City Development Strategies (CDS) can be defined as:
A dynamic exercise involving broad public consensus to guide the design and
implementation of a comprehensive municipal development program. CDSs focus on
the living city, its human element, its economic activity, and its political
realm and dynamism, as the unit of analysis, with the view that the city is a
dynamic, integral and driving component of a regional or national, or even
international economy.
The CDS integrates all of a city's actors in a concerted
and consensual development proposal. The CDS develops a common understanding of
municipal priorities, constraints, and challenges, and constitutes a shared
vision of the city's short, medium and long term development objectives. It
orders the city's resources, and gives reason and orientation to the use of
these resources through a clear and consensual development implementation
strategy.
The CDS is a living and dynamic exercise, paving the way to a better
and more prosperous future envisioned by the city's residents and leaders.
Source: Jorge Daniel Taillant - jdtaillant@worldbank.org