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The notion of a network is one of the key terms used to describe the contemporary world. The role of cooperation networks is also stressed in the context of innovation and its spatial aspects. In this particular case, most attention is given to metropolises as major networks of flows not only of people, capital or goods, but also of information and knowledge. The paper discusses selected spatial aspects of collaborative networks in Polish science. The discussion of examples is preceded by a theoretical introduction intended to outline various aspects of innovation networks at national and regional levels, with particular emphasis on the role of metropolises in collaborative networks.

For some time local governments and urban politics have been undergoing significant changes related to the change of the traditional welfare state model. These changes have concerned economic, political and management dimensions. While describing these processes numerous authors refer to the notion of New Public Management. This article discusses three theories which have been created to help in interpretation of on-going processes. New Political Culture theory by T.N. Clark stresses value and economic changes and underlines their implications for changes in styles of local politics. Local governance theory developed mostly by Peter John concentrates on shape of local government institutions. Another T.N. Clark’s theory of the “city as an entertainment machine” focuses on evolving mechanisms of local economic development and their impact on policies adopted by urban governments. The paper formulates questions and initial hypothesis about applicability of these concepts to Polish environment.

The main focus of the text is the city tourism viewed as a form of city promotion on which the city development depends to a great extent. At the beginning of the industrial age, tourism concentrated around the sea resorts and spas. The first changes in tourism resulted from the decline of the paradigm of the industrial progress in western countries. The decaying cities previously bound up with industry started then to change the image in order to improve their economic situation. The new image pointed out culture in the first place, because culture started being perceived as the tourist attraction. The article presents the different ways of city promotion. The particular stress is placed here upon public space investments – such as revitalization phenomena, theme space and commercialization of urban landscape and constructing the museums and other public use buildings by the outstanding architects. The development of the urban tourism is also closely tied up with the changes in tourists’ behaviour and preferences. The phenomena presented in this article explain the increasing interest in the city as the tourist attraction and emphasise the indispensability of the promotion efforts.

The paper gives an appraisal of Polish cities in the context of processes and problems observed in cities of highly developed European countries. These last cities, in particular those situated in the hard core of EU, enter a new development stadium. Interconnected by networks of multifarious links, they create an integrated urbanised space of the highest ability to compete in the global economy but lose at the same time the character of relatively closed and spatially distinguished socio-economic systems. The paper, pointing at the processes that lead to this phenomenon, stresses that they are already visible in Poland but not advanced. Poland is a country of a delayed urbanisation and cities the economic base of which is not competitive in Europe. These cities possess a not bad human but rather weak social capital and the urban space is of a low quality. The paper outlines the main challenges Polish cities are facing in the era of European integration and presents also the most frequently discussed visions of XXI century European city described through development goals and strategies.

Article presents results of the analysis of 15 regional innovation strategies prepared by the Polish regions in the years 2002–2005. The stress was put on their conformity with the standards. In particular, adequacy of the diagnosis and objectives and character and scope of the first implementation activities were taken into account. The strategies in question turned out to be quite different as far as methodology and conceptual underpinnings adopted or objectives and activities proposed are concerned. The efforts put into RIS preparation were not in vain, however, there is a need to upgrade them up (wider use of qualitative criteria in diagnosis, improved compatibility of methodology used) and first of all to get full picture of innovativeness of Polish regions. And this is what cannot be achieved on the basis of those 15 strategies. Strongly recommended nationwide research on regional innovativeness may serve as a starting point to create national Innovation Support and Technology Transfer System SWIFT which is considered by Authors a precondition for effective utilization of regional efforts for the benefit of the country as a whole.

After the fall of communism local communities in Poland stress the history of their own. This phenomenon is still going up, being a part of a larger rebirth of local communities’ life. Even small communities are building monuments of people with local or national merits, who lived in this place. The pope John Paul II (a pope from Polandl) is frequently remembered in this context. His monuments are built – especially when he visited a given town as a pope and/or had some contact with it when he lived in Poland.