Applying the four‐capital model to the assessment of regional development in the Lubuskie region of Poland

This paper is part of the Special Issue of European Environment devoted to the outputs of the EU SRDTOOLS project, which developed and applied a new model of regional sustainable development evaluation. The paper first discusses the application of the four‐capital model to evaluate, in the light of an exercise carried out in collaboration with the authorities of the Lubuskie voivodship, the impact of the implementation of the regional strategy on the status of the four capitals. The findings are then contrasted with the opinions of the local government authorities and entrepreneurs. This helped identify the weaknesses of the strategy implementation and outline potential conflicts between the development of different types of capital. The same method was applied to the regional operational programme, which resulted in the formulation of recommendations for the updating of the regional development strategy and better adapting the regional operational programme to adopted goals related to sustainable regional development. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.