Localism and the Design of Political Systems

by Rick Harmes

Overview

This book examines localism as a political idea and policy approach and explains what localism is about, why it is growing in importance and how it relates to other themes in politics.

Illustrated with case studies from the United Kingdom, mainland Europe and the Indian sub-continent, the book analyses localism in conceptual and theoretical terms and locates it within the overall landscape of political thought. Key themes covered in the book include place, space and scale; decentralization and devolution; multi-level governance; public value; democracy and empowerment; and political design. With the focus on the bottom-up, constructivist aspects of localism, the book argues that localism is most likely to work successfully in a political order where sovereignty is ‘distributed’ across various social spheres and levels of government. It offers a comprehensive view of localism by synthesizing its various strands and creating a distinctive framework for design and evaluation.

This book will be of particular interest to scholars, students and practitioners of localism, particularly within local and regional government, public administration and policy, human and political geography, and urban studies.

The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780367406011
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	12/31/2020
Series:	Routledge Studies in Governance and Public Policy
Pages:	206
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.19(h) x (d)

About the Author

Rick Harmes is a former teacher and local government officer. He is currently Associate Research Fellow in Politics at the University of Exeter, UK.

Table of Contents

List of figures ix

Foreword and acknowledgements x

List of key abbreviations xii

1 Introducing localism 1

Localism: a political doctrine for our times? 1

Questions and aims 1

Key themes and paradigms covered in this book 2

Structure of the book 3

Organizing perspectives 4

2 Analysing localism 6

The polycentric world order 6

In search of localism: mapping the intellectual and conceptual landscape 6

Conceptual analysis of localism 11

Tfoe localist turn: geography, environmentalism, politics 12

Analysing social and political organization 14

Three dynamics of localism 16

3 Localism in context 22

Place, space and scale: core dimensions of social and political organization 22

Communities of place and their governance 24

The nation state and the limits of government 25

The international relations system and the size of states 27

The global and the local 29

Multi-level governance, empires and political orders 31

Political community, public goods and sovereignty 35

Localism and sovereignty in conflict: the case of Catalonia and Spain 37

4 Varieties of localism 54

'Old localism': established local governance 54

Neighbourhood governance 56

Governance at the micro level: pathologies and challenges 58

Governing locally in a polycentric world: towards a 'new' localism? 62

Trans-localism and the upward-shaping potential of the local 64

Localism in flux: Cornwall, England, UK 66

5 Localism and public value 96

On public goods and public value 96

Core domains of public value 98

Localism and democracy 100

Localism and human wellbeing 103

Localism and environmental sustaindbility 108

Joining up the domains of public value 113

Territorial cohesion within political systems: the case of the European Union 115

6 Designing for localism and multi-level governance 128

Institutions, political systems and their design 128

Principles for institutional and system design 132

Design trends in national, regional and local governance 135

Visionary localism: the case of India and Kerala 137

7 Local outcomes 163

Policy evaluation and achieving public value 163

Towards a local outcomes framework 164

Evaluating local outcomes in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly 166

Evaluating localism: Area Assessment in the UK and Cornwall, 2009-2010 169

8 Localism and political systems in the twenty-first century 173

The argument so far 173

The twenty-first-century design context 177

Designing political systems 179

In conclusion: ten propositions 184

Index 188