France and the ESDP in the context of European integration and Mediterranean cooperation

Abstract

This article will firstly recall the main concepts that are common to the guidelines set out in the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) and the culture of spatial planning in France, particularly the concept of polycentrism which—under another term and in a different context—experienced some degree of success in the 1960s and 1970s (policy of balanced metropolitan areas). It will also describe how France worked together with a number of southern European countries (Spain, Italy and Portugal) in the different phases of development of the ESDP between 1994 and 1996, with the setting up of a transnational think tank (Franco-Iberian and Franco-Italian).