Abstract

Territorial Pacts (TP) aim to improuve those elements of the social context, which can help generalized cooperation and local development processes. The systematic empirical research has pointed to two typical configuration of the local level concertation processes of the TP: the "integrative" TP and the "distributive" TP. This article has two main aims: (i) to argue that public policies can positively increase the social capital and trust of the local production systems, and (ii) that public policies can have positive effect also where the inherited social capital is a very low level. The major analytical framework used in this article tries to combine insights from game theory and network analysis, in the resolution of real world collective action dilemmas. To support the analytical schema, four case studies of TP in the same territorial area, will be sketched.