A research paper by EPRC 'The Concept of Macro-Regions: Practice and Prospects' formed the basis for debate at the Baltic Sea Region Programme Conference 2010 'The power of the Baltic Sea macro-region' held in Jyvaskyla (central Finland) on 30 November/1 December 2010.
Commissioned by the Finnish Ministry of Economy & Employment, and drafted by Dr Katja Mirwaldt, Dr Irene McMaster and Professor John Bachtler, the EPRC paper examined the conceptual background underpinning the emergence of 'macro-regions' as a policy approach and reviewed the implementation of the concept to date, notably through the Baltic Sea Strategy and the emerging Danube Strategy, and it identified areas for discussion and further debate at the Conference.
The paper was used to inform a session of the Conference 'Macro-regional strategies and future Cohesion Policy' which was moderated by John Bachtler and involved speakers from the European Commission, Hungarian Government, the Baltic Sea Programme, Nordregio and the Baltic Institute of Finland.