Elevating the Scale of Cross-Boundary Cooperation: Mechanisms for Inter-Regional Policy Coordination

This contribution focuses on metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) to demonstrate that even inplaces where there are instruments of regional governance in place, there can still be a need to coordinatepolicies beyond those regional boundaries. This necessitates cooperation between regional governance organizations. In making this observation, Soyoung Kim (Seoul National University of Science and Technology) pushes us to think about metropolitan spaces and geographies of governance differently. In line with our call to consider the constellation of actors involved in regional governance, she argues that these geographies sometimes necessitate a patchwork of actors constructing and coordinating their own metropolitan spaces, which will often not align with those of other organizations. In so doing, she raises important questions about the appropriate, and optimal, roles for different types of actors. When should such cross-boundary activities be coordinated by or within a RIGO, for example, versus through a potentially more flexible and focused network of MPOs? When should states be involved in this coordinating effort? What do these collaborative mechanisms substitute for and at what scales?
Furthermore, what are the limits of scale? How large can and should our conceptions of regionalism be when contemplating cross-regional collaboration? These questions and more should challenge us to understand regions and regionalism as multifaceted and to consider with a critical eye the alternative, competing, and complementary configurations of governance that may coexist.