Contradictory rescaling: Confronting state restructuring and the building of new spatial policies

The paper explores the tensions between state and spatial policy rescaling processes. It argues that the different timescales of their dynamics may produce significant barriers to the transformative goals of spatial policy. Supported by evidence of the gradualist nature of state restructuring in Portugal and the rescaling of a new spatial policy instrument, the paper illustrates and discusses the transformative difficulties in issues such as territorial integration, strategic negotiation at local level, inter-municipal cooperation and new forms of multi-level, multi-sectoral and state—society networking. Cross-national comparison with other Southern European countries allows conclusions to be drawn with regard to a dynamic approach to context-dependent phenomena and to the relevance of a timescale approach to state and spatial policy rescaling processes.