Metropolregionen

At a time of global competition and increasing global economic interdependencies, within discussion on both spatial-development policy and regional-development policy, the spotlight has once again come to be focused on the role of metropolitan regions. The increasingly dynamic character of processes of globalisation is resulting in a restructuring of city systems. The regions around major cities are developing into hubs within increasingly complex networks. These are the centres of the knowledge economy. Moreover, the theoretical insights emanating from recent research – for example, from New Economic Geography and New Growth Theory – suggest that the major metropolitan regions will in future come to represent the focal points and agents of macroeconomic growth. There is now therefore a pressing need to examine the spatial effects ensuing from these changes, and the consequences these will have for the governance and organisation of metropolitan regions, in particular with regard to the new demands which are placed on “metropolitan governance”.

This topic has been addressed by a joint working group comprising representatives of four of Germany’s major research institutes for the spatial sciences (ARL, Difu, ILS, IRS). The various studies presented here deal with terminology and definitions, theoretical approaches concerned with the emergence, development and performance of metropolitan regions, as well as with possible methods for quantifying metropolitan functions and measuring “metropolitanity”. The explanations put forward relate primarily to regional economy, organisation theory, and regulation theory. In two studies based on discourse analysis, the
particular focus is on the significance of metropolitan regions as a spatial category both in Germany and in Europe. The closing article refers back to the individual studies presented and summarises the findings produced by the working group. Here the focus is placed in particular on insights and conflicts, on questions which remain open, and on perspectives which may be of interest for further research.