ABSTRACT
Since the mid-1970s, important transformations have affected the process of economic growth and, thus, the development policies. On the one hand, the forms of firm organization have changed (more flexible and integrated within the territory today) as well as the firm location patterns, which are transforming the spatial development models. Furthermore, urban growth is encouraging the appearance and development of city networks and their insertion in the globalization process. Last of all, many countries have begun political and administrative decentralization processes, which allow the cities and urban regions to assume, to a greater or lesser degree, new competences in the definition, implementation, and management of economic policy.
