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Explore the challenges of regional governance in Australia and discover a decentralized model that empowers regions to define their own priorities. Address the barriers to effective regionalism and foster collaboration for sustainable economic development.
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How to Put the Power Back – a Decentralised Model Associate Professor Paul Collits Research Director Economic Development and Enterprise Collaboration, USQ
The Joke No need for a joke to start the presentation as regional policy in Australia is itself the joke.
Some Takes on the Regional World • “In today’s world, we find that it is increasingly regions that compete – not countries” (McKinsey) • “Today we live our lives regionally” (Bruce Katz, Brookings) • “It is a tricky business to define a region” (Dore and Woodhill) • Regions are simply “generalisations of the human mind” (Walter Isard) • A region is a process... Not a thing” (Cooke and Morgan)
Some Takes... • “A region, someone has wryly observed, is an area safely larger than the last one to whose problems we found no solution” (Jane Jacobs) • Regionalism is “part of an insidious agenda to end the nation state”, “wasteful, offensive and ultimately sinister” (A British Observer) • “Is localism the new regionalism?” (Ward and Hardy) • Regionalism is the new black in the USA (see Drabenstott) • Declaration: I remain a new regionalism sceptic
Three Types of Regional Governance • There are three things happening with regional governance • The regional coordination of central government policies • Regional development • Regional planning • All have limitations - involve many layers of interventions and activity, multiple and complex processes, often uncoordinated and under-resourced governance and poor evaluation of interventions • There is a regional governance deficit • Too little OR too much regional governance?
The Barriers to Regionalism • The familiar refrains in Australia – centralism; no regional government; not in the Constitution; no statutory basis to regional organisations; no local taxing powers – hence no mandate • Other problems – regional Australia is obsessed with, well, regional Australia, not with regions • Regional collaboration remains an unnatural act between non-consenting adults • Fragile, possibly false, consensus over regional scale • Regions are largely top down constructs in Australia • Fragmented, messy arrangements • Silos matter – few incentives to own joint projects • So... Putting the power back is not simple and centralisation is not the only problem
Overcoming the Barriers – Broad Scenarios • 3 options • Business as usual • Process improvement • Process re-engineering • But... Is it a process problem? And who takes responsibility? • Must government drive it? What about civic entrepreneurship? • Urgent need to define “reach” • Are spatial constructs like regions themselves clunky and outdated? eg by the new mobility?
Overcoming the Barriers – A Decentralised Model • Abolish RDAs and start again? • Let regions define regions • Don’t be hung up on new regionalist memes • Make the case that ‘regions’ are where it is at • Look at the old and new UK models • Address the lack-of-mandate issue • Governments to commit to genuine localism/regionalism, not localism/regionalism-lite • Reward collaboration • Resource new bodies (which could be old RDAs) • Let new bodies decide on AND fund regional priorities • Remove oversight from Ministers – a regions commission? • Resource research on drivers and models of collaboration – a project for RUN?? Or RAI??
