<italic>In Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian cities and urban regions, strategic approaches in urban planning have been developed by introducing different kinds of informal strategic plans. The means of improving the strategic quality of urban and regional planning have thus been searched from outside the...</italic>

The article describes tensions generated in land-use planning practices in Norway, Finland and Sweden, due to the shift towards New Public Management in actual governance practices, while the ideals of deliberative democracy in planning discourses and legislation have been retained. These...

This introductory article introduces the political notion of Services of General Interest in Europe with reference to an ESPON applied research project entitled ‘SeGI’ (‘Indicators and Perspectives for Services of General Interest in Territorial Cohesion and Development’) and also...

An indicator is a measure of synthesis, thus representing an abstraction of a situation. Therefore, the indicators can have different functions, from offering the possibility to describe a situation, to the ability to simplify and measure that same situation being, par excellence, a means of...

There is quite common understanding of the importance of provision of Social Services of General Interest (SSGI) in the European states. The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU and several other official documents like green paper and white paper nevertheless guarantee every EU citizen...