Reducing disproportions between the level of development of particular regions and an effort to control the regional development process have become the key challenges of EU regional policy. From the point of view of local development, which determines conditions for an enterprise’s environment and the general social needs satisfied using local resources, it is specifically important to analyse particular subregions. In this thesis the author makes an attempt at approaching regional development from the point of view of activities undertaken within the scope of regional policies related to selected regional development factors. The author presents an analysis of selected programme documents as well as their impact on executing development policies. Furthermore, the author presents selected results of research conducted in local government units in the Leszno subregion in the context of prodevelopment activities undertaken at lower levels of public administration.