QUARTERLY MAGAZINE OF THE
THE VOICE OF THE MEMBERSHIP NO. 281, SPRING 2011
Issn: 1367–3882
REGIONALISM VERSUS LOCALISM
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Comment & Debate, pp. 4-5
Regions No 281 Spring 2011
THE BIG SOCIETY AND THE REGIONAL STUDIES AGENDA: WHY THE CONNECTIONS MATTER John Diamond, Edge Hill University, UK The apparent preoccupation by the UK national media with the meaning behind the ‘Big Society’ may seem of marginal importance to members of the RSA and to readers of Regions. I want to suggest the opposite. I think that the way David Cameron has framed his definition of what he means by the Big Society and its linked public policy initiatives on localism are very much part of our agenda too. Indeed, the RSA – through its growing family of international research networks – is one of the key academic and research focused organisations to provide some of the intellectual grounding with which to point to the weaknesses and contradictions in the Cameron concept of both localism and the Big Society. In this piece, I want to (briefly) discuss the following: 1. What is meant by the Big Society? 2. What is the link to localism? 3. Why does this matter for us – the RSA? 4. What next?
What is meant by the Big Society? The debate over what is meant by the Big Society is one which is likely to go on for some time across the media and commentariat. I think that we can sketch out some of the key elements which inform Cameron’s definition of his ‘Big Society’ and also we can see where (and how) others are attempting to redefine it as well. In Cameron’s definition the ‘Big Society’ does represent a re-defining of the relationships between the state, the market and the individual. It seems to me that in this process of redefinition a redrawing of the boundaries is taking place which includes the roles, rights and responsibilities of each. Whilst the current discussion is taking place in the context of the spending cuts in the UK and a global crisis of capitalism, the Big Society does not come out of the banking/finance collapse. On the contrary,
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I think that the advocates of the Big Society see its potential for reducing the role of the state and increasing the marketisation of what were/are public services. In the UK, the debate over what Cameron means by his definition of the ‘Big Society’ has got merged with the public spending cuts introduced by the Coalition as if they were the same thing. Whilst I think they are linked I do not think that they are the same. To be sure, the international banking/ finance collapse from 2007 onwards (and especially in the autumn of 2008), including the loss of confidence in the refinancing of countries in the euro zone, has resulted in this cross party consensus on the need for cuts in public spending, but the ‘Big Society’ debate goes much further than the cuts. In reviewing some of the published literature on the Big Society debate, it seems to me to be important that we situate our thinking and ref lections in the context of competing concepts of civil society and what John Clarke (2004) in his seminal paper describes as the “public realm”. Part of this debate is informed by an understanding of whether there is a shared set of meanings when we discuss these ideas. Much of the current literature – I think – ignores these discussions. An important exception to this is Anna Coote’s paper (2010). It looks at the ways in which the recession/banking crisis are resulting in cuts in public spending which are being legitimised because of the crisis. Also, the promotion of the Big Society provides an additional layer of legitimation to the recasting of the role of the state and civil society. The focus on the credit crunch and the recession was the subject of a report by Michael Parkinson et al (2009) commissioned by the last government. It provides a detailed analysis of the impact of the banking collapse of 2008 on local authorities and other public agencies involved in regeneration and local economic development initiatives. This report is worth reading alongside the work of both Rebecca Tunstall (2009) and Melanie Bowles (2010). All of these reports are shaped by the context and time within which they were researched and written. I think what is important
to observe is the following: the speed by which the language of the ‘Big Society’ has now entered the discourse of everyday politics and discussion and the need to think carefully about the conceptual and theoretical levels on which we are working. The work of Kean Birch and Geoff W hittam (2008 ) is a real ly good example of where the debate and the terrain for discussion and exploration is not solely defined by public policy initiatives of particular governmental programmes. We need, I think, to be setting out a practice and research programme within the Regional Studies Association which does explicitly draw together those academics, researchers and activists who are engaged in these discussions. An important part of that research programme could include an analysis of (and critique, too) of ideas of governance, local democracy, neoliberalism and the nature of the state in advanced capitalist economies and the need to think internationally (and to reflect/learn from that experience) too on the relationship(s) between the state, the market and the individual.
What is the link to localism? The present Coalition Government claims to have a commitment to decentralisation and a ‘local’ dimension to decision making and the organisation and provision of public services. The link to the ‘Big Society’ initiative can be seen in the expectation that the voluntary and community sector will become a provider of public services securing their contracts through competitive tendering or through other means, including the transfer of local assets to community interest companies or the setting up of social enterprises or social/community businesses. The particular economic and financial structures are not as important for the Big Society advocates as these changes represent a decline in the role of the state and also an explicit shift in the organisational focus and location to the neighbourhood. Localism – in this context – is not about changing the ways in which decisions are made about local priorities or the allocation of local resources or services but about the spatial context within
Comment & Debate which they are placed and configured. Indeed, the parallel policy shift towards a reduction in the role and purpose of local government with a changed set of responsibilities with regard to schools and education, the abolition of primary care trusts and anticipated level at which local enterprise partnerships will be placed (crossing existing local authority boundaries) all appear to suggest that the democratisation of local decision making is not part of the ‘localism’ agenda. We can trace the localism agenda however across the political spectrum and see it as part of the resistance to Thatcher and the New Right in the UK in the 1980’s. Whilst the networks and alliances of different interest groups which came together to challenge/ question the political choices of that Government did lack an ideological and conceptual coherence, there were some important strands present in the 1980’s ‘Going Local’ approach of the New Urban Left. These elements included: an explicit commitment to tenant/resident participation initiatives; the setting up of equality and diversity units and initiatives; the promotion of an alternative economic strategy focused upon co-operatives and social enterprises through supporting managed workspaces and local neighbourhood regeneration projects; and a commitment to devolved decision making through local neighbourhood fora. This brand of ‘municipal socialism’ stressed the value and importance of collective and community approaches to services rather than individualising them. These debates have been revisited a number of times but they are worth putting in a different context too in order to reflect upon their importance and the extent to which they offer any framework within which to place the current discussion on the Big Society. In 2010, two different publications approached these discussions by placing them in a slightly different context – one which is informed by the collapse or change in the post-war consensus which celebrated the importance of the state and central planning/decision making and the other which saw the contemporary discussion in the context of a post-bureaucratic age. Thomas Neumark (2010) and David Boyle (2010) write about localism in different ways and their papers are worth looking at.
Paul Benneworth (2010) provides (what I think is a seminal paper) a rich and thought-provoking exploration of the ways in which we might conceptualise the process by which different professionals mobilise into “innovation coalitions” to develop knowledge and understanding across and within different disciplines/ areas of practice. I think it is an important paper because I think the way Paul Benneworth sets out his framework for analysis can be utilised in different ways to facilitate a broader exploration of how we think of working collaboratively and so invites us to think too about the role of the state in the process.
Why does this matter for us – the Regional Studies Association? The multi-disciplinary nature of Regional Studies and the intellectual scope it offers for both critical enquiry and reflective analysis of the relationship between place (locality) and communities (and how we define or categorise these labels) provides a number of opportunities for joint research and the sharing/ exchange of ideas. The ‘Big Society’ debate has been taken up across a number of public sector and Third Sector fora as well as within the academic community. Whilst we can see the contribution from political science, sociology, human geography as well as management studies it does seem to me that within the RSA we have a particular opportunity to disseminate ideas and to provide a public space for debate and discussion. Some of those opportunities might sit within the existing research networks supported by the Association and/or through this magazine as well as through Regional Studies itself. However, I also think that through our network of conferences – whether through themed panels or through invitation to present plenary papers at the national and international networks – we could ref lect upon the contribution to the public debate which the RSA could provide. Within the UK we can anticipate the impact of the changes in public funding (and not just on the higher education sector) but on the neighbourhoods and communities which are more cut off from the public discourse of the Big Society than is realised or accepted. There is a place here to revisit the idea of the connection between the academy and the localities and communities within
which it sits. My sense is that revisiting and redefining the relationship(s) between the university/academy and those communities most affected by the Big Society are challenging processes and ones in which we are likely to experience discomfort. An unintended consequence (I think) of David Cameron’s launch of his Big Society is that it is offering a more focused discussion on the role of the state and the public sector than I can remember in the last 30 years – I think we need to go back to the Miners’ Strike in the UK of 1984-85 for a similar focused debate. In this new context we need to be informed by international experiences as well. It is for these reasons that I think it is important to look at the links and to invite the Association to do so too.
References Benneworth, P. (2010), “Five scalar challenges and barriers to innovative practice in regeneration management, “ Journal of Urban Regeneration and Renewal, Vol. 4.1, pp.63-75. Birch, K. and Whittam, G. (2008), “The Third Sector and the Regional Development of Social Capital,” Regional Studies, Vol. 42.3, pp.437-50. Bowles, M. (2010), The Big Society and the Responsive State, London: Community Development Foundation. Boyle, D. (2010), Localism: Unravelling the Supplicant State, London: New Economics Foundation. Clarke, J. (2004), “Dissolving the public realm?: The Logics and Limits of NeoLiberalism,” Journal of Social Policy, Vol. 33.1, pp.27-48. Coote, A. (2010), Cutting it: The Big Society in the Age of Austerity, London: New Economics Foundation. Neumark, T. (2010), Town Halls in a PostBureaucratic Age, London: Community Development Foundation. Parkinson, M. et al (2009), The Credit Crunch and Regeneration, London: DCLG. Tunstall, R. (2009), Communities in Recession, York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation.
Professor John Diamond works at Edge Hill University, UK. He is a co-editor of Critical Perspectives on International Public Sector Management (2012) and also a co-convenor of the RSA research network on the Changing Dynamics of Leadership and Partnership across European regions. diamondj@edgehill.ac.uk
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Regions No 281 Spring 2011
Regions THE VOICE OF THE MEMBERSHIP The Regional Survey in this issue focuses on regional integration in Latin America. Our contributors explore the difficulties that these countries have traditionally faced in integrating interventions to develop their peripheral regions as well as the potential for growth that coordinated interventions might generate in the continent. Despite the widely held belief that the lack of linguistic and religious barriers would simplify integration efforts between these countries; the lack of both political and economic coordination, the large size of the areas, regional disparities both between them as well as within them, and poor infrastructure have always worked against integration efforts in the region. This series of articles edited by Carola Ramon-Berjano provides expert views on three different integration initiatives in Latin America; namely MERCOSUR (the area between Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay), UNASUR (a more ambitious project involving 12 Latin American countries) and ZICOSUR (an economic zone comprising neighbouring and peripheral areas of Argentina, Chile, Paraguay and Bolivia). These articles approach the issue of larger versus smaller integration schemes as well as differences and similarities between countries and regions. These schemes are viewed at different scales from the wider Latin American perspective, to the national and regional levels to illustrate how the potential gains as well as problems vary between countries and regions. This issue also contains insights into the changing landscape of regional and local development in the UK and in France. John Diamond discusses the new Coalition Government’s concept of the “Big Society” and renewed interest in ‘localism’ in the UK. He argues that these concepts may have little to do with democratisation of local decision-making but more to do with a decline in the role of the state at all levels, including the demise of the Regional Development Agencies that were set up under the previous Labour Administration. This theme is picked up by Lee Pugalis in the In Depth article on the changing institutional structures surrounding sub-national development in the UK. It is noted that these changes are particularly intriguing from the perspective of European Cohesion Policy which remains firmly based on ‘regions’ as the basic spatial unit for territorial development. In contrast, Anna Geppert provides a research note on the French Government’s plans to strengthen the City-Region scale of development through the promotion of collaborative networks.
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