ABSTRACT
Finally, the SPD’s specific inclusion of a ‘strategy for investing in the people of Merseyside’ as the most important of the five key drivers for change, marked a significant shift of focus (Interview 12). Under this ‘driver’, the ‘Pathways to Integration’ initiative set up 38 area-based partnership structures across the region that were intended to provide a channel of access between identified areas of social exclusion and EU development projects (CEC, 1994c:33). This introduction of the concept of ‘social exclusion’ is notable since it challenges the traditional British view of development as a process that is centred around physical regeneration and the attraction of business and investment into an area (see: Stewart, 1996). In this respect, the Pathways programme illustrates the introduction of ‘European approaches’ to development that place an emphasis on building the capacity of the population through measures designed to bring about social animation (Interview 1). Whilst the Pathways programme represents an acknowledgement of this view of development, it does not indicate a clear change of policy practice (Interview 15).
