ABSTRACT
This chapter demonstrates how much thinking about development in the North has changed since the Second World War in parallel with changes in development economics and hence demonstrates how much development is a global concern. Nel shows how regional development strategies in the North in the Bretton Woods era involved state strategies to assist ‘lagging regions’ included state subsidies for economic activity, infrastructure support and indirectly support through comprehensive public welfare. With the rise of neoliberalism, markets were meant to solve the problem of lagging regions, but when they did not, governments could not simply ignore the spatial inequality, so their new strategies were based on developing so-called regional comparative advantage and devolution of power. Regions were expected to promote local innovation, creativity and leadership and more. The chapter demonstrates how critical human geography has challenged the premises and practices of neoliberal strategies, showing how resilience, history, and path dependence all shape regional paths influence by both endogenous and exogenous factors.
