Expanding Possibilities in Local Development Policy: An Examination of U.S. Cities

Some local governments in the U.S. have expanded their economic development policy from the incentives and subsidies that have characterized the arena for 30 years to policy that is increasingly concerned with equity, the control and regulation of private development, and the direction of tangible growth-related benefits to low-income groups. This new development policy orientation provides an opportunity to test the explanatory power of competing models of local politics. Using cross-sectional data on a large sample of U.S. cities, I argue that the role of political actors and local political conditions are extremely important in explaining the variation in development policy across cities.