Local Governance Networks Research Articles

Go Your Own Way: Ray Mallon and Local Leadership in Middlesbrough

The directly-elected executive mayor was an entirely new concept in English local government. Introduced as one of the choices available to local electors under the Local Government Act 2000, it had the potential to revolutionise the way our towns and cities would be run. The office of elected mayor was thought to provide the basis for effective local leadership, better management, community advocacy, and a degree of direct public endorsement that was singularly lacking within the old bureaucratic committee structures of local government. Strongly influenced by the experience of the United States and European countries, the mayor would reconnect the council and the public. Supporters of this new approach could be found on both the Left and Right of the political spectrum. Within the Conservative party, Michael Heseltine was an early advocate of the elected mayoralty, and, within the Labour -party, its supporters were not confined to the Blairite modernisers. Elements of an older Left discerned the prospect of strong democratic renewal in the shape of the elected mayor (eg, Todd, 2000). Yet the idea has not caught on. By 2004, only eleven English areas beyond London had chosen the elected mayor as their preferred form of local leadership. No major city outside London is run by an elected mayor. Even where local mayors have taken office, local attitudes have frequently been shaped by specific local factors, not least the negative reputations of the previous local regime. However, much still remains to be said about the mayoral experiment. It has been persuasively argued by Anna Randle (2004), in her study for the New Local Government Network, that elected mayors have indeed made a difference. While the elected mayor must be seen as, to some degree, political failure for central government, given its very low take-up and its uncertain future, it is beginning to deliver a changed relationship with the public and a strong form of leadership in the small number of areas where it has been introduced (Fenwick and Elcock, 2005). Study of the achievements and failures of elected mayors now in place tells us much about the nature of local leadership and the changing role of political representation.

Civic Involvement, Organizational Ties, and Local Economic Development

Research on local economic development has taken a significant turn in recent years. Much of the previous work has focused on market factors that influence the adoption of economic development policies or the effects of policy adoption on employment and population change. There is a growing interest, however, in the role of social factors in local and regional economic development. In this paper, I examine how organizational networks and civic participation may affect employment growth in municipalities across the nonmetropolitan United States. The organizational networks of local governments consistently influence the success of their economic development efforts, while civic participation has no effect on job growth. The benefits of organizational contacts are largely due to increased levels of information and potential sources of resources through organizational contacts rather than through increased levels of public participation or local government integrity.

The Role of Local Development Organizations in Rural America*

Abstract Rural communities rely increasingly on local development organizations (LDOs) to promote economic development. The rise of LDOs has been the source of much debate. Using a national data set that links local governments with development organizations, we contrast the economic development activities, and their outcomes, of local governments and development organizations in rural America. We find that LDOs are involved in more economic development activities than are local governments. They are more successful at business recruitment and more effective at retention/expansion, both in number of firms and in jobs. The organizational networks of LDOs and local governments consistently influence their effectiveness. Finally, we examine the effects of an LDO's presence on the outcomes of business recruitment and of retention and expansion activities. The results suggest that the LDOs' success may be due in part to the networks in which they are embedded and to the amount of effort they make to promote growth.

New Labour's Third Way: Pragmatism and Governance

The article critically examines New Labour's development of the concept of the Third Way. Despite the apparent centrality of ‘social democracy’ to the Third Way, it is proposed that a more pragmatic approach dominates, in that outputs and not ideology are driving the new agenda of governance under New Labour. This is seen to have its roots in the new ways of working the party has embraced in local governance, where public–private partnerships have become the norm and a new ethos of public service has emerged. In contrast with the top-down approach to setting output targets favoured by Tony Blair, the Third Way offers the possibility of a more experimental, pragmatic and decentralised decision-making process—and the local governance network (with elected local councils as pivotal and legitimising actors) is presented as the ideal agent to deliver this.

Public Services under New Labour: collaborative discourses and local networking

A by-product of the fragmentation of services that occurred at local government level under the Conservative Government was the emergence of networks and other forms of joint working. These became formalised particularly through various economic and urban regeneration schemes. But elsewhere they were often an ad hoc response to the changing local governance structures. The election of the Labour Government in 1997 has, this article contends, seen the emergence of a more collaborative discourse in which networking and partnership are the intentional outcomes of many of the central government's policy initiatives, including the Education and Health Action Zones and the Social Exclusion Unit. This collaborative discourse is founded on a perception of the importance of trusting, mutually beneficial relationships, as distinct from adversarial, low trust relationships, to achieving central government aims and objectives. Based on interviews with local authority Leaders and Chief Executives, and other 'elite' actors, the article explores how well local authorities are responding to the challenges and opportunities that these policy initiatives will bring both with regard to internal structures and decision making processes, as well as to the role of the local authority in local governance networks.

Conflicting Objectives for Rural Local Government: Service Provision to Exurban Communities in Israel

The delivery of public services in rural areas is a problem encountered not only by declining and peripheral areas but also by newly founded exurban communities. The problems of small size are exacerbated by the demand within these communities for high levels and a high quality of service provision. The existing local government network in these rural and rurban areas is unable to cope with the increased demand emanating from these new communities. This is particularly problematic in Israel, where the rural system of local government, the regional councils, have traditionally fulfilled the role of providing services to agricultural and cooperative communities. In this paper the nature of the service demands made by new exurban communities in Israel, the problems encountered by the regional councils in providing these same services, and the tensions which result from this lack of compatibility are discussed. Proposed functional solutions are presented and compared, ranging from minor modifications to the existing system of rural local government to those which require a change in the formal municipal status of the exurban communities.

Networking for Change

Describes the origins of the Women in Local Government Network (WLGN); the issues facing women managers and our preferred strategies for change through networking and personal support. Focuses on the particular current developments and issues in local government and how these can or do assist or further disadvantage women from getting the top jobs. However, the broad themes and issues of, for example, effective leadership and management style, the need for flexible working hours and practices and dealing with male networks are common to women managers working both in the private and public sectors. Describes how the network gives professional and personal support through seminars, training workshops and social events.

地方公共団体における情報化ニーズと情報サービスネットワークシステム

地方公共団体における情報化ニーズと情報サービスネットワークシステム