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Challenges to Local Government
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Challenges to Local Government

Edited by:

Volume: 28

January 1991 | 272 pages | SAGE Publications Ltd
This volume provides a timely discussion of how local governments have undertaken public policies during the last decade. Concentrating on Britain and the United States (with chapters also on the Scandinavian countries and France), the contributors document, explain and analyze the implications of these policies for local autonomy and local government, focusing especially upon local economic initiatives. Both the empirical and theoretical implications of these local government policies are discussed, drawing on recent research on local autonomy, regulationist theory and flexible specialization. In each case the challenge posed to the resources and capacities of local governments in advanced industrial democracies is emphasized. The topics discussed include such policies as privatization, industrial policy, economic initiatives, public-private partnerships, municipal liberalization, business urban initiatives, and local radical politics. Challenges to Local Government will be of interest to scholars and students in political science, urban studies, sociology, and geography. "An impressive and stimulating range of international material. . . likely to influence thinking and teaching on local government for several years to come." --Local Government Studies "Particularly welcome is the comparative focus of several of the chapters and the attempt to apply the American political economy approach to British local government. That the collection raises more questions than answers is not a fatal defect in a newly developing field. It is a useful if somewhat tentative contribution to the study of comparative urban politics." --British Politics Group Newsletter "This book is the product of an ECPR Work Group; would that all such groups produced outputs of this quality." --Political Studies "...of interest to teachers and students of local administration, as well as to political scientists and economists." --International Review of Administrative Sciences "This is a well-structured, informative and interesting book." --Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy

Desmond S King and Jon Pierre
Introduction
 
PART ONE: THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES
Michael Goldsmith
Local Autonomy
Theory and Practice

 
Jon Pierre
Assessing Local Autonomy
 
PART TWO: ECONOMIC CHALLENGES
Chris Moore
Displacement, Partnership and Privatization
Local Government and Urban Economic Regeneration in the 1980s

 
Alan Harding
Local Autonomy and Urban Economic Development Policies
The Recent UK Experience

 
Desmond S King
The New Urban Left and Local Economic Initiatives
The Greater London Enterprise Board

 
Patrick Le Gal[ac]es
Local Economic Policies, the State and City Councils
Conventry and Rennes

 
 
PART THREE: POLITICAL CHALLENGES
Harold Wolman
The Reagan Urban Policy and its Impacts
Warren Magnusson
Progressive Politics and Canadian Cities
Brian D Jacobs
Business Leadership in Urban Regeneration
Towards a Shared Vision?

 
Lawrence E Rose
Nordic Free-Commune Experiments
Increased Local Autonomy or Continued Central Control

 
 
PART FOUR: THE EVOLUTION OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Gerry Stoker
Regulation Theory, Local Government and the Transition from Fordism
Desmond S King
Economic Activity and the Challenge to Local Government

`The editor's aim is to provide a collection of papers which document and interpret the changing economic and political situations of local governments in various advanced countries. This is a laudable goal and a great deal of useful empirical information is provided throughout the book. Challenges to Local Government is a valuable resource for those seeking a factual, descriptive account of recent changes in central-local relations and local government programs in the United Kingdom and selected advanced countries. It is a collection that invites us to develop more complex conceptions of the processes involved in local state research, and to engage with alternative critical perspectives such as feminism' - Environment and Planning `contributes to the scholarly literature about the role of decentralized government in modern society' - Professor George Jones

`The thirteen chapters in this book...demonstrate an impressive and stimulating range of international material, from Britain, the US, Canada, Scandinavia and other EC countries....The chapter on the `free communes' in various Scandinavian countries by Lawrence Rose is excellent, and Warren Magnusson's survey of Canadian cities a model of compression....It is likely to influence thinking and teaching on local government for several years to come.' - Local Government Studies

`This is a high-quality series of essays written by a group of well-known students of local government and local economies....This book is the product of an ECPR Work Group; would that all such groups produced outputs of this quality' - Political Studies

`lucid development of fresh ideas with good empirical description. King and Pierre offer a useful collection of essays...the general high quality of the essays is likely to make it a feature of urban politics least for a years to come, especially as the focus of the bulk of essays is British' - International Journal of Urban and Regional Research

`King and Pierre have produced a book that is at once timely and topical given these times for crusades for greater government accountability. The book is extremely readable. It treats otherwise complex topics in a lucid and interesting manner. Each chapter provides a wide range of references. The references should prove useful to those interested in doing additional reading on the subject. The book clearly brings out the impact of various economic and political developments on local governments' - International Review of Administrative Sciences

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Hardcover
ISBN: 9780803984059
$255.00