What does it really mean to grow a place? This episode unpacks the concept of place-based productivity and explores how it differs from traditional regional development. The discussion examines real-world examples and whether this approach works everywhere, from rural towns to major metropolitan areas.

The episode also looks at how the world is changing around place-based strategies, diving into the big shifts shaping the landscape: deglobalisation, digitalisation, and political upheaval. Should policy stay technocratic, or embrace politics to make place-based growth stick?

Host Professor Bart van Ark is joined by:

• Jeff Anderson, Professor at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service and Department of Government at Georgetown University.
• Andy Westwood, Professor of Public Policy, Government and Business at The University of Manchester and Policy Director at The Productivity Institute.

For more information on the topic:

• Jeff Anderson and Andy Westwood (2026) The New Political Economy of Place-Based Policymaking, The Productivity Institute.
• Joe Peck, Huw Spencer, Samuel Thorpe and Andy Westwood (2025) Place-Based Industrial Policy: Six Lessons for the UK, The Productivity Institute.
• The Productivity Institute, Investment in Places campaign.
• Jack Shaw (2025) The role of place and the ‘zonification’ of growth, The Productivity Institute.
• Andy Westwood (2025) Regional growth, Labour and the biggest decisions still to come, The Productivity Institute.
• Tony Pipa and Natalie Geismar (2020) Reimagining rural policy, Brookings.
• The Guardian (2025) ‘Deeply demoralizing’: how Trump derailed coal country’s clean-energy revival.
• Andrés Rodríguez-Pose, The revenge of the places that don’t matter (and what to do about it), Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, Volume 11, Issue 1, March 2018, Pages 189–209.
• Bennett School of Public Policy (2019) Measuring wealth, delivering prosperity.
• UK Government (2022) Levelling Up the United Kingdom.

About Productivity Puzzles:

Productivity Puzzles is brought to you by The Productivity Institute, a research body involving nine academic institutions across the UK, nine Productivity Forums throughout the nation, and a national independent Productivity Commission to advise policy makers at all levels of government. It is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council.