The role of municipalities in the 21st Century

The environment where Portuguese municipalities act upon has gone through a deep transformation ever since the council’s arrival which was subsequent to the 25th April, 1974. Two aspects of this transformation are, in my perspective, particularly relevant:

(I) The change of focus in the autarchic performance. After, in most of cases, a great investment has been made in the basic infrastructure of territory and at the level of equipment, the central paper of the autarchic advisor is, more and more, to lead a territory project, organizing competitive networks and poles and contributing towards the attraction and maintenance of companies, projects and people.

(II) The growing competition, whether at a national level (between cities, city networkss and regions) or at an international level, not only of cities and regions which are close to us (for example Spanish ones) but also of places in the world which are physically distant and that globalization brings closer to us (examples: the rise of the “factory and office of the world” – respectively China and India; the opening and modernization of eastern European economies).

É neste contexto que cidades e regiões europeias embarcam com cada vez mais frequência em projectos de Prospectiva Territorial capazes de criar uma Visão comum e mobilizadora para o futuro, de fortalecer sinergias, redes e interfaces (capital social), de mobilizar os actores do território e melhorar as relações entre os cidadãos e as autoridades regionais/locais, de facilitar a implementação de processos inovadores e eficientes, de definir prioridades estratégicas, de melhorar a imagem do território e de melhorar a capacidade de inteligência económica dos territórios (identificando riscos a minorar e oportunidades a aproveitar com o máximo de antecipação face à concorrência).
It is in this context that European cities and regions embark more and more frequently in projects of Territorial Prospective capable of creating a common and mobilizing vision for the future, of strengthening synergies, networks and interfaces (social capital), pf mobilizing the territory’s actors, improving the relations between citizens and regional/local authorities, of facilitating the implementation of innovative and efficient processes, of defining strategic priorities, improving the territory’s image and the capacity of the territory’s economic intelligence (identifying risks to minimize and opportunities to make the most of with maximum of anticipation in relation to other competitors).

Examples to explore: Project Vision 2025 for the region of Helsinki (http://www.ytv.fi/ENG/future/vision/frontpage.htm), Strategic Partnership of Birmingham (http://www.bhamsp.org.uk/), Gipuzkoa 2020 (http://www.gipuzkoa.net/g2020/es/index.html), Vision Dublin 2020 (http://www.dubchamber.ie/economy_item.asp?article=496), Scenarios for the urban region of Edinburgh (http://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/internet/environment/planning_buildings_i_i_/planning/planning_policies/CEC_a_vision_for_capital_growth_-_2020_-2040), Millénnaire3 (Grand Lyon) (http://www.millenaire3.com/), Metropolitan Strategic Plan of Barcelona (http://www.bcn2000.es/ca-es/default_ca_es.aspx), Gothenburg 2050 (http://www.goteborg2050.nu).

Where to look? The three Californian “tigers”: Silicon Valley, San Diego and Los Angeles

Occupying most of USA’s West cost, California is a nuclear state on what concerns the concentration of activities based on knowledge, innovation and technologic intensity. It holds cities, regions and metropolitan areas that are among the most dynamic when it comes to the industries and services of bigger growth over the last two decades as well as a great percentage of people with the necessary capacity to innovate and to put new products and services in the market, to create employment, to sustain the continuous increase of productivity and to continue making north-American economy the “giant incubator” that Kaihla[2] talks about. In this article some characteristics of the three main sub regions of California (Silicon Valley, San Diego and Los Angeles/Orange County) are presented, and at the end, I put forward some explicative factors of the Californian success.

Silicon Valley is the most shining global pole on what concern knowledge economy and the production of technology, being the greater concentration of high-technology offices in the world. Robert Metcalfe, a famous businessperson of the area, founder of the 3Com commented:

“Silicon Valley is the only place on Earth that is not trying to find a way of becoming Silicon Valley”. San Jose is the capital of Silicon Valley, being the metropolitan area of the USA with greater percentage of employment whether in sectors linked to Information Technology (48,9%) or sectors linked to high-technology (24,8%). São Francisco/Oakland, area of initial growth of the USA linked to the gold rush, is, nowadays, the world leader in high-technology, capital of risk and biotechnology and the most attractive region of the USA for qualified workers in the areas of the knowledge economy. San Francisco is 1st in the creativity index (big cities) of Richard Florida with 34,8% of workers belonging to the “creative class”. It is one of the epicenters of talent in the USA, with its pool of scientists, engineers, artists, cultural creators, managers and liberal professionals.

Gifted with a unique geography (sitting between the ocean, the desert and the mountains), San Diego is 3rd in the creativity index (big cities) of Richard Florida with 32,1% of workers belonging to the “creative class”. San Diego County, an urban region which is clearly growing had, between 2000 and 2002, some of the biggest gains in terms of companies (more than 1100), employment (30 000 new jobs) and salaries (increase of 2 billions of USD) of the whole US. In spite of a quarter of the employment still being in the defense sector, San Diego has managed to diversify the productive tissue, with the rise of clusters associated to telecommunications and medical/biotechnology’s sciences. This last cluster has assumed itself, in the last years, as the main motor of development.
More towards the south, the Los Angeles’ region is characterized by a great economic diversification, not so much concentrated in internet/dot.com companies like in Silicon Valley, or in biotechnology/defense as San Diego. This diversity gives greater stability at the Economy but, by lack of a better defined economic motor, it limits the creation of wealth and employment in periods of expansion of certain activities. It coexists, however, with a particular importance of the entertainment, Aerospatiale, services to companies and some activities in the sector of non-lasting possessions.
Orange County (nowadays world famous because of the television series O.C.) went from suburb and residential zone supporting Loa Angeles in the 70’s and 80’s, to the 4th place of the big metropolitan areas of the USA in terms of percentage of employment, whether in what concerns sectors linked to the Technologies of Information, or when it comes to high technologies’ sectors. The strength of the Aerospatiale industry contributed a lot to the development of countless innovative companies in sectors like computer components, industrial machinery, medical equipment and scientific instruments.
Among the factors that most contributed to California’s success in high technology and creativity activities we can point to (i) the quality of Universities – sustained effort by the state government in reinforcing some of the great universities, namely Stanford, California–Berkeley and California-São Francisco. For example, Stanford University participates in the capital of hundreds of startups – including Google, the biggest internet search engine in the world – that uses technologies developed at the university; (ii) the availability of capitals thanks to the existence of risk capital and of the strong presence of the investment bank; (iii) the attraction of public investments and of suppliers of public programs in the areas of Defense and Space – of these, the Space centre of Houston and the investments of Pentagon’s great contractors should be of particular mention; (iv) the unique combination, in intensity of knowledge and competences in two great technologic routes that marked the last twenty years: Life Sciences and Computer Sciences; (v) the cultural environment and lifestyles favorable to innovation and creativity. San Francisco is an example: being one of the main creative centers of the USA, it has a solid mix of industries and high technologies with a rich history, with great appeal when it comes to qualified workers in the areas of knowledge economy (for example, the new campus of San Francisco of the University of California dedicated to biomedicine and that would employ 9000 researchers); (vi) the geographic position that since always, has facilitated an opening to the outside and, in a more recent period, a greater interaction with Asia, translated, among other aspects, in the attraction of talents from India and China to the state universities, most of them subsequently involved in the creation of innovative companies. (example: in 2000 there were in San Jose 3755 companies belonging to Indians and Chinese, corresponding to a business volume above 23 millions of dollars and 88 000 jobs.[3]

[2] Paul Kaihla: Boom Towns, Business 2.0, March 2004, pp. 94-102.
[3] For a deep analysis of the California case and of other regions of the USA see Marques, I., Chorincas, J., Alvarenga, A. e Félix Ribeiro, J. M., “Prosperidade e Inovação nas Regiões dos EUA”, Informação Internacional - Análise Económica e Política, DSP-DPP (MAOTDR), Lisboa, 2006, pp. 9‑102.