Interpreting and defining economic resilience: regional resilience in policy practice

This chapter focuses on the burgeoning interest in the resilience concept in economic development policy and planning discourse. It explores the extent to which regional planning organisations in the United States have adopted the term resilience in their economic development plans and consider how resilience is defined and used within these policy documents. The chapter finds that whilst resilience is increasingly referred to and upheld as an important objective, it is poorly defined and articulated in plans. This raises questions regarding the connections between regional economic theorising and analysis and policy discourse and practice.