On Unresolved Issues in Regional Development Thinking

Two survey articles on the state of the art in regional planning have recently appeared: one by Lloyd Rodwin (1978) and another by Harry Richardson (1978). In a volume dedicated to identifying areas of theory formation as well as of research and policy making for the 1980s, it would not make, sense to leave them undiscussed. Lloyd Rodwin, with sensitivity to the environment, notes a shift in pre-occupation,among regional planners 'from a technical' to a 'socio-political' emphasis over the past 25 years. Richardson - who had a different objective than Rodwin - takes up the thread spun by Meyer (1967) and iooks at how regional economics has progressed over the past 10 or so years, while apologizing for not taking into consideration a trend towards multidisciplinarity.