political mobilisation on the base of a mix of economic and cultural elements, analysed through the lenses of the New Regionalism approach.The main aim of the paper is to deconstruct the rhetoric of 'North',practised by political actors and movements but quickly spread to the publicdebate, affecting the imaginary of Italians. We do not deny the reality ofthe social and economic differences featuring the 'North' as a whole incomparison to the other parts of the Italian territory, but, at the same time,we argue the existence of deep contrasts within the supposed unitary'North'.KeywordsRegionalism, local systems, North.Le Nord sans boussole: evolutions spatiales et stratégies territoriales à cent cinquante ans de l'UnitéL'article analyse l'essor d'une région «Nord» à l'intérieur de l'Italiecontemporaine, à la lumière de la «crise» de l'Etat-nation expérimentéeen Europe pendant les dernières décennies. Même si l'idée d'un abandon du camp par l'Etat est questionnable et imputable, plutôt, à la naissance d'un Etat post-national, l'activisme des gouvernements régionaux italiens est en train de challenger l'ancienne architecture institutionnelle conçue par l'Assemblée constitutionnelle après le Fascisme.Cette région «Nord» est investiguée selon des différents points de vue:celui d'un véritable mosaïque de plusieurs systèmes locaux qui diffèrent l'unde l'autre – agglomérations métropolitaines, districts industriels, réseaux devilles petites et moyennes; celui d'un construit social qui existe sous desconditions et pour des acteurs particuliers, qui peuvent changer leur référencesd'échelle; et, finalement, celui d'une mobilisation politique sur labase d'un ensemble d'éléments économiques et culturels, analysés à traversles lentilles du Nouveau Régionalisme. Le but principal de cet article est celui de déconstruire la rhétorique du «Nord» telle que pratiquée par les acteurs et les mouvements politiques mais diffusée très vite dans le débat publique, affectant l'imaginaire actuel des Italiens. On ne dénie pas la réalité des différences sociales et économiques qui caractérisent le «Nord» comme une entité unique par rapport aux autres composantes du territoire italien, mais, en même temps, on soutient l'existence de contrastes profonds à l'intérieur d'un «Nord» supposé comme unitaire.Mots-clésRegionalism, systems locaux, Nord.