The geo‐constitution and responses to austerity: Institutional entrepreneurship, switching, and re‐scaling in the United Kingdom

Abstract

A nation's geo-constitutionits spatially uneven political institutionsplays a critical role in mediating change. This paper explores this in relation to local government responses to austerity. The paper presents original research collected in Cornwall, United Kingdom, to highlight the scale and impact of asset transfers to town and parish councils. This degree of institutional switching was possible because of a willingness to use legacy constitutional institutions to mediate the trajectory and impact of reform in response to austerity. Town and parish councils have taken on important assets (public toilets, parks, and libraries) and raised local taxation to pay for them. This has reconfigured relationships between local government institutions while also incentivising innovation in service organisation. The research highlights the role of political institutions and their personnel in mediating responses to austerity, as well as raising broader questions about the rescaling of the social contract, and the scope for further constitutional reform. K E Y W O R D S asset-transfer, austerity state, Cornwall, geo-constitution, institutional switching, town and parish councils 1 | INTRODUCTION Rather like the furniture in a room, a nation's political constitution provides the background infrastructure that facilitates collective activity. It is often only when this furniture comes to the end of its life that we recognise what it has been doing for us, and we think about whether to replace it or not. Living in the United Kingdom (UK) in the early 21st century, it seems that much of our constitutional furniture is getting worn out, or even collapsing, prompting debate about whether and how we should embark on reform. While this has been accelerated by the decision to leave the European Union (EU), the holes in our constitutional furniture were evident well before this event. Demands for greater autonomy for Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland already had prompted the establishment of geographically differentiated constitutional arrangements from the late 1990s (Bogdanor, 2009). This, in turn, helped to generate the sharp geographical cleavages exposed by the vote to leave the EU that now threaten the nation itself (McCorkindale, 2016). Moreover, granting new freedoms to the three smaller nations has prompted the sleeping giant of England to stir and demand its own voice in a more federal world (Kenny, 2014). After the New Labour governments (1997-2010) tried and failed to provide acceptable regional bodies in England (

Guest editors’ introduction: the power of now. Reimagining the future of local government through studies of ‘actually existing’ practice

“…Inserting local government back into this picture, we argue, requires more nuanced attention to the institutional responses of local government to austerity, and to the agency of local government actors. Firstly, it involves taking up and moving on the work of Wills (2020), who notes the 'institutional switching' of powers from the county council to parish councils in Cornwall, which has served to mediate the trajectory and effects of austerity by building on historical institutional legacies to produce a 'new geography of local government' (12). She therefore re-focuses our attention on 'actually existing' local government and a pragmatic response to austerity, via the use of the 'legacy' institutional framework available to local actors, which is seen to offer opportunities rather than be lamented for its critical shortcomings.…”

“…At first glance, any questioning of this mature and dynamic field of political studies may seem misguided, particularly given the range of important work being published. This includes investigations into the local as a space for progressive politics and the new municipalism (see, for example, Penny 2017; Russell 2019; Thompson 2020), studies of the local governance of austerity (see Bello et al 2018;Davies et al 2020;Fuller and West 2017;Gray and Barford 2018;Hastings et al 2015;Lowndes and McCaughie 2013), of devolution and the hybridisation of local political landscapes (see Berry and Giovannini 2018;Lowndes and Gardner 2016;Lorne et al 2019), as well as critical explorations of community empowerment and new spaces of democracy within local civil societies (see Richardson, Durose, and Dean 2019;Willett and Cruxon 2019;Wills 2016Wills , 2020. Such dialogues have further 'softened' the disciplinary boundaries of local government studies, attracting contributions from disciplines such as critical theory, political geography, and urban studies.…”

Localism partnerships as informal associations: The work of the Rural Urban Synthesis Society and Lewisham Council within austerity

“…Yet, as Roy and AlSayyad note, “if formality operates through the fixing of value … then informality operates through the constant negotiability of value” (2004, p. 5). Informality has thus also been used to argue how the institutional frameworks of localism nevertheless present a platform for productive local responses within/to austerity (Wills, 2019, 2020). Specifically, auto‐agencies can emerge through, rather than only despite, formal policy (Tonkiss, 2013).…”

“…Formal policy mechanisms provide a frame that can facilitate particular responses and activities. Without them, these responses – and their wider effects – would not be possible (Wills, 2020). Without being fully “structured by pre‐given sets of rules or formal institutions,” local authorities and communities can resist, adapt, and innovate in ways that overcome constraints and leverage opportunities in their articulations of localism (Van Tatenhove et al., 2006, p. 14).…”

“…Although the CRTB was not useful in facilitating CLT development, another element of the Localism Act, the HRA reform, provided a formal basis for RUSS and LBL to continue their conversations (cf. Wills, 2020).…”