title: European Healthy Cities come to terms with health network governance.
abstract: A focus on good governance in the WHO European network of Healthy Cities mirrors the WHO Region's strategic emphasis-its member states in the Health 2020 strategy espouse governance for health as key. Healthy Cities adopted governance as a key value and approach to delivering specific health programmes and policies. This article reviews the extent to which they actually introduce and align governance concepts and approaches with their local government commitments. Healthy Cities show that better participation, policy-making and intersectoral action result from an emphasis on governance. This happens across the designated cities and is not limited to a certain class (in terms of population or geographical location) or the time they have been designated. The support of WHO in driving the governance agenda seems important, but no data are available to show that European Healthy Cities are different from other urban environments.
authors.affiliation: La Trobe University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia e.deleeuw@latrobe.edu.au.
authors.forename: Evelyne
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: de Leeuw
authors.affiliation: IHEID, Geneva, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Ilona
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Kickbusch
authors.affiliation: La Trobe University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Nicola
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Palmer
authors.affiliation: La Trobe University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Lucy
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Spanswick
mesh_terms: D002947:Cities; D019058:Community Networks / Q000458:organization & administration*; D003159:Community-Institutional Relations; D005060:Europe; D006291:Health Policy; D006293:Health Promotion / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006801:Humans; D007400:Interprofessional Relations; D009111:Local Government; D019982:Organizational Case Studies; D011050:Policy Making; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014504:Urban Health; D014944:World Health Organization
keywords: Europe; governance; health policy; healthy cities