Regional development involves a wide range of initiatives that help to address issues such as providing sustainable energy sources, creating jobs, and boosting economic growth. In doing so, they often need to take into account a variety of local and international factors. The main challenge is to identify, collect and analyze the relevant data, which will then allow them to make informed decisions regarding possible future developments of their region.
As a result of these factors, the process of regional development is not purely economical, as it involves a social dimension, with power relations playing an important role. This point is well illustrated by two influential strands of literature, namely evolutionary economic geography (EEG) and regional innovation systems (RISs).
Both of these approaches view the process of regional development as a kind of game with multiple equilibria. While this is a useful framework for understanding the dynamics of a given region, it neglects the role of power in determining which equilibria will actually be reached.
As a result, the current level of research on the dynamics of regional development is woefully underdeveloped, with little to no consideration of the role of power relations. This article seeks to contribute to this debate by calling for a greater focus on the study of visible and invisible forms of power in research on regional development. Moreover, the authors would like to stress that such a debate should be conducted within an inter-disciplinary context that also includes studies in political science, sociology and human geography.