Regional Development Strategy, a Solution to Decentralization (Sample: City of Rasht)

Rasht county, has been experiencing unique circumstances compared to its surrounding cities and have had a growing tendency to centralization, since the beginning of its formation. Formation of one-sided relationship and orientation of most of the vital and functional movements of the cities of the province toward the city of Rasht have led to seclusion and inactivity in other settlement points of the province. It seems that with the expansion of activities in the city of Rasht, this problem will be expanded. This study investigates the fields of centralization in the city of Rasht in three areas: administrative-political centralization, economic-service centralization, and centralization of the population. During explaining the most important symbols and instances of centralizations in mentioned areas, to reduce the centralization in the city of Rasht, orient the movements to the other points and consequently balance the movements and interactions, we use the new model Regional Development Strategy (RDS). Regional development strategy with its strategic, community-based and flexible thinking is very effective in the establishment of regional balance since this model attempts to exploit the capabilities, capacities, actions and cooperation of all the regions and organize them as well as possible.