Call for papers: Cross-border regions & inter-regional policy transfer in the past, present & future

The CEU Center for Policy Studies in cooperation with the RSA Research Network on Regional Economic and Policy History organize a workshop on cross-border regions and inter-regional policy transfer at CEU between June 29-30, 2017.

Key themes

In the past decades the world has witnessed two strong and parallel trends. On the one hand, flows of goods, people and ideas across international borders have increased in conjunction with institutional innovations in the area of cross‐border cooperation between sub‐national (local and regional) authorities. This development has been especially strong in Europe, where since the 1950s around 150 formalized institutions for cooperation have been set up, but similar institutions have been created in North and South America, Africa and Asia as well. What they have in common is that emphasis is put on construction and/or reconstruction of local transnational political, social and economic spaces. Regional cooperation on continental scale (e.g. EU, ASEAN) have supported these endeavours in various ways.

Some have noticed tendencies to assume, and aspire for, further development towards cross‐border regional integration, i.e. the research agenda on cross-border cooperation has had strong normative and teleological underpinnings, often fuelled by policy-demand for short-term evaluations of specific programmes or projects. However, the number, length and security level of wall or fence border has, according to some estimates, never been higher than today, with border management and border security being increasingly in the focus of commercial and political interest.

The workshop will aim at taking stock at both these empirical developments over time, paying specific attention to communication, learning and policy transfer across regional and national boundaries. Reflections around issues surrounding what kind of historical data is available and how they can be used will feature highly in discussions.

Keynotes speakers:

• Dr. Katja Mirwald, Brunel University: Trade-offs in evaluating the long-term effects of small projects funds in territorial cooperation
• Dr. Estelle Evrard, University of Luxembourg: Reflexivity and mutual learning: reconsidering cross-border studies with an historical perspective
• Prof. Birte Wassenberg, University of Strasbourg: Linking the history of European integration with the history of regional territorial cooperation: the role of ‘forgotten’ actors

Abstract submission
We invite colleagues to participate with original papers. Please send an abstract of about 400 words and a short bio with full contact details before May 10, 2017 to Sara Svensson (svenssons@ceu.edu).

Financial support
Thanks to the financial support from the RSA we will be able to offer several travel bursaries for attending the workshop. If you wish to apply for a bursary or if you have any questions regarding your eligibility, please contact the key contact of the REHi network (Marijn Molema, Fryske Akademy/Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences, m.molema@fryske-akademy.nl). Please note that bursaries can only be offered to participants who are members of the RSA and fulfil one of the following eligibility criteria:

o are student or early career members of RSA,
o are associate (retired) members of RSA,
o are RSA member working in a Band B, C or D country
   (see http://www.regionalstudies.org)

Call for papers (Download)