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Partnerships have become an integral part of public policies in many countries all over the world and their contribution to local development in a wide variety of policy areas, be it employment, social inclusion or enterprise creation, is well recognised. More and more countries are therefore reshaping their legislation to allow for network solutions to complex problems of areabased development. As partnerships are formed according to regional and local needs (or are a local response to certain global conditions), they can provide positive and successful answers to certain problems regardless of all the differences in region, conditions, legal frameworks and funding structures. It is because of their flexible setting that the same topic e.g. social inclusion, can be found to be a key area of intervention of partnerships in so different countries as Australia and Austria.
It is therefore of vital interest to better understand the common issues of partnerships, but also to learn more about the differences and the reasons for success – and sometimes failure. The European Union, amongst others, has recognised the important contribution of partnerships and has not only widened funding possibilities within the framework of the Structural Funds but is also supporting Member State to learn from each other and to make best use of this structure. The Forum, while strongly co-operating with the European Commission and sharing results, has a different target: it is the networking partnerships themselves to help improve their performance and possibilities by drawing on their experience and facilitating exchange of this knowledge. And this has been a great success due to the information provided by partnerships and their willingness to co-operate and to share their findings with their colleagues.
What you are now reading is an overview of concrete partnership activities from many parts of the world. 35 partnership mechanisms and initiatives from 25 countries and three continents are presented here, providing at the same time structured, precise information about the individual cases and an excellent overview on the wide variety of approaches, solutions and of good practices. The “forumpartnerships2009” is intended to further spread the knowledge about the absolutely valuable contribution partnerships provide to our societies, their local economic performance and their social cohesion. And I am absolutely convinced that the last 15 years of growing partnership activities mark only the beginning of what can be done by combining the forces of public institutions, enterprises and the civil society for the benefit of all of us.
Robert Strauss
Chairman
OECD LEED Forum on Partnerships and Local Governance
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