Regional Economic Planning

- (Paper first received, March 2009; in final form, September 2009) Abstract The paper covers the scientific debate among Italian regionalists since the mid-1970s on Regional Economic Planning, understood as socio-economic planning carried out by regional administrations and expressed in the drafting of regional development programmes. The somewhat critical survey locates contributions by Italian scholars within a broader debate simultaneously ongoing at international level, the purpose being to advance the discipline both theoretically-methodologically and in its concrete implementation. The conclusion reached is that Italian regionalists have made a major contribution to the international scientific debate especially when they have induced (at high government level and in a decidedly wider territorial context) a limited number of regions to adopt the strategic planning model hitherto applied to urban and metropolitan areas in both Italy and abroad. Keywords: planning policy and models; regional socio-economic development policy JEL Classification: O21; R58