PLANNING COOPERATION AND TRANSBOUNDARY REGIONALISM - IMPLEMENTING POLICIES FOR EUROPEAN BORDER REGIONS IN THE GERMAN-POLISH CONTEXT

Research summarized here indicates that, despite a certain degree of s uccess, particularly in the area of environmental protection, German-P olish transboundary planning cooperation is being hampered by consider able lags between political agenda-setting, European Union structural programming, and postsocialist institutional transformation. Furthermo re, though German-Polish cooperation institutions have been created la rgely from the 'top down: research indicates that transboundary region alism must also develop local roots through a slow and gradual process of routinized interaction. The real test of German-Polish regionalism will thus be the development of new networks between public and priva te actors stabilizing the institutions now in place, but there nonethe less remain questions as to the intrinsic economic development potenti als of transboundary cooperation within a context of European integrat ion and expansion.