Responsible participation and housing: restoring democratic theory to the scene

Tensions between individual liberty and collective social justice characterise many advanced liberal societies. These tensions are reflected in the challenges posed for representative democracy both by participatory democratic practices and by the current emphasis on (so-called) responsible participation. Based on the example of ‘community’ housing associations in Scotland, this paper explores these tensions. It is argued that the critique of responsibility may have been over-stated – that, in particular, ‘community’ housing associations offer the basis for relatively more inclusive and effective processes of decision-making than council housing, which relies on the traditional processes and institutions of representative local government for its legitimacy

Some Reflections on the Limitations to Public Participation in the Post-Political City

Neoliberal practices are the new orthodoxy within urban governance imposing limits to participatory and more democratic forms of engagement in the city, particularly where they challenge the official discourses through which cities strive to be competitive spaces in the globalizing economy. This paper offers a theoretical understanding of these limits through two related propositions. First, that urban governance has assumed a post-political configuration; second, and reflecting such a configuration, urban entrepreneurialism is becoming defined by a new style of politics, urban neo-populism. Against the disciplining imperative of creating the competitive city, neo-populism becomes defined around the manufacture of consensus politics, the effect of which is to marginalize protest and dissensus

Introduction

British readers of this volume, at least, will scarcely need reminding of the reasons why an edited volume on local government finance within the economically advanced nations is timeous. Quite apart from the intrinsic academic value in examining current issues in local finance within such countries, the problem has particular relevance for Britain with the impending introduction of the community charge (or poll tax) and system of assigned revenues, and the abolition of domestic rates. The reform, radical enough in itself, marks an important stage in a long history of debate, centring around dissatisfaction with property rating on the one hand, and the relative merits of alternative local taxes on the other. Contentious as the community charge is, it is unlikely that its implementation - already programmed for Scotland by 1989, and extended to England and Wales in legislation introduced in the third Thatcher administration - will prove to be the last word; local government finance will remain on the political agenda

Conclusions

As we argued in the introductory chapter the comparative analysis of local government finance on a cross-national basis is fraught with difficulties. One of the few generalisations which can be made, and which does approach being a universal truth, however, is that the structuring and restructuring of the system of local government finance is a continuing concern of national politicians. Whether it is on the scale of modifying the system of grants paid by the centre to the localities, or the installation of a new tax option, local finance is never far from the political agenda

Radicals vs positivists and the diversification of paradigms m geography

Paddison R., Findlay A. Radicals vs positivists and the diversification of paradigms m geography. In: Espace géographique, tome 14, n°1, 1985. pp. 6-8