Regional development, equality and gender: Moving towards more inclusive and socially sustainable measures

Abstract

As the efficacy of the neoliberal model is now in question this is an appropriate moment to consider ‘what kind of regional development and for whom?’, or, as the authors interpret it, what kind of development model would be inclusive and economically and socially sustainable. Current indicators of regional performance are based on growth alone, overlook distribution and so misrepresent the performance of regions in terms of social well-being. An alternative, more inclusive measure of regional development and a gender sensitive variant are calculated for UK regions. On these measures London falls from the top ranked region to a middle rank on the regional development indicator and on the gender sensitive variant falls to the lowest position, arguably better reflecting the experience of life in this region. Optimistically, use of these measures would lead to more inclusive models of development that would render the more contentious social, redistributive policies less necessary.