Assessing Sustainability and Organizational Innovation of Urban Regeneration Projects

Urban regeneration is acknowledged as a policy for the sustainable development of cities by the use of a multidisciplinary approach. Reclaiming unused space that has been abandoned by factories and production processes and restoring the environmental, economic and social quality of degraded neighbourhoods responds perfectly to the concept of a sustainable city. All this should be done by limiting urban sprawl and reducing the environmental impacts which are inherent in the built environment. Indeed, the consumption of land, not previously urbanised, raises the issue of direct and indirect living costs for the environment that need to be taken into account if the underlying perspective is that of sustainability. Another important issue for urban regeneration is the construction of appropriate inclusive decision-making processes. Citizen participation is pivotal for two main reasons: at one hand, it aims to identify, support, develop and sustain sustainability policies, and at the other hand, it is a tool used to achieve shared solutions. However, participation needs to be a continuous and recurring practice in order to be effective and efficient. Hence, to regenerate a city in a sustainable manner means generating more ecological benefits and social opportunities if it is appropriately planned.

Along with the perspectives of this manuscript, policies of urban regeneration fit into the wider realm of policies of urban sustainability. Therefore, urban regeneration is pursued by taking into consideration that the social, economic, environmental and institutional dimensions of a city are made fully sustainable. Although experiences of urban regeneration worldwide demonstrate that it is quite impossible to achieve, by equal measures, levels of sustainability in all dimensions, nevertheless, they demonstrate that practices of urban regeneration have the same rationale. The relationship between physical restoration and social renovation stands as a priority objective of urban regeneration policies that have developed in both large metropolitan areas and smaller communities. From this point of view, urban regeneration processes include actions of social innovation also aimed at re-characterization of espace vecu, i.e. the relationship between people and the spaces in which they act to meet certain needs. Initiatives of urban regeneration must have a ‘bottom up’ approach, underpinned by partnerships between key local players, hence, and are area-based. That means that urban regenerative actions gather a wide range of ambitions and activities of a social character directed to the community living in areas characterized by socioeconomic challenges. By this perspective, area-based regeneration stands as an umbrella term with a socio-economic and environmental focus.

Urban regeneration with the lenses of economic, social, and environmental sustainability is a key strategy towards the accomplishment of sustainable development goals worldwide. The changing patters of innovation, natural resources management and the fight to climate change are urging such strategies of renovation. The challenge of nowadays development is to involve communities in urban regeneration and social innovation strategies stressing on the growing in importance of the role of software components of urban management on the hardware part, which keeps a certain relevance. The aim of the present chapter is to outline a framework of change for organisations in considering new elements of cultural aesthetics in the structuring processes and the wellbeing of organisation members. After building a theoretical framework of the extant literature, a bibliometric analysis was conducted in order to assess the state of the art of academic research and the state of the advancement of best practices of social innovation through the lenses of cultural aesthetics. Implications for policymakers, public management and citizens have been addressed in order to plan and enhance the processes of urban regeneration with more efficient and inclusive strategies.

In recent years, the integration of sustainability principles in urban planning has become increasingly important. The growing attention to economic, social and environmental aspects is also influencing urban regeneration. In particular, the search for new ways to regenerate cities in a sustainable way has led to the concept of sustainable urban regeneration. The relevance of urban regeneration interventions in the development and design of sustainable cities led scholars to examine the actual sustainability outcomes of different urban regeneration interventions. Instead, a topic still little explored by the academic literature is represented by the determinants of the sustainability of urban regeneration. This study aims to fill this important gap by examining the role played by the profile and characteristics of the mayor in the sustainability policies of urban regeneration interventions in the Apulian context. The results demonstrate a positive impact of the gender diversity and educational background of the mayor. Therefore, it is possible to state that the municipalities led by more educated and female mayors have a greater propensity to implement sustainability-oriented urban regeneration interventions.