A recent open access paper published in Regional Studies is proving very popular, with 829 views since the 4th April. Place leadership and regional economic development: a framework for cross-regional analysis, by Beer, Ayres, Clower, Faller, Sancino and Sotarauta explores the capacity of vignettes to identify features of place leadership in 12 cases across six nations, including Australia, Finland, Germany, Italy, the UK and the United States. The research finds unequivocal evidence that vignettes on place leadership can shed meaningful insights, determining that each locality has a system of place leadership that directs, but does not determine, outcomes. Commonalities shed a greater light than the differences, in terms of building generalisable conclusions, with the researchers noting that all nations had systems in place to respond to the scenarios presented, but some nations were more effective (Finland, Germany and the United States) than others (Australia). An article published on the 23rd April by Andrew Beer follows up on the themes raised in the original research with his piece in The Conversation (Australia) where he suggests that Australian governments are not working with each other which is holding back regional economies in trouble. Read the original article here and Andrew Beer’s piece here