Local needs and global challenges. How next generation Italia addresses the territorial disparities. A resilient reinterpretation of the Reggio Calabria metropolitan strategy

This paper aims at providing a conceptual framework to display how the Italian plan for recovery, under the next-generation goals, can “absorb”the disparities inside each regional context and how the local systems can differentiate the response to global challenges. The transition towards a more sustainable and innovative Europe is the main objective of the European Union and its policies. Considering the two pressing crises to tackle, namely, climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic, transformative development is gaining increasing momentum. Nowadays, processes of adaptation and transition are increasingly driving urban and territorial transformations. A reinterpretation of the Reggio Calabria Metropolitan Strategy is proposed to sharpen spatial targeting towards resilience and transition in a particular “fragile”context.