Various substantive and procedural policy instruments can be used for local economic development. Based on the Swiss case, this study identifies eleven substantive policy instruments and examines whether they are used to the same extent in local economic development strategies focused on either the productive economy, represented by enterprises, or the residential economy, represented by residents. Furthermore, the use of procedural policy instruments, operationalised as cooperation, is determined. The planned use of instruments is only comparable in the case of the substantive policy instruments “infrastructure & energy supply”, “marketing” and “security”. In the case of all other instruments, the importance is differing quite strongly between residents and enterprises focused strategies. “Amenities”, “financial incentives”, “real estate” and, to a lesser extent, “day care, education & other social services” constitute more important instruments for the attraction of residents, whereas “land-use”, “networking & facilitating”, “support & services” and, to a lesser extent, “incubators & other parks” are the dominating instruments for the attraction of enterprises. The use of cooperation is clearly more often planned in the case of enterprises focused strategies. Substantive and procedural instruments contain an interesting potential for more intensive use in both types of economic development strategies.
Paper presented at V International Scientific Conference of Economics and Management Researchers, 22-25 June 2023, Baku, Azerbaijan
