Mayoral Model Research Articles

Leading Locally: How New Zealand's mayors get things done

New Zealand’s directly elected mayors are considered an example of a weak mayoral model, with mayors having limited legal powers to make decisions or appointments. However, many mayors continue to shape policy direction alongside their councillor colleagues. This article examines how a collaborative leadership approach allows mayors to successfully lead locally even without strong executive powers. Future reforms of local government should consider how to build on this leadership framework.

Place, power and leadership: Insights from mayoral governance and leadership innovation in Bristol, UK

This article aims to enhance understanding of the role of place in urban leadership by examining the way leadership changed significantly following the introduction of mayoral governance into a UK city. In 2012, 10 cities in England held referendums to decide whether to introduce a directly elected mayor model of leadership. Bristol was the only city to vote in favour of this radical change, and the Bristol Civic Leadership Project, set up before the first mayor was elected in November 2012, was designed to discover what differences the directly elected mayor model might make to the leadership and governance of a city. This article addresses two important questions: (1) Does the institutional design of local governance in a place influence leadership effectiveness? (2) How, if at all, do the leadership styles of the individual elected as mayor affect the quality of place-based governance? The article identifies three main reasons why place is important in public policy – expression of identity, strengthening democracy and enhancing governmental effectiveness – and considers how the leadership innovations in Bristol engage with these three dimensions of place. As well as presenting evidence documenting how bold civic leadership has transformed the governance of a particular British city, the article contributes to leadership studies by exploring the relationships between place, power and leadership.

The dynamics of depoliticisation in urban governance: Introducing a directly elected mayor

Within the context of debates regarding depoliticisation, this article considers how the introduction of a directly elected mayor system of governance impacts on urban politics. Directly elected mayors are now a fundamental feature of many political systems. They have been widely introduced as a reform to improve processes of local democracy, enhance the effectiveness of governing practices and to offer a more potent form of city leadership. This article focuses on developments in England, by presenting the case of Bristol, a city epitomising many aspects of modern neo-liberalised urban development. Bristol adopted a mayoral system in 2012 and the article presents empirical data from before and after this reform pertaining to two frameworks to understand city leadership. We conclude that the move to mayoral governance, in Bristol in the 2012–2016 period, eroded the influence of party politics and led to the adoption of elements of a leadership style associated with a depoliticisation of urban politics in the city. Nevertheless, the analysis suggests that the mayoral model also provides significant space for the expansion of political agency on the part of the city leader, not least because power becomes concentrated in the mayoral position.

Horizontal “checks and balances” in the socialist regime: the party chief and mayor template

AbstractJános Kornai's pioneering scholarship examined the mechanisms of the socialist system. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Kornai's main focus was on the transition process in former socialist countries in central Eastern Europe. This paper builds on Kornai's work on the socialist system by analyzing horizontal bargaining within every political branch in contemporary China. I argue that this horizontal bargaining within the party is enhanced by the vertical bargaining. Incorporating Kornai's work on socialism, the “party chief and mayor” template extends the bargaining model from one key figure and one group in the “king and council” template to two key figures and their respective confidants. In addition, it incorporates institutional constraints into the graphical model. It also defines a “collective decision probability function,” which shows how the party chief and mayor model reaches “checks and balances” that limit the policy space, regardless of whether the policy is exogenous or endogenous.

The Price of Populism: The Association between Directly Elected Mayors and Unit Expenditure in Local Government

It would appear that directly elected Mayors have indeed become fashionable. However, few seem to have paused to ponder the pecuniary impact of directly elected Mayors on local government: Indeed there is no evidence at all from the Antipodes and much of the extant work is somewhat dated. We analyse a five year panel of data for New South Wales, Australia and find evidence of strong and statistically significant increased unit operational expenditure in local governments that employ the directly elected mayor model. We conclude by outlining the effect that this association might have on local government sustainability.

What a difference a Mayor makes. A case study of the Liverpool Mayoral model

ABSTRACTThe city region devolution deals have ushered Directly Elected Mayors (DEMs) to the front and centre of the political and governance landscape within English metropolitan regions in the UK. DEMs are invested with high expectations to deliver a range of beneficial urban outcomes. Yet, there is little empirical evidence on the how such Mayoral leadership might act differently to other types of civic leadership to bring about these outcomes. This paper through the deployment of an innovative methodology, a diary analysis, examines how different this leadership model is when compared to its immediate predecessor; the council leader. It finds that the new Mayoral role is less about ‘city management’ and more about ‘city representation’ particularly on the national and international political stage. The paper concludes that this has implications for resourcing this particular leadership model and for the wider research agenda into political and executive leadership of our cities.

Metro Mayors: Devolution, Democracy and the Importance of Getting the ‘Devo Manc’ Design Right

It is quite clear that the devolutionary settlement negotiated between the UK chancellor George Osborne and the leaders of the Greater Manchester Combined Authorities (GMCA) required local political actors to agree to oversight of the new arrangements by an elected metro mayor. In the intervening months since that announcement, governance arrangements for a Greater Manchester (GM) ‘metro mayor’ have proved to be both unique and fluid, drawing on earlier arrangements for electing mayors in Greater London, other city mayors, the Police and Crime Commissioner arrangements and the existing arrangements in the ten local authorities making up the GMCA. This article maps the development of the GM metro mayor and argues the unique governance arrangements set a path for other areas who want to extend a devolutionary agenda and negotiate enhanced devolutionary powers. However the governance arrangements developing for the GM metro mayor pose questions about the checks and balances built into these new executive arrangements. In particular how accountability and scrutiny of the metro mayor should be conducted going forward in GM, and elsewhere. In concluding it is argued that the metro mayoral model needs to include and prioritise democratic engagement alongside economic and social goals as a crucial element in making the new arrangements work.

Still want to party? An assessment of party-politicization in directly-elected mayoral authorities in England and Germany's North Rhine-Westphalia

Very little attention has been paid to the political impact of directly-elected mayors. This paper sheds light on the topic by comparing the English case with that of North Rhine-Westphalia. Both demonstrate that parties continue to monopolize their local political systems and most aspects of mayoral office; nevertheless, some de-party-politicization is noted. There is much to learn about the English case from observation of the mayoral model in North Rhine-Westphalia.

Innovation in urban political leadership. Reflections on the introduction of a directly-elected mayor in Bristol, UK

In May 2012, 10 of England's largest cities, outside London, were required to hold referendums giving citizens the option of introducing a directly-elected mayor. Bristol was the only city to vote in favour of the mayoral model. This paper outlines the main themes that feature in current debates about urban leadership. It presents a framework for understanding place-based leadership and, by drawing on a current researchproject on mayoral governance in Bristol, highlights the existence of very different perceptions of how to improve city leadership and democratic accountability.

Americanization, Europeanization or Path Dependency? Comparing Mayoral Leadership from a New Institutionalism Perspective

This paper seeks to explicit the link between the institutional tendency towards the strong mayor model of political leadership and the shifting substance and nature of mayoral agendas and networks in localities from a (European) comparative perspective. It develops a plea for a more systematic research agenda in this field by outlining the potential of such an approach. In doing so, it theoretically draws on arguments stemming from the emerging body of literature that links local politics to new institutionalism. For empirical exploration, the article reconsiders quantitative data from a comparative project that studied mayoral leadership in 17 European countries. It concludes that institutional form matters for mayoral business orientation but is contingent upon leadership context and leader characteristics.

Local Political Leadership in Portugal: Excepcionalism or Convergence Towards a 'Mayoral Model'?

The purpose of this paper is to examine the reform of institutional forms that frame local government in Portugal, and to put them into a comparative European perspective. The paper addresses the following research question: To what extent have Portuguese local government reforms shown convergence or divergence with the local political leadership models in Europe over the last three decades of democracy? We hypothesized that reforms affected the local government system in different ways, using some of its components and following more explicitly international trends than others. This hypothesis was tested against the model of local political leadership, including the rules governing the recruitment of mayors and local councillors. This study is based on both archival research for the Portuguese case and the literature review for the survey of international trends. The findings indicate the existence of similarities between reforms in Portugal and reforms in other European countries. But they also indicate divergence in some important dimensions of the local government system.
 
 KEYWORDS: • local government reform • institutional forms • recruitment • models of local political leadership • Portugal

A governance blueprint for the “federalist” Manchester City Region

PurposeThis paper aims to present a case study of the Manchester metropolitan area's efforts at implementing a regional approach to economic policy making and metropolitan governance. Vis‐à‐vis an emerging proposal for a concerted and effective approach towards the development of a governance model for the Manchester City Region, the paper aims to discuss the competing proposals for a mayoral and more “federalist” model of coordinating local policies in the area..Design/methodology/approachThe paper examines the roles of different agencies – business representations and local authorities – in working towards a form of coherent governance for the city region against the backdrop of the many current precedents of such arrangements across Europe.FindingsThe paper finds that local authorities in the Greater Manchester area tend to favour a federalist City Region approach with greater autonomy for each participating local government. Yet, the alternative mayoral model retains the advantage of a distinct identity and direct accountability. In any case, a strong and coherent private sector input on key issues affecting the economy and its development in the Manchester City Region are required, but, as yet, not always sufficiently articulated.Originality/valueFinding an “appropriate” model of city‐regional governance is a very topical issue. The contribution of this paper is thus timely and offers a good insight into the practical side of coordinating public and private sector interests and ways of making policies as part of city‐regional governance.

Options for Change: Mayors, Cabinets or the Status Quo?

The concept of local authorities providing 'community leadership' lies at the heart of the Blair government's modernisation agenda. The Local Government Act, 2000 embodied three models of political leadership to support this new community leadership role. To date, a number of authorities have held referendums for mayoral or cabinet systems of local leadership, with some having gone on to elect a mayor. This paper reviews the new executive structures and, based on surveys of public attitudes, explores public receptiveness to the options, comparing it with councillors' own responses. The consequences of adopting a cabinet or mayoral model are examined, together with their implications for officer-member relationships within the decision-making process.

Le maire de Paris en représentation(s)

The mayor of Paris In representation(s). Florence Haegel [65-87]. Jacques Chirac staged his mayor of Paris' role using essentially the common mayoral model as a reference. The chiraquian iconography and rhetoric illustrate the reproduction of municipal stereotypes. In conformity with this model, he has privileged the representation of Paris as a village or even as provincial - Paris, symbol of the nation.