The objective of this international conference was to reflect on the issues of attracting and retaining talents in the territories as a factor for the development of the endogenous potential of these territories. The conference took place on 7 February 2018 at Viana do Castelo, Portugal. A follow-up event is now envisaged for October 2018, […]
What does “community led” really mean?
In the 2014-2020 programming period “community-led local development” (CLLD) has become embedded in the terminology all those working on local development. But while we are already starting debating the future of CLLD beyond 2020, there are still uncertainties about the basics of this approach, including what we mean with “community led”. This question was raised […]
LDnet joins the Cohesion Alliance
The LDnet association has joined the Cohesion Alliance. LDnet is actively supporting a strong and effective EU Cohesion Policy beyond 2020 and is participating in the debate on appropriate ways for supporting CLLD as part of the Cohesion Policy – see recent posts. The Cohesion Alliance was launched during the EWRC 2017. On 11 October, […]
RELOCAL conference: How to strengthen the involvement of places and communities in European cohesion policies
The international research project ”Resituating the Local in Cohesion and Territorial Development–RELOCAL”(2016-2020), funded under the H2020 Programme of the European Union organised its first scientific conference on 14-15 February 2018 in Barcelona, Spain. The broad topic of the Conference was Spatial Justice in Europe, and addressed issues such as the effectiveness and the perception of […]
The Emergence of Social Innovation: A Translocal Perspective
This paper is an output of TRANSIT, an international research project that develops a theory of Transformative Social Innovation that is useful to both research and practice. TRANSIT is co-funded by the European Commission and runs for four years, from 2014 until 2017. The paper investigates how spaces and places play a role in the […]
Evaluation of CLLD: concerns raised by local practitioners and a practical response
Practitioners from different countries have been commenting on the new guidelines on the evaluation of LEADER/CLLD. These guidelines, published by the European Evaluation Helpdesk for Rural Development complement the legal requirements relating to LEADER/CLLD evaluations and aim to clarify the common elements related to LEADER/CLLD evaluations and to offer a wider set of recommendations on […]
European Rural Parliament and the “Venhorst Declaration”
The 3rd European Rural Parliament took place on 18-21 October 2017 in Venhorst in the Netherlands. The European Rural Parliament is a long-term campaign to express the voice of rural people in Europe; and to promote self-help and action by the rural people, in partnership with civil society and governments. During these four days, around […]
Local development in the EU beyond 2020: Practitioners and researchers kick off the debate
On 10 October 2017, LDnet co-organised with ELARD a workshop on “Communities as change agents: local development in the EU beyond 2020” as part of EWRC 2017. It was followed by a networking session co-hosted by the Regional Studies Association. An impressive line-up of local practitioners and international experts led a lively debate, with many […]
Reinventing Europe – with and for its people
The CARMEN Group is made up of people with significant experience of the LEADER approach and territorial development, who have decided to make their ideas and proposals available to all who wish to draw inspiration from them. They met in CARMEN, Alentejo (Portugal). The following proposal emanates from this meeting: [bsk-pdf-manager-pdf id=”24″] The group welcomes […]
Circular economy and CLLD
This draft report has been developed as part of LDnet’s cooperation with HAWK Göttingen University under Erasmus+. It outlines the main concepts and policy position, presents 20 local examples examples of circular economy experiences in urban, rural and maritime contexts, and discusses the links between the circular and the sharing economy, and the circular economy […]
Local development and ‘localism’
The traditional paradigm of local development, of enhancing the development of its own area, has limitations. It is clear that it has positive effects in several areas, where local stakeholders, private and public, have understood that giving added value to local assets and to local resources can improve local areas’ situation and improving the welfare […]
The Praia Manifesto of Social and Solidarity Economy and Finance networks on local economic development
Meeting in Praia, Cabo Verde, on the occasion of the 4th World Forum for Local Economic Development, the SSE International Forum, the Global Fund for Cities Development-FMDV, the Global Social Economy Forum-GSEF, the International Association of Investors in the Social Economy-INAISE, the Intercontinental Network for the Promotion of Social and Solidarity Economy-RIPESS, and their regional […]