On Wednesday 5 March, EPRC hosted a seminar by Dr Adrian Healy from Cardiff University. The aim of the seminar was to present initial findings of recent work examining the spatial impact of the economic crisis across the EU, and to consider why some regions have proved more resilient than others.
Regional resilience was considered using four broad areas (business, community, people and place) as a general conceptual framework. Whilst there is significant complexity and interdependency between factors associated with resilience, evidence from European case studies indicates that certain factors (such as good innovative performance) are correlated with greater regional resilience. The Structural Funds were also seen to have been relatively quick to respond to the economic crisis, through both active and passive means.
The presentation slides can be downloaded here.