Reports

Strategic International Ties at the Local & Regional Level: The Case of Northern Virginia

Local governments around the world face similar challenges like climate change, public safety, economic development and infrastructure revitalization. By looking beyond country borders for strategies and solutions through global engagement with other local governments, communities and regions may find a way to prosper and strive.

NVRC’s 21-year relationship with the region of Stuttgart stands out as a potential model for transatlantic relations at the local and regional level. Partnerships like this prioritize transfers and applications of policy and technical innovations from abroad towards outcomes that benefit Northern Virginia’s communities economically, environmentally and socially.

In a policy paper for the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung USA, authors Dr. Dale Medearis (NVRC) and Ambassador Richard Kauzlarich (George Mason University, Schar School for Public Policy) point out the current challenges local governments in the U.S. confront when trying to work internationally and ways in which NVRC’s model might inform potential application by other local governments in the U.S. and Europe.

NVRC was pleased to participate in a webinar sponsored by the Adenauer Foundation with our colleagues in Stuttgart Region. You can view the video below of that conversation.