The Polycentric State: New Spaces of Empowerment and Engagement?
New Labour claims to have radically reformed territorial governance structures in the UK by devolving political power to the Celtic nations and London, begetting the most enduring legacy of the first Tony Blair government. More recently it has sought to extend its devolution agenda by embracing city-regionalism and the new localism, ostensibly to create new spaces of empowerment and engagement. But devolution is not the whole story of New Labour's attitude to power. On the contrary, this article argues that New Labour is a modern Janus because its commitment to devolving power, so clear in principle, is more equivocal in practice. Drawing on these three devolution narratives, it concludes by assessing the implications for the current debate about relational versus territorial readings of place politics.
Regional Studies, Volume 41, 1237-1251, (2007)