Evidence of inter-territorial collaborative economic development strategies in Ontario, Canada

Abstract

This article discusses the issue of municipal collaborative policymaking and economic development efforts. We emphasize two major contributions in the conclusion: first, from a scholarly perspective, this article bridges the information gap in the existing scholarship, which has demonstrated municipalities’ willingness to collaborate but has provided little evidence of collaboration on common efforts; second, from a policy perspective, initiatives discussed in this article could serve as a platform to build economic development strategies that are more comprehensive and sophisticated than currently employed. Information is from in-depth interviews with eighteen (n = 18) economic development practitioners in the province of Ontario, Canada. Overall, municipal practitioners interviewed for this study demonstrated a strong affinity for collaborative economic development efforts, which clearly represents a marked departure from the earlier reports of competitive attitudes and unwillingness to collaborate.