Urban Political Economy

by Newton, Kenneth

• ISBN13: 9781472514950
• ISBN10: 1472514955
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2014-01-09
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic

Summary

The study of urban political economy needs no justification, for cities are the heart (and arguably the soul) of our civilization, and their political and economic conditions are the linchpins of its existence. But how should we study urban political economy?

Urban Political Economy deals with different nations – Belgium, Denmark, France, Norway, the UK. and the USA – and with different problems – expenditure patterns, service provision, economic development, fiscal strain, budgetary cuts, and borrowing systems – but they all agree on two fundamental points about the study of their subject matter: first, that the urban economy cannot be understood outside its political context, just as urban politics cannot be understood without its economic background; and second, that the local and the national are knitted together so closely and so tightly that it is necessary to think of them as forming a single system.

Urban Political Economy explores the idea of the fusion of factors by demonstrating the extent to which local and national conditions react upon one another to analyze the urban political economy.

Author Biography

Kenneth Newton is Emeritus Professor of Comparative Politics at the University of Southampton, UK.

Table of Contents

Preface
Part I: Urban Politics and Economic Policy
1. Does Politics Matter? L. J. Sharpe (University of Oxford, UK)
2. Transforming Needs into Expenditure Decisions,Tore Hansen (University of Oslo, Norway)
3. Party Influence on Local Spending in Denmark, Carl-Johan Skovsgaard (University of Aarhus, Denmark)
4. Economics, Politics and Policy in Norwegian Communes, Stein Kuhnle (University of Bergen, Norway)
Part II: Urban Systems and Public Services
5. The Urban System, Politics and Policy in Belgian Citiesm Michael Aiken (University of Wisconsin, USA) and Roper Depre (Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium)
6. Central Places and Urban Services, Kenneth Newton (University of Southampton, UK)
Part III: Debts, Cuts, and Crises
7. Fiscal Strain and American Cities: Six Basic Processes, Terry Nichols-Clark (University of Chicago, USA)
8. Fiscal Strian in American Cities: Some Limitations on Popular Explanations, Lorna Crowley Ferguson (University of Chicago, USA)
9. Urban Management and Fiscal Stringency: United States and Britain, Andrew D. Glassberg (University of Missouri-St. Louis, USA)
10. Cities, Capital, and Banks: The Politics of Debt in the USA, UK, and France, Alberta Sbragia (University of Pittsburgh, USA)
About the Authors