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Faced with the confusion caused by the exponential growth of relational approaches in the field of territorial development and their growing interest in the field of action and politics, this article seeks to lay the groundwork for a clarifying reflection on the functions of relational dynamics in development processes. The text proposes a review of the emergence of this central intuition in the recognition of the social embeddedness of economic activities and focuses on the renewed interest in these approaches since the integration of social innovation and civil society actors in the field of territorial development. It is based on several localized examples, distinguishing between relational dynamics that emanate from the territory or from practices, and themes that contribute to the creation of new relational dynamics in the territories. In the end, the objective is to discuss the ambivalence of their contemporary understanding in the scientific and political field, the prevalence and persistence of injunctions to networking leading to the reinforcement of governance and cooperation between all territorial actors.