Laying the foundations for inclusive growth in European cities

According to the EU’s current Broad Guidelines for Economic Policies, inclusive growth is taken to mean that “Member States should guarantee all citizens equal access to the economy. Inclusive growth should, therefore, contribute to creating a society in which all citizens participate in the labour market and profit from economic benefits”. The emphasis on “access” to the economy and, particularly, the labour market is clear. However, Paul Soto argues that the current situation is adverse for such a topic: over the last three years – precisely the lifespan of the first round of URBACT projects – the economic climate facing European cities has swung violently from boom to bust and from emergency stimulus packages to stringent austerity cuts.

Four URBACT projects on inclusive growth

In this article, Paul Soto looks at the results of four URBACT projects: OPENCities, FIN-URB-ACT, Urban N.O.S.E and WEED. These represent 39 cities from all over Europe who have been focussing on key elements for inclusive growth.

These projects all took a different entry point to this challenge.

FIN-URB-ACT and Urban N.O.S.E focused primarily on the practical steps that cities can take to stimulate the demand-side of the labour market.
The aim of FIN-URB-ACT was to explore how cities can provide more efficient local support structures for SME development and for more innovative economies.
Urban N.O.S.E went one step further to consider how cities can support social enterprises which create jobs for disadvantaged groups in fields which meet social and environmental needs.

WEED and Open Cities also dealt with issues related to demand but focused mainly on issues related to labour supply.
WEED pointed out that women’s participation in the economy plays a vital role in the sustainable development of cities and has been exploring practical methods of mobilising their potential in urban economies.
OPEN Cities investigated how cities can build the kind of diverse, creative environment that retains and attracts the pool of talent that is available in migrant communities.

These four projects made it clear that “inclusive growth” is a jig-saw made up of many components that in turn can be assembled in different ways. They therefore did not pretend to offer comprehensive solutions.

Five recommendations for cities on how to enhance inclusive growth

• Map the barriers and opportunities of economic development for citizens
Three of the projects have developed or applied specific tools for mapping out the problem and often plotting the position of different stakeholders around it (mapping the supply and demand for business support, the Download WEED Gender Impact Assessment Toolkit (484.74 KB), the Download OPENCities Baseline study Summary (420.57 KB)). This may seem obvious but it is an essential first step towards understanding the dynamics of the different “worlds” that make up any city and starting to build up the trust and common ground for change.

• Represent focal points to mobilise stakeholders
A new sense of modesty and realism about what cities themselves can achieve and how they can do this appears. Several of the projects insisted that cities often have neither the competences and the scale nor the skills for directly providing certain services, such as financial or non-financial support for firms. However, on specific case studies, these projects show how cities can go further in their role as focal points for mobilising the business community, the universities, the civil society organisations, and other institutions – around a common agenda for change.

• Implement a “one-stop shop”
Physical spaces such as incubators and institutions like universities are important. However, it seems that their nature is less important than their role as “one-stop shop” in integrated chains of activities, which systematically deals with the barriers to change.

• Address both sides of the equation: demand and supply side
All projects insist that it is necessary to deal with both sides of the equation to have a real chance of success. WEED and OPENCities  provide examples of how large companies (e.g. Allstate NI), social enterprises (PAN and Casa) and universities can open opportunities for groups that are frequently excluded from the labour market.

• Develop a holistic approach to identify future prospects
Urban N.O.S.E. and WEED  argue that the city needs to take a holistic view of social (and environmental) needs, as well as its own services as these can under certain circumstances become a source of new economic activities and jobs for local people. The challenge remains to explore the business models which allow public, private and social economy operators to provide both the services that meet local needs and the jobs required by local people in the context of the current crisis.

Read more:

• Full article in  Download URBACT Project Results First Edition (18.49 MB) - PDF
• FIN-URB-ACT results – URBACT website
• WEED results – URBACT website
• Urban N.O.S.E results – URBACT website
• Open Cities results – URBACT website