During the last decade all over Europe, urban development programmes (UDPs) have been established with a view to combat urban problems and/or to stimulate urban dynamics. These programmes have been set up in a new policy-making context, that of urban governance, the development of which they have often stimulated. Three problems will be addressed in this project:

To answer these problems, the project undertakes multilevel research in 32 neighbourhoods in 9 countries. The cases are selected on two criteria. Firstly, neighbourhoods must be part of an urban development programme. They are, however, selected in such a way that a sufficient range of differentiation is obtained on a number of crucial variables. Second, to minimise new and expensive research, data should be available for at least two time periods.

The research integrates multiple levels and will proceed from a comparative perspective, but will focus on the European dimension.

The effects of urban programmes on social inclusion in deprived urban areas, on sustainability in the selected cities, and on urban governance are assessed through the analysis of a multilevel database and through cross-evaluation by the international project team.

A network of stakeholders is developed and activated through this collaboration and through the production of a handbook. The evaluation focuses on 'benchmarking' for evaluating the processes and outcomes of the programmes (in terms of strengths and weaknesses of types of programmes and of related forms of urban governance). The conceptual and theoretical framework forms a strong basis for a common database that will contain both quantitative and qualitative data at different levels. This framework and the methodology offer opportunities to develop a genuine European approach. A number of concrete deliverables will be developed that can be used by end-users, such as the network, reports that puts local initiatives in a European comparative context, the handbook with models of good practice.

OASeS - Research Unit on Poverty, Social Exclusion and the City
Universiteit Antwerpen Ufsia, Gratiekapelstraat 10
2000 Antwerp
Belgium
http://www.ua.ac.be
Jan Vranken (Project Coordinator), tel. +32 (0) 3220 43 20

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OASeS - Onderzoeksgroep Armoede, Sociale Uitsluiting en de Stad

research

Urban Policy > Urban environment

Environmental sustainability