Community futures: An evaluation of a top-down approach to community economic development.

摘要

The purpose of this thesis is to determine the extent to which a government program, namely Community Futures, can promote community economic development (CED). A three part methodology has been used to accomplish this goal. First, a review of the relevant CED literature was performed to determine the goals of this approach to economic development and the impediments which exist.;Having analyzed the relevant theory and practice, the third part of the methodology studied the policy design of Community Futures to determine the program's ability to overcome the impediments to bottom-up CED and thereby facilitate the achievement of the goals described by CED writers. (Abstract shortened by UMI.);The second part of the methodology consisted of a historic review of Canadian regional and local economic development policy to determine the nature of top-down economic development in Canada. This study found some of the relevant trends which have developed throughout the past decades, thus placing Community Futures into its appropriate historical context.