Evaluating performance in urban development networks - the Nordic context

摘要

This article examines the performance of three urban development networks typical of the Nordic countries. While such networks generally are believed to produce effective solutions to the complex problems they are established to solve, not all networks perform well. In the three illustrative cases discussed in the article the stakeholders themselves, despite obvious lack of immediate results, seem to evaluate the networks in rather positive terms. Positioned in the literature on evaluation and network performance we discuss whether there are instrumental reasons to believe in this self-evaluation. This article discusses four criteria: goal attainment, well-informed and joint understanding, participation/representativeness and favourable conditions for future collaboration.