ABSTRACT
Over recent years there has been a recognition in Ireland (see Figure 8.1), as in many other countries, of the role of local development initiatives. The rationale for such initiatives is not always clearly articulated. For some, local initiatives are seen as little more than a scaling down of interventions that were previously organized from the top by centralized policy-making units, and delivered through sectoral agencies with little emphasis on coordination or integration. An alternative approach is to view local development strategies as a radical response that seeks to achieve new objectives in relation to the development process by focusing on concepts such as multi-dimensionality, integration, coordination, subsidiarity and sustainability. In other words, local development is not only about changing the scale at which interventions are made – it is also about finding new approaches to facilitating a broader concept of development. This chapter commences with an outline of the components of a local development theory which will be used as a yardstick in the remainder of the chapter for evaluating the outcomes from recent initiatives on local development in Ireland. The Counties of Ireland https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9781315000220/3bdb01c5-379a-486a-89bf-9dff4222659f/content/fig8_1_B.tif" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"/> Source: Whitaker's Almanack 1995, p.913
