Massification, governance and inter-urban disparities

The idea that the concentration of particular 'high level' functions - especially in financial services - in a small number of cities enables them to occupy leading positions in the international urban hierarchy has been well established within urban social science ever since the publication of Saska Sassen's The Global City (1991). Since then much research, often based on case studies, has focused upon the way in which urban leaders representing cities at various levels of the urban hierarchy have engaged in competitive strategies designed to attract flows of capital and skilled labour. The focus of these efforts has invariably been on sub-national tiers of elected government and the way in which they have used their autonomy and influence to build horizontal and vertical coalitions for change. What is less clear, from two decades' worth of research, is (a) what the net impact of various forms of 'massification' (i.e. the uneven accretion of resources at the urban-regional scale) has been on national urban hierarchies, and (b) what role semi-autonomous non-governmental urban institutions (e.g. football clubs, universities, cultural organisations), and the variety of governance arrangements which guide institutional behaviour, have played in encouraging (or managing or discouraging) massification processes.

This paper builds upon preparatory work being undertaken by the N8 group of research-intensive universities in northern England under the theme of ‘just cities and rebalancing’. It will draw upon empirical analysis of the extent to which key urban institutions (including football clubs and universities) in particular city-regions have experienced increased domestic and international flows of labour and capital and analyse, through case study work, the extent to which the various governance arenas in which they operate (sector-specific, national, European, inter-national) have encouraged massification processes. If a German research partner can be added, the paper will include UK-Germany comparisons.