PROSPECT AND TASK OF REGIONAL SCIENCE IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

Abstract

Regional science, as a new field of science, has been widely developed by the efforts of academic pioneers in major countries. As a result of these efforts, the Regional Science Association itself has grown up as a worldwide organization in the last two decades. Historically speaking, the first stage of the growth of regional science took place, as is well known, in the academically fertile soil of the United States and West European countries. Its academic progress in the advanced countries then began to gradually exert influence upon the developing countries in East Europe and Asia. Although regional science is a science of general adaptability in every country, the circumstances of its development may differ from country to country. Thus, Dr. Torsten H/igerstrand in his presidential address once alluded to a difference in emphasis or tone between the European and North American RSA meetings. He pointed out that participants in this part of the world (Europe) preferred to remain closer to issues of application rather than to issues of pure theory. We in Europe seem to have been looking at Regional Science primarily as one of the possible instruments with which to guide policy and planning. ''1 As a matter of fact, regional science has developed rapidly in Japan, not only on the grounds of pure theoretical interest but much more so on the basis of practical needs of regional development policy. In this respect, compared to West European countries the development pattern of regional science in Japan has been conspicuous for its policy-making orientation. The same developmental characteristics may be seen more notably in other Asian countries. In order to understand wJay these particular characteristics emerge in developing countries, let us look at the background of the growth of regional science in Japan. Generally speaking, development of any new division of science in a country is founded on favorable cirumstances and conditions for its development. Regional science is not an exception; it has grown up in an enviously favorable academic condition in an affluent society with the largest fertile land in the world. In this connection, it might be interesting to follow, as a chapter in the history of regional science in a developing country, how regional science has been imported,