Designing better economic development policies for regions and cities: Lessons from theory and practice

This chapter summarises cross cutting lessons on how to improve the design and implementation of regional development policy discussed during a series of 2017 seminars organised by the OECD and the European Commission. It highlights the main seminar lessons, bringing together frontier economic theory and country practices regarding performance frameworks, financial instruments, policy conditionalities, contractual arrangements and behavioural insights in regional policy. Nine lessons are derived from the latest theoretical developments and practical examples to design and use regional development policy instruments more effectively. It highlights pitfalls that policy-makers should avoid and proposes potential practical solutions to improve the management of economic development programmes.