How does a moderately-sized region rise from the pack, focus its strengths so well it’s seen as a continental and global leader? The 2000-year old city of Barcelona, riding high on the fame it won from hosting the 1992 Summer Olympics, attracting visitors in astounding numbers, developing and then following a strong regional strategic plan, is a prime example.
Barcelona was the target this May of the Ninth International Study Mission of the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce/Trade Development Alliance. We’ve accompanied three earlier trips — to Hong Kong, Sydney and Berlin — but the report on the Barcelona trip, by former Seattle Times reporter Dick Lilly, suggests this may have been the most stimulating ever. (For Word file of the report, e-mail Jenny Steen at jennys@seattlechamber.com).
The Seattleites found virtually every speaker on an extensive program had a strong grasp of Barcelona’s economic strategy and spoke with enthusiasm for the motivating power of the strategic plan. Even Joan Coscubiela, general secretary of the Catalonia trade union group, focused on Barcelona’s role within Europe and city-region’s strong mix of social guarantees and economic competitiveness.
Barcelona’s unified leadership sets a high standard: How many American citistates could come close? The Seattle mission members, by contrast, depicted their city (surely in exaggerated terms) as “mired in process, stuck in traffic, lacking in leadership, and without a strategic plan for regional development.”
All of Seattle’s global missions (the brainchild of Citistates Associate William Stafford) have revealed remarkable unity of among the foreign cities’ leaders — unified views of their region, the world, their challenges. (An earlier example: Hong Kong, so unified, strong and investing that the Peoples’ Republic couldn’t even consider ending its autonomy).
Yet it’s our observation there are just as many talented leaders in American regions. Do we lack a sense of history? Are special interests tearing us apart? Are we destroying the leadership that could propel us forward? How do we need to change?
Your views will be welcome!