THE EVOLVING CONTEXT FOR REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT POLICY - FROM THEORETICAL SHIFTS TO NEW POLICY APPROACHES.

In the context of globalization and dynamic economic processes regions seem to gain crucial importance in the course of development. The increasing emphasis being placed on the role of regions raised significant changes in the approaches used in defining regional economic development and in the ways, we can use to improve policies and strategies. The new regional policies and strategies have been transformed into more context sensitive policies which tend to stimulate local communities to be proactive toward sustainable development and their own economic, social and political future. Over the past thirteen years North Macedonia has made significant progress in the implementation of the policy on balanced regional development. The paper analyzes the achievements as well as the challenges faced by the regional policy in light of the global trends and the EU regional policy. The paper also investigates the latest amendments introduced with the new Law on Balanced Regional Development as well as the new Regional Development Strategy 2020-2030. Finally, the paper provides directions and recommendations for policy improvements and full usage of regional development potentials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]