Urban waterfront regeneration and local governance in Tallinn

This article analyses the efforts to regenerate the centrally located but underdeveloped waterfront of Tallinn, the capital city of Estonia, into an area of new offices, tourist services and up-market housing. The objectives of this article are twofold. First, it provides a case study of Tallinn waterfront revitalisation, focusing on the role of local governance in that project. Second, it examines the similarities and differences between Tallinn and the cases hitherto examined in the urban regeneration literature. I argue that, owing particularly to the fragmented and unstable institutional setting that is among the central components of post-socialist transformations, the waterfront regeneration process in Tallinn differs considerably from Western examples. Thus, the concept of entrepreneurial urban governance as a local coalition or partnership actively promoting local economic development, extensively used in Western contexts, has a limited applicability to Tallinn. I suggest that in order to improve our understanding of urban regeneration and local governance in Eastern Europe, research must incorporate the specific post-socialist context of urban development. In emphasising the specificity of this context, I do not wish to deny a diversity of experiences and circumstances among both Western and post-socialist cities, nor to imply a trite analytical separation of 'the West' and 'the East', but to argue for a sustained and in-depth engagement with post-socialist transformations. The article thus contributes to studies critically interrogating the ways in which we conceptualise the varied institutional and economic settings of urban regeneration and governance.