Qualitative meta-analysis of scholarly papers on the city-region

The city-region concept which is against theories such as “The death of distance”, “The end of geography” or the emergence of “weak economy” has recently become popular among academic and political elite. The city-region as the place of exchange, innovation, development and competition is an ideal area that identifies which economic competition can be promoted and cultivated. Hence, the identification of the context, the nature and reasons for the importance of the city-region pattern needs to be explained in an accurate manner. Various studies have been taken place on the city-region so far.In this paper using qualitative meta-analysis method, 45 scientific articles, published since 2000 are studied in a descriptive way and evaluated (in terms of questions, goals, and results). It seems that the necessity and application of this meta-analysis can be helpful in understanding the spatial nature of the city-region and identifying the role and position of it as a driving engine of the regions to balance and develop. The paper combines these scientific works and provides a structural-functional analyses of the city-region pattern for academic and executive policy-makers institutions.