Questions about cross-border good practices

1. Questions about cross-border good practices Some questions for cross-border good practices: • Relations between borders and practices (hyphotesis: what is “good” depends from the cross-borders relations); • Relation between the specific nature of the Interreg projects and the general idea of good practice. • Has the “good practice” the same meaning for bottom-level practitioners, EU level and local societies?

2. Interreg and the meaning of “borders” • “National borders should not be a barrier to the balanced development and integration” (EC Communication) • How many kind of (idea of) border in the EU? Which is the meaning and the use of “good practices” in different border situations?

3. border as a problem in the integration policy barrier, historically defined, strongly divisive frontier: as extreme border, unkown and dangerous space. But also as “advanced” border (as frontier in science), plenty of innovative possibility Italy-Austria; Italy-Balkans; inside Balkans; Greece-Turkey; etc. border as an open space of transition, as a line that keep oppositions apart and unites them. boundary weakened by economic, cultural and social cross-border practices. Nordic countries; Italy-France. Meanings of “border”

4. Meanings of “borders” • Interreg projects may include both kinds of borders (ex.: many of Alpine Space projects). • Hybrid situations are interesting: will be there sub-coalition formation? Or hybridity may facilitate the interaction process?

5. ESPD: experiment in framing Europe as a new (cognitive and policy) frame for many practices (cultural, social, ideas of local democracy and governance) ESPD: frame and guide for transnational investment and functional-spatial organization policies in a globalization process ESPD and “borders”

6. Difficult borders Frame reflections, practices as symbolic negotiation, construction of a sense of interdependency (ESPD may be an element of “contexts building and enacting”). Paradoxically, it is more activating (it’s a challenge with a strong symbolic stake); differences may not be obstacles but resources. Loose boundaries Effective coordination in order to assure more functional transnational integration. All obstacles (political, cultural, social, administrative) are seen as more or less negative, elements that must be removed to achieve good communication and coordination. Good practices: they are different, depending on the border situations

7. For local practitioners: There’s a need for circulation of good practices. Why? In part for some planning deficit, but probably also in order to overcoming differences in administrative settings and professional practices. Good practice works as a recipe, as a frame of certainty that rises probability to get EU Funds, in a situation of uncertainty and complexity From EU perspective: It is a style of “soft law” and “soft regulation”, like the regulation via standards, in an ecology of regolatory forms (directives, certifications like ISO, formal negotiations, etc.) Good practice may be accepted or not at local level; incentives for choice. Needs for good practices in Interreg (“An Assessment of Need”, Vienna, 2004)

8. What are practices in the dayly life • Practice as a space of structured possibilities; kind of joint activity socially constructed and institutionalized; forms of actions (and cognition) that are stables during the time. • Practices are not good, neither bad. They are simply what people do, historically defined models of doing and thinking. • Practices are learned via interaction with other actors (ex.: “communities of practice”). • Practices usually change in the long term, but also in the short one, by enactment of new context (different interpretations of the situation) or new models of actions, often exogeneous and locally experimented, when a situation is seen as problematic one.

9. “Normative” good (bad) practices and social practices: a link • In a policy design perspective: in order to learn from good practices, there is need for “good learning spaces”, where the complexity of practice may be understood and explored. A good practice is always local and context-dependent. • Toward a definition of good practice as joint activity: some general properties: • Continuity-stability: practice that works is embedded in social and political life, is an institution. This also means: stability of networks, of cognitive frames, and a certain amount of social capital, mainly as environmental and institutional trust. • Learning capability (innovation): openess to the environment, openess to the ecology of projects, pluralism, “bridging” social capital, no very strong ties (Granovetter), presence or construction of (symbolic and material) incentives, re-framing capabilities (in terms of new perception of interdependences and so on)

10. The Interact definition of good practiceFirst proposition • 1. A practice that obtain concrete results, in accordance with its objectives (effectiveness and input-output models). • But: it needs a perfect flow from policy formulation to policy implementation. A definition that may be useful in non-problematic cross-borders situations, where the decision process may be similar to the problem-solving process (even in multi-actor situations). Moreover: objectives are often a strategic tools for getting consensus and initiating an action, so they are (wisely) vague. Implementation is in many cases a creative re-planning. • Questions: history of the policy, structures of implementation, cognitive frames, interaction models, links formulation-implementation policy, etc.

11. The Interact definition of good practiceSecond proposition • A good project generates added value, outside its declared objectives. • This proposition is useful in general, because interaction generates non-intentional outcomes. It is even more important for the problematic cross-border situations, where the uncertainty (cognitive, about role expectations, etc) is higher. • Kinds of added values: networking, framing, social capital, learning to work together, technical learning, …

12. In the case of non-problematic boundaries /projects of functional integration: Structuration of epistemic communities and policy communities Growth of technical competence Formation of transnational advocacy or growth coalitions linked to European policies. In the case of problematic borders and frontiers: A new idea of border Legitimation of the “others” (as resource) Inter-cultural social capital (bridging) Growth of interactive (dialogic, negotial, deliberative) capabilities Examples of added values from “good” practices

13. The Interact definition of good practiceThird proposition A good practice doesn’t suffer major administrative or financial problem (efficiency criteria) Nature of administrative problems in cross-border policy: • complexity of European procedures; • lack of local technical skills; • differences in administrative and legislative systems; • inadequate structures of implementation; • etc. Internal and external efficiency problems.

14. A tentative taxonomy of Interreg projects • Strategic projects. Are “strategic” according to Lindblom’s definition of strategic planning in poliarchic situations. Strategic planning as process of social interaction, with a mix of knowledge forms, that may produce networks, social capital, usable knowledge, frames, model of interaction. A strategic project is a project that try to trigger and/or influence an interaction process in view of a policy result. • Methodological projects. These projects aim to experiment tools (for ex.: GIS, management systems, etc) or models, sometimes externally defined (such as the “best practices”), sometimes locally produced (pilot projects)

15. Kinds of Strategic projects Strategic projects may clustered in two groups: • Networking projects: NP are constitutive policies. NP aim to constitute stable networks of actors (more than the ad hoc partnership) in few strategic fields, as political and policy instrument for the cohesion objective. • Framing projects: FP aim to build a common language and common policy discourse, as a kind of constitutive policy. • Links between NP and FP. • Often, NP and FP are components of the same project.

16. Examples of networking projects (from Alpine Space IIIB) • ALPLAKES (France, Italy, Slovenia): creation of a network of “lake managers” in the field of lake management, in order to implement better transnational sustainable policies. • NEPROVALTER (Austria, Italy, Slovenia): networking public institutions and farmers at transnational level, for sustainable development in mountain rural areas. • ALPCITY (Austria, France, Italy, Switzerland): networking and exchange of experiences to create a common knowledge and strategies for local development in small alpine towns (NP+FP) • SENTENDALP (Austria, France, Italy, Slovenia, Switerzland): network of public institutions and sport events organizers to plan and marketing sport events in Alpine Area.

17. Examples of framing projects • URBAL (IIIB North Sea Region – Belgium, Norway, Sweden, UK): understanding and generating awareness among local decision-makers on how managing urban-rural areas. • EUROPOLIS (IIIB North West Europe – France, Belgium, Germany, UK): to establish an action platform for sustainable development in medium-size towns. • REKULA (Cadses – Germany, Italy, Poland): defining common criteria for cultural landscapes recovery. • LEXALP (Alpine Space – France, Germany, Italy, Switerzland): harmonizing terminology in normative documents, in order to achieve a common language.

18. Another kind of strategic projects Projects that build cross-border “practice spaces” and cross-border communities (framing by experiences and social experiments). Examples: • Two Shores Gardens (IIIA – Germany-France): a common garden along the Rhine, linking Kehl and Strasbourg along a new footbridge. • People to people (IIIA – Upper Rhine Centre – France, Germany, Switzerland). Implementing a framework programme for small scale project directly initiated by citizens (cross-border active citizenship) • DUO (IIIA France-Wallonie-Flandre): a common transnational television space where schoolchildren participate discussing important social issues.

19. Kind of methodological projects: tools Technical integration projects: common tools and instruments for planning, managing, monitoring and evaluating. • Examples: • KATER (Cadses – Italy, Croatia, Austria, Slovenia): development of a GIS system in order to asses environmental impacts. • MARS (Alpine Space – Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Slovenia): development of a database for monitoring sustainable development at the NUTS2 level. • DIAMONT (Alpine Space – France, Germany, Italy, Slovenia, Switzerland). Development of SOIA, system for observation and information on the Alps, in the field of economic regional development.

20. Kind of methodological projects: experiments Pilot projects, developed locally or esternally, to be experimented in order to increase the learning capabilities and the range of local opportunities. • Examples: • GO (Cadses – Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Greece, Italy, Poland): new opportunities of investments with innovative financial tools. • Living Space Network (Alpine Space – Austria, Germany, Italy, Switzerland): cross-border conservation policy and pilot-project on water and bat populations. • Safety for sustainable development in Hautes Vallées (IIIA Italy-France (ALCOTRA). Experiments on risk prevention and building of a diffuse risk culture.

21. Added value of Good practices: a preliminary frame