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From City-region Concept to Boundaries for Governance: The English Case

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  • Mike Coombes

Abstract

Defining city-region boundaries for governance or policy requires robust data analysis reflecting a conceptualisation of city-regions. Geddes introduced the concept to England and both fundamental and contingent features he identified remain valid. Subsequent work has not clarified issues raised by the contingent features and one of these—whether or not cities dominate the region definitions—here structures the review of city-region definition methods. Following a historical review of the failure of proposals for English city-region governance geography—which ascribes a key role in those failures to institutional inertia fuelled by rural interests—a review of the ‘city-centric’ methods which exacerbate rural opposition shows they fail to meet essential requirements. By contrast a ‘regions first’ approach to city-region definition is shown capable of implementing all the fundamental features of the concept, including the analysis of flows over and above those of commuting.

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  • Mike Coombes, 2014. "From City-region Concept to Boundaries for Governance: The English Case," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 51(11), pages 2426-2443, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:urbstu:v:51:y:2014:i:11:p:2426-2443
    DOI: 10.1177/0042098013493482
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    1. Mike Coombes & Peter O'Brien & Andy Pike & John Tomaney, 2016. "Austerity States, Institutional Dismantling and the Governance of Sub-National Economic Development: The Demise of the Regional Development Agencies in England," SERC Discussion Papers 0206, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.

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