by looking at regional and local budget data.  might start with tax sharing at the regional and local levls

In national and regional scale some visions, guidelines and policies are decided and kind of dictated to local governments so they can translate them to plan. Those visions ,policies and guidelines will be utilized in Comprehensive plan for cities and if it is a town to a master plan. So it is not just about budget or administrative level of the local government , it is also about the level of services that are to delivered to the local government. In terms of literature, it really differs and depends on the context (the country) you are doing the study for.  As these principles can be very different in terms of regional and urban plans.

I totally agree with Gregory. However, analysis of municipal budget plans and financial statements should be compare with analysis of strategic plans of local development. Such kind of analysis allow us to compare strategic and operational aspects of local development policy.

Dear Panos,

Some information about this concept in Brazil (these papers address the economic and technological profile of this integration):

http://info.worldbank.org/etools/docs/library/229986/Souza%20Brasil's%20system%20of%20local%20government.pdf

http://www.globelicsacademy.net/2013_pdf/Presentations/Lastres/Lastres%20LIPS%20in%20BNDES%201.pdf

Vanessa

Regional planning, being a strategy for development, gives the guidelines for development in a certain, long-term, time-frame. The scale of all the data, physical, statistical, analytical, used for such a planning is large, enabling both planners and decision-makers see the big picture. Moving down, to more specific themes, areas and issues should be done within the regional frame, but with detailed data and usually for a shorter planning period.

Development and governing are connected to each other. Often one talks about multi-level governance, quadruple helix, etc. to illustrate how different stakeholders (business, administration, people, knowledge providers) are connected to development locally, regionall and beyond. Governing is used to identify and guide development.

Another way of approaching the connections might be discourse analysis. You can work with two bodies of policy papers, development plans, etc. One body for "regional development" and the other for "regional governance". First, you analyse which main "problems", "objectives", "solutions" etc. and central lines of argument are brought forward within each body. In a second step you might analyze what is shared and what is not shared. Finally you might ask why things are shared and why not. This kind of analysis might give you a societal background of regional development and government. What kind of arguments are plausible and legitimate? What are the problems? What are the plausible solutions? Who is responsible? And so forth?

Some literature:

Michel, Boris (2013): A Global Solution to Local Urban Crises? Comparing Discourses on Business Improvement Districts in Cape Town and Hamburg http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02723638.2013.799337

Rydin, Yvonne (2005): Geographical knowledge and policy: the positive contribution of discourse studies. DOI: 10.1111/j.1475-4762.2005.00604.x

Some thoughts on policy translation of global scripts in local contexts and further literature can be found in a conceference paper of mine on RG.

Best regards,

Moritz

See Participatory budgets in Europe and in particular Giovanni Allegretti and Carsten Herzberg 'Between Efficiency and Growing Local Democracy'.  Currently Giovanni Allegretti works for Coibra University and participates in world wide debates and conferences. And also search at http://pas.sagepub.com for 'Participatory Budgeting in Porto Alegre: Toward a Redistributive Democracy' by B.de Sousa Santos.  Participatory budgets are now working very efficiently around the globe.