The uphill battle for reinventing post-industrial regions: The case of Greater Manchester's ‘clean growth’ mission

• We explore multi-scalar challenges in deploying problem-based policies aimed at sustainable regional development. • We investigate the dynamics linking global wicked problems, such as climate change, with local developmental challenges. • We find that linkages between global and local problems are constructed during problem framing processes. • We identify place-based leadership as crucial for mobilising and coordinating local problem framing processes. • We demonstrate the strategic utilisation of problem frames to enact local policy change. In this paper we enrich the concept of place-based leadership. Building on social movement theory, our analysis of the clean growth mission development in Greater Manchester (UK) reveals the role of place-based leadership in mobilising and coordinating framing processes that linked the global climate change problem with local challenges, articulated local benefits of its resolution, and provided justification for local change efforts. We draw on theories of the policy process (i.e. Multiple Streams Framework) to shed light on how place-based leaders frame problems and solutions strategically to engender policy change. While framing processes had an impact on local policy agendas, we do not find evidence of accelerated implementation, pointing to the important distinctions between problem ownership and solution ownership in the context of wicked problems. Our findings contribute to the ongoing debate on the role of multi-level governance and localised agency in problem-based policymaking for sustainable regional development.