The role and potential of Local Development Agents
Employment is currently the main concern for Valencian society. Finding a job
opportunity is rooted to a large extent in the characteristics of diverse local contexts. Hence, beyond international or state
level factors such as the economic juncture or the Spanish Strategy for
Employment, a number of local items exert a great impact on jobs generation:
high-skilled workers, territory resources, economic activity sustainability
over time, entrepreneurial network, connectivity or local development public
policies.
Local
Development and Employment professionals work from
municipalities and supra-local institutions towards social cohesion and
economic development in their territories, privileging the creation of job
opportunities through appropriate local conditions-setting. What are the main
tasks of Local Development and Employment managers in the Region of Valencia,
and how can they improve their contribution to enlarged employment
opportunities?
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| Conferència a la Universitat de València IUDESCOOP |
Their embededness to local contexts places Local Development and Employment
managers in an advantageous position between public
regulation and social, environmental and economic contexts at the local level. On the one hand, they
are responsible for the implementation of employment and development policies
enacted at the central and regional level. On the other hand, they also undertake
the monitoring of human capital and local resources in order to unblock
elements that could generate added-value and enhance local economic potential. In this vein, they
promote a range of activities oriented to economic growth, emphasising
innovation, entrepreneurship, and social and environmental sustainability.
Local Development and Employment managers’ activities have been steered by the
regulatory framework, and the central state assessment on their outcome on
territories turned to be particularly positive. Indeed, public spending on local development constitutes
one of the most gainful sectors in terms of employment generation. Among the
wide range of legally established areas of promotion we find entrepreneurship guidance,
vocational training delivery, communication and information society promotion,
tourism development, declining industrial sectors restructuring or recovery and
valorisation of historical, cultural and cottage industry heritage.
Despite the smooth line transmission existing from public regulation to
local implementation, the way back reveals somehow obstructed. Certainly, the
new Spanish Strategy for Employment 2012-2014 has made substantial steps
forward concerning decentralisation and citizen participation during its design
process, approaching the regional level and embracing the contributions of entrepreneurs
and trade unions. However, this institutional structure broadly bypasses the contributions of local actors that could have a remarkable value, considering
that employment issues are to a large extent locally-based and
context-dependent. Namely, the professionals of Local Development and
Employment attached to the local level who undertake employment policy
implementation are excluded from this process, entailing an avoidable and
deeply undermining lack of knowledge on both local fitness of state regulations
and the local needs, weaknesses and potential for development within different territories.
Local Development and Employment professionals stand as key actors in
fostering jobs generation at the local level, and they could also play a key
role in employment policy-making by steering a better fit of regulations with
local economic, social and environmental reality. Besides the relevance of their
implementation role, the standarised participation of
Local Development and Employment agents in the
design and assessment of employment policies would allow a more
efficient and effective management of scarcer public economic resources,
through the establishment of strategic objectives based on local practise
knowledge.
II Conferences on Educative Innovation in Cooperative and Social Economy
"ADLYPSE:
L'ocupació des de l'àmbit local i el paper dels AEDL"
May 29th,
2012
