Tag: cities

No ordinary think tank

Improving economic security is a neglected policy goal. A new initiative in Nottingham seeks to address this

Guest post by Jonathan Schifferes, Associate Director – Public Services and Communities at the RSA

At the dawn of a new parliament – one which will be gripped by negotiating Britain’s international relations while also negotiating new alliances in the House of Commons – the UK gained another think tank last week.

Some political insiders explain that this kind of parliament is likely to sideline the philosophers and reformers with a policy vision for government. Instead the deal-makers, the tactical masters, and the charismatic will be in demand.

In this context, what contribution can a think tank realistically make in the coming year? At the RSA we have been working over the last two years to support the development of a new kind of think tank: one that is focused on the issues of a specific place, within an ‘anchor institution’ that itself shapes the place it is in.

Despite over a decade of devolution and localism in UK politics, there are remarkably few1 civil society organisations that have been established with a place as their focus. We hear frequent complaints of policy silos and politics centred on Westminster, yet most think tanks organise themselves around a policy issue and locate themselves in Westminster.

To generate a richer debate on the social and economic development of the UK’s towns and cities, we need to bridge the gap between the sidelined political philosophy and the daily grind of machine politics. For several years, the RSA has recognised that universities have enormous potential to drive social and economic outcomes in the places they exist – echoing calls for a new breed of ‘civic university’.

RSA Chief Executive Matthew Taylor gave the keynote speech last week, launching Nottingham Civic Exchange, based at Nottingham Trent University (NTU). In partnership with the university leadership, the RSA has helped shape this civic think tank – bringing together many of our Fellows across the region and pooling our research capabilities. NTU views Nottingham Civic Exchange as a key part of delivering its overall strategy.

Going to the heart of what will matter in the lives of one million people across Nottingham and Nottinghamshire, the first programme of Nottingham Civic Exchange is called ‘Out of the Ordinary’. Today, NCE publishes an analysis of ‘ordinary working families’ in the city-region. Rather than simply using economic analysis to fuel Westminster soundbites, and packaging up a new demographic for electoral fodder, this study uncovers important data on Ordinary Working Families in a specific place.

Six million people define themselves as ‘just about managing’

While the struggles of the ‘squeezed middle’, ‘alarm clock Britain’ and households on low and moderate incomes have been discussed for years, what is most remarkable is that nationwide, an estimated six million people define themselves as ‘just about managing’, despite being in households with income above the national median.

In Nottingham, jobs in the caring and leisure industries are more common sources of employment compared to the UK average, and the prevailing low pay of these sectors – where women hold the majority of roles – challenges household finances. The RSA’s Inclusive Growth Commission made the case for place-based industrial strategies, which will be even more crucial as the economic adjustment of leaving the EU approaches, and devolution seems likely to stall. NTU has a particular accountability to families who are ‘just about managing’ – 21% of their 2015 full time undergraduate intake is estimated to come from this background.

Through the summer, the RSA’s ongoing work with NCE will bring a further focus on economic insecurity. We think addressing economic security is a neglected policy goal, which will help bring in to focus the following:

  • The breakdown of traditional class markers. University education has expanded for the recent generation, occupational roles in the workplace are undergoing accelerating change, and home ownership is declining among adults in their 30s establishing families. The financial security previously afforded by a university degree and a white-collar job is eroding, and partly as a consequence owner-occupation is less easily accessible as a form of insurance to protect against unstable or falling incomes. As post-election analysis has suggested, ‘age is the new class’ when it comes to predicting how people align to support political parties.
  • The importance of households as a unit of analysis. Most labour market statistics, for example, look at workers as individuals. Most workers live in households and financial decisions are made in that context: 43% of people have a joint account with their partner. Families and their homes transmit wealth through the economy at a scale which dwarfs the government’s own system of tax-funded pensions. Differences in the experience of insecurity between generations remain relatively under-explored.
  • The importance of looking across the life-course rather than using snapshot data pictures. Looking at longitudinal data across Europe, the lower middle class has the highest rates of transitory poverty; moving in and out of poverty defines their economic status.
  • The economic, fiscal, social and health impacts of subjective (‘felt’) insecurity are just as, if not more potent than, the effects of objective insecurity and material deprivation. This doesn’t mean that addressing material deprivation and poverty should be neglected as policy goals. But it does mean recognising that progressing in the modern workplace brings anxieties and volatility, not necessarily the secure affluence that many crave.
  • Longer-term, a defining characteristic of our era is declining confidence that the future will be better than the past. A survey in 2015 found 25% of UK respondents thought their children would be better off than them; 68% thought they would be worse off.

Nottingham housing

My hypothesis is that in a rich country like the UK, being secure in your economic status matters alongside your absolute affluence. And overall economic inequality matters in part because it exacerbates the experience and perception of insecurity for all in society: greater inequality means there is more to gain and more to lose from a change in their position on the income spectrum.

Beyond the day-to-day parliamentary dealmaking, the election aftermath may prove be one in which austerity plans are dialled down, labour market considerations dominate Brexit talks and vote-winning policies for ‘ordinary working families’ are reconsidered. At the very least, facing a broad range of possible futures makes it a good time to be a nimble think tank.

We need more people to be more involved in policymaking

The next phase of work for Nottingham Civic Exchange will look in more detail at the lives of Ordinary Working Families through research, policy development and working with local communities to identify important issues and come up with recommendations for making changes which have real life impact. They will also link students and staff at the university with wider communities through scholarships, internships, and research projects. In line with the RSA’s wider programme on revitalising economic democracy, we need more people to be more involved in policymaking – in this parliament and beyond – if government and society is to successfully address growing economic insecurity for growing numbers of people. Through partnering with a university committed to improving the city and region it calls home, Nottingham Civic Exchange will tighten the links between policy, action and legitimacy in addressing economic insecurity.

Jonathan is Associate Director – Public Services and Communities at the RSA (Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce). Read his posts on the RSA website here, or follow him on Twitter here.

This post originally appeared on the RSA blog.

Photos of Nottingham: top jess_k_kent1 on Flickr, middle Mr Thinktank on Flickr.

  1. We are aware of: Newcastle City Futures, Centre for London, Southern Policy Centre, Manchester New Economy. Let us know in the comments of others that we have missed. ↩

Internationalisation of universities and cities session at Going Global 2017

New research looks at the internationalisation strategies of cities and universities, and how they intersect

I was fortunate to join Professor Edward Peck, Vice-Chancellor of Nottingham Trent University, and Mihnea Costiou, Rector of Politehnica University of Bucharest, as part of a panel chaired by Bianka Stege, Director of Education and Society (EU Region), British Council at last week’s Going Global conference in London.

The panel focused on the internationalisation of cities, and I presented new research funded by the British Council. You can see the slides and listen to the audio here. A summary of the research is provided as part of the highlights of day three here, and Times Higher Education covered the research here.

The full report is embargoed until the UK general election, but will be published after June 8th.

Commissions, conferences and the voice of universities

Universities can position themselves as integral to parts of the debate where their inclusion is less obvious

Last week Stephanie Flanders, former BBC economics editor, launched the emerging findings of the RSA Inclusive Growth Commission at the Core Cities summit in London. The Commission follows in the footsteps of the City Growth Commission, which informed much of the previous government’s policy on cities and devolution.

The findings argue that:

As a country we need to put social capital on a par with traditional physical infrastructure when we consider how to invest public resources in future growth. That means treating as investment, policies that are designed to bring poorer people and places up to the level where they can contribute equally to economic growth.

A similar message emerges in the ‘zero draft’ of the New Urban Agenda that will be set out at the major UN Habitat III conference in Quito next month:

We recognize that we must ensure equitable and affordable access to basic physical and social infrastructure for all, including affordable serviced land, housing, energy, water and sanitation, waste disposal, mobility, health, education, and information and communication technologies. We further recognize that provision must be sensitive to the rights and needs of women, children and youth, older persons and persons with disabilities, and other people in vulnerable situations such as refugees, migrants, and displaced persons, removing all legal, institutional, physical, and socio-economic barriers that prevent them from participating equally in urban life and the opportunities it offers.

(For more on why Habitat III is a big deal, see this excellent piece published on The Conversation.)

Many economists and policymakers have long advocated for increased investment in education and other social goods on par with physical infrastructure. The voices of the Inclusive Growth Commission and Habitat III will add weight to these arguments.

However, the beneficiaries of investment in social capital also need to speak up at the major conferences and forums. Bodies such as universities and hospitals can make the case for investment in their facilities, and the economic and social returns this generates. They can also position themselves as integral to other parts of the debate where their inclusion is less obvious, such as provision of public space: a strong case can surely be made for investing in open university campuses designed to bring people and ideas together and share knowledge. When I read these sentences in the New Urban Agenda draft, they seem almost written with universities in mind:

Public spaces, which consist of open areas such as streets, sidewalks, squares, gardens and parks, must be seen as multi-functional areas for social interaction, economic exchange, and cultural expression among a wide diversity of people and should be designed and managed to ensure human development, building peaceful and democratic societies and promoting cultural diversity.

Photo: Panorámica del Centro Histórico de Quito on Flickr

Engines and Powerhouses evidence published

In what now seems like the distant past, before the Brexit vote and the change of government, the House of Commons launched an inquiry looking at the Northern Powerhouse and Midlands Engine and government policy towards regional growth. (You can read my thoughts on the Northern Powerhouse post-referendum here).

The written submissions to the inquiry have just been published. Of the 50 submissions, a quick count suggests that least a quarter are written by a university, a university group, or an institute based out of a university. Clearly universities are taking the regional growth agenda seriously.

Following the change of government, the committee will now look ‘more broadly at Industrial Strategy, rather than focussing on specific regional models’. Hopefully some of the good practice and lessons learned around forming strong regional links will be taken forward.

Work by Centre for Cities, looking at lessons learned from the Rhine-Ruhr (Germany) and Randstad (Netherlands) regions, found that these areas were successful not because of transport connections between their respective cities, but that ‘strong regional economies require strongly performing cities at their heart’, with a high concentration of knowledge-based businesses and highly skilled workers. This perhaps explains the high level of university engagement with regional policy in the UK.

The Rhine-Ruhr and Randstad regions were part of the inspiration for the Northern Powerhouse. Hopefully the importance of knowledge and skills as the basis for strong economies won’t be lost with a wider focus on Industrial Strategy rather than specific regional models.

I wrote Universities UK’s submission to the inquiry – read it here.

Photo: Kranhaus, Cologne on Flickr

Sim University

In Sim University YOU are the vice chancellor!

Introducing the latest instalment in the award-winning Sim franchise: manage your own university!

Will you guide a multi-faculty university to the top of the global league tables, or sit at the helm of a small specialist institution?

Will you become a pillar of your local community, helping the disadvantaged and working with small businesses? Or will you look to attract international students and form multi-country research partnerships?

You’ve just been hired. You have a board of governors on your back, local newspapers watching your every move, and students looking for jobs after graduating (and a great time before then). League tables are constantly tracking your rise or fall.

How will you balance the books and grow your reputation? Will you launch an aggressive expansion campaign, constructing lots of shiny buildings to attract students and staff, or focus on forming partnerships? Will you open overseas campuses, or build incubation centres for student startups?

How will you keep your staff and students happy? Will you pay salaries above the local average, or give free laptops to students? Your star academic is ruffling feathers – do you fire them or promote them?

In Sim University YOU are the vice chancellor!

Exclusive to the UK Brexit edition: prepare for the Teaching Excellence Framework, lobby the Home Office on student visa regulations, form regional alliances, and dabble in Higher and Degree Apprenticeships!

university_sc4-1

The case for simulators

Simulators can be a valuable testing ground. In a fascinating tour through the history of city building games, Richard Moss notes how urban planners used the original SimCity (released 1989) to test existing ideas and inspire new ones:

Playing SimCity helped develop our understanding—or mental model, as Will Wright [Sim City’s founder] calls it—of the urban environment that so much of the world’s population lives in, and it took some of the mystery out of why urban planners make the seemingly bizarre decisions that they do.

If you thought you could improve traffic flows by making the roads five times wider and staggering residential blocks with commercial and industrial ones, you could try it and see (spoiler: it doesn’t work—traffic always expands to fill road capacity, and such a zoning policy would lower land values and increase pollution). If you believed a nearby rail line was increasing crime in your area, you could model your city in the game and experiment with changes.

…the city builders of tomorrow will likely be all about exploring the future of real-world city design. After all, city builders were always—right from the very beginning—about building a utopia, and our best hope of one day achieving a perfect built environment is to practice in simulations first.1

Modern simulators have become increasingly sophisticated. One city planner has said that SimCity 4’s traffic simulator is ‘actually more advanced than what most traffic engineers use in real life’. The game has been used to model suburban sprawl.

She built more police stations in Providence than probably exist in all of Southeastern New England, swapped out the electric power plant for a nuclear one, and bulldozed the church

Others have used simulators as tests of competence for leadership roles. In a great article about the real mayors of SimCity, Jason Koebler tells the story of the 1990 Democratic primary election in Providence, Rhode Island, where a 15 year old freelancer for the local newspaper invited five mayoral candidates to compete against each other in a game of SimCity. One candidate didn’t take the test too seriously. She ‘built more police stations in Providence than probably exist in all of Southeastern New England, swapped out the electric power plant for a nuclear one, and bulldozed the church’. In a strongly-Catholic area, some felt this lost her the primary.

Some fare better. Koebler writes how in 2002 mayoral candidates in Warsaw, Poland played SimCity 3000. Lech Kaczynski won the competition, won the election, and eventually became the president of Poland.

So might there be a case for a university simulator? Universities are highly complex and higher education policy is interlinked with wider policies on economic growth, employability, skills, education, cities,2 internationalism and immigration. No two institutions are alike, and some are unrecognisable from one another. But I still think there could be some merit in a university simulator. I don’t suggest Sim University would make a good selection exercise for prospective vice chancellors, but we could test new ideas and also understand the complexity of effectively managing a university. I might be the only person who would play it though…

Images from SimCity 4

  1. Here is an example of a game created by a professor from the University of Southern California School of Architecture that aims to contribute to the discussion about the future of cities. ↩
  2. Incidentally, SimCity 4 confirms the important role universities play in cities. Josh Dzieza in the Daily Beast: ‘Education in SimCity is a sort of wonder drug: if you build a university, people get sick less, commit less crime, build solar panels on their roofs, get wealthier, and are generally better off. They also start to complain more about bad city services and pollution, so depending on what sort of Sim mayor you are it could have drawbacks.’ ↩

Four reasons to look at universities and urbanism in Ghana

Universities meet education and skills needs, but are also local development actors in their own right. In Ghana they can play an important role in both

Ghana faces a set of challenges similar to many emerging nations…

Ghana is an ‘African Lion’: a fast-growing economy, falling levels of vulnerable employment and rising productive employment led to Ghana becoming a lower-middle income country in 2007. However, there are skills gaps in the areas of medicine and health, engineering and technical skills, limited job opportunities in the formal sector for those leaving university, and the proportion of the labour force leaving tertiary education rose just 2 percent to 5.4 percent from 1992 to 2013.

…including the transition to a ‘knowledge economy’

In a paper submitted to the African Center for Economic Transformation, Baah-Boateng and Baffour-Awuah lament the gap that opened in per capita income between Ghana and South Korea from 1950 – when incomes were broadly similar – to today, when South Korea’s output is six times higher. They cite a World Bank paper that suggests ‘at least half of the difference is due to South Korea’s success in acquiring and using knowledge’. Their paper finishes with a strong set of policy recommendations (that are applicable nearly anywhere in the world), including the participation of industry in curriculum design, more internships during courses, placing university staff in industry, and government intervention to subside expensive technical courses at public universities.1

As I’ve noted before, creating better jobs requires making difficult decisions in education policy to match labour market demand.

Ghana

Ghana is a case study of global urbanisation…

In 2015 51.9 percent of Ghana’s population lived in urban areas, broadly similar to 54 percent globally in 2014. Ghana’s urban population will reach 72.3 percent by 2050, in line with 70 percent globally. Urbanisation is moving much faster than planning.

…which will bring challenges universities can help solve

UN Habitat recommends government collaboration with universities in Ghana to improve planning and to address sustainable urban planning principles. Accra, for example, is at risk of flooding and – as Rotterdam has demonstrated – universities can help city planners to simultaneously prepare against disasters and create a better place to live and work.

In the Greater Accra region, 40 kilometres from the capital, the new urban area of Ningo-Prampram is rapidly growing. Urban strategies stress the ‘very limited timeframe to avoid unplanned sprawl and transform Ningo-Prampram into a thriving and prosperous compact, connected, socially inclusive and resilient city, which would be a sustainable development example for the country of Ghana and for the region as a whole’. A ‘university city’ in the northeast would offer ‘residential areas and services for students, professors and researchers, developing innovative agriculture and forestry processes that are tested in the fertile central park and the northern irrigation lands, improving crop production and fostering food security’. This is an excellent example of the campus working with the city to test new ideas before rolling them out further – seen elsewhere in the form of smart campuses.

Photos: Cape Coast and Ghana on Flickr

  1. Although there are objections from within Ghana’s universities to relying on the taxpayer for funding. ↩

Rebalancing: a case study of South Korea

Previous governments restricted the expansion of universities in Seoul. In the 2000s, a new government put universities in charge of regional growth

Discussions over ‘rebalancing’ the economy outside of London by strengthening other regions – explored in part one and part two of this miniseries – are not unique to the UK.1 South Korean academic Haknoh Kim writes that:

Balanced development is not a new policy goal in South Korea. Two basic facts – too heavy a concentration in the “Seoul capital region” and a very limited degree of political decentralization – have aggravated the disparities across regions in Korea for a long time… the Seoul capital region, only 11.8% of the South Korea’s total areas, accommodates 46% of the population, 57% of all manufacturing firms, about 70% of enrolled university students, 2/3 of financial activities.

In the mid-2000s the South Korean government prioritised decentralisation and balanced development as a national priority, but, unlike previous governments, saw this ‘as a means to strengthening the competitiveness of the country as a whole’.2 Yong-Sook Lee, an academic at Korea University, explains how balanced national development was encouraged through innovation:

…the PCBND [Presidential Committee on Balanced National Development] set up 14 regional innovation councils with 725 commissioners across the country… These councils were designed to encourage local initiatives in creating and implementing regional policy. To achieve self-sustaining endogenous development, the PCBND pursued a Nuri [New University for Regional Innovation] project that nurtures local talent by supporting local universities. In 2004, the government allocated a five year grant of 1.4 trillion won [about £900m at today’s rate] for cultivating local talent in promoting regional strategic industries. In 2006, a grant of 260 billion won [£170m] was awarded to 109 local universities in non-capital regions… Furthermore, the PCBND placed emphasis on reinforcing networks between local universities and local industries for the purpose of boosting R&D activities in non-capital regions.

Universities seem to play a particularly prominent role in South Korea. Kim expands on the New University for Regional Innovation concept:

NURI promotes “competition” within respective provincial regions by concentrating financial support on excellent projects selected in each region. It is worth noting that local universities form the project headquarters in NURI programs. They should include in their project teams other regional innovation actors such as other interlinked universities, research institutes, local authorities, business firms, or NGOs. This way, the principal universities serve to build and expand innovative networks between business, academia, public authorities, and other related actors.

Arguably, business is underrepresented. Here is the composition of the Daegu-Gyeongbuk Regional Innovation Council in 2006, where universities are nearly a quarter of members but business less than 10 percent:

Category Number of councillors
Local/regional authorities (including civil services) 23
Research institutes 7
Civil society (including NGOs) 19
Universities 24
Business 9
Press 6
Innovation supporting agencies 12
Total 100

Kim concludes that ‘the emergence of regions as an autonomous and important actor in the development of the country is quite a remarkable progress in Korean society’. However, ‘Korea is lagging behind in that it lacks “regional experimentalism” found in Europe’, mainly due to a lack of ‘sufficient autonomy and independent resources despite the participatory government’s emphasis on bottom-up approach’.

Whilst universities have been instrumental to South Korean attempts at rebalancing, genuine autonomy, devolved resources and partnership between important local actors are required for regions to be strengthened. It would be valuable to see progress in the ten years since the two academic articles referenced here.

This blog is in three parts. Previously we looked at the future of the Northern Powerhouse, and how universities can help realise the benefits of agglomeration.

Photo: Daegu, Korea on Flickr

  1. My interest in South Korea was piqued by a single reference in the excellent Nations and the Wealth of Cities publication by the two Greg Clarks: ‘the national government has employed a strategy to diversify economic activity from the dominant Seoul capital region by incentivising clusters and universities to scale up in the regional cities. The complementary economic roles of Busan’s seaport and Daegu’s manufacturing expertise have also been significantly supported’. ↩
  2. Previous administrations tried to rebalance the economy by many means, including applying brakes on Seoul’s development by restricting the expansion of universities, factories, shops and other development that might attract migrants. Did we see an echo of this in the UK, albeit under a different policy narrative, in 2015 with the proposed crackdown on satellite university campuses in London, ostensibly to stop exploitation by economic migrants? ↩

Four ways universities can ensure effective agglomeration

Councils and local authorities outside of the larger cities have less experience of devolution. Here’s how universities can help

Yesterday we explored a possible widening of devolution in England beyond the 10 deals in place. These deals cover 16.1 million people mostly in larger urban areas. The highest profile devolution has been within the so-called Northern Powerhouse, with Manchester as its unofficial capital. The relative leadership strength of Manchester and history of close cooperation between its constituent local authorities has allowed it to forge a path that others outside London will struggle to emulate.

The driving concept behind the Northern Powerhouse is agglomeration. Devolution without agglomeration is certainly possible, but the sum-greater-than-the-parts benefits that arise from close proximity of workers, firms and education bodies mean truly effective devolution must be underpinned by agglomeration. Think of it as Devolution + Agglomeration Economics = Growth and a Knowledge-Based Economy.

The two highest profile agglomeration projects in England – the Northern Powerhouse and the Midlands Engine – have 50 universities between them. Higher education, as a knowledge industry, contributes to the agglomeration economies that drive city growth. This is evident in London, with over 40 higher education institutions. Other areas in line for devolution deals will often have at least one university on their patch. Here are four ways universities can help.

  1. If devolved areas are to be functional economic actors, there will need to be effective coordination between the different towns, cities and local authorities within the area. Universities can help. They have long-standing networks between and within regions. Universities have a long history of supporting local areas with analysis of needs and assets, and providing of evidence and policy insight. This will continue with Science and Innovation Audits that will help to map local research, innovation and infrastructure strengths and uncover opportunities for businesses.

  2. Locally-built international links will be important. Universities can draw on their global alumni and international research networks. Universities attract overseas students but also foreign direct investment. When considering regional investment in the UK, the skills of the local workforce and transport infrastructure are the key factors that influence decisions.

  3. Agglomeration economics can be seen in practice within universities. Many university campuses are public spaces, providing community services and cultural events, and the line between the public realm and the university estate is softening. Universities are ideal hosts for the human face-to-face connections that spread new ideas and knowledge. They often house incubation centres for startups and social enterprises, work with SMEs, and generate cutting edge research.

  4. Universities can meet local skills needs. There is a strong correlation between cities with more skills and higher levels of human capital, and local employment growth.1 The majority of future growth and the rebalancing of the economy will rely on knowledge based industries which are dependent on high level skills.

Recognising that devolution is a journey rather than a destination, universities should provide a long-term vision and help local partners to overcome the challenges and recognise the opportunities that come with devolved powers.

This blog is in three parts. Previously we looked at the future of the Northern Powerhouse. Next we’ll look at an international example of agglomeration economics in action.

Photo: ‘Granary Wharf’ (Leeds) on Flickr

  1. Shapiro, J., Smart Cities: Quality of Life, Productivity, and the Growth Effects of Human Capital, NBER Working Paper No. 11615, p.2; Glaeser, E. and Resseger, M., The Complementarity between Cities and Skills, NBER Working Paper No. 15103, p.17 ↩

Is the Northern Powerhouse dead?

The name may have fallen victim to shifts in the political landscape but the idea is a sound one

The past few weeks have been full of speculation as to the future of the Northern Powerhouse, the plan to create strong links between urban areas in northern England. The Northern Powerhouse was a mainstay of the Cameron government, and closely linked to George Osborne.

The Northern Powerhouse concept is underpinned by agglomeration – the idea that the concentration of people, businesses and education establishments in close proximity leads to new knowledge, transfer of new ideas and greater productivity. It’s a really good idea. I talked about it (under the guise of proximity) here. There’s plenty of academic work on agglomeration economies and clustering effects, and it is the driving force behind many of the City Growth Commission’s final recommendations.

But is the Northern Powerhouse still alive?

On 27 July Northern Powerhouse minister Andrew Percy and Treasury commercial secretary Lord O’Neill reaffirmed the government’s commitment to building a Northern Powerhouse. (Lord O’Neill had previously threatened to quit if the Northern Powerhouse dies. A few weeks later he threatened to quit again, this time over the UK’s approach to China. He’s not having a good month.)

However, Theresa May hasn’t mentioned the words Northern Powerhouse since assuming office. Her Economy and Industrial Strategy Cabinet Committee met for the first time on 2 August 2016 – the press release doesn’t mention the Northern Powerhouse either, but quotes May: we ‘need a plan to drive growth up and down the country, from rural areas to our great cities’. Many commentators have picked up on this – perhaps previous plans were too Manchester-centric, or the government needs to appease voters in large swathes of the country that voted to leave the EU, or the plans were too closely associated with the former chancellor. A broader focus seems inevitable.

At the same time, Andy Burnham used his nomination as Labour candidate for Manchester mayor to campaign for the resurrection of the Northern Powerhouse – a curious case of a Labour politician pushing a Conservative policy.

However, as Alexandra Jones notes on the Centre for Cities blog, a likely outcome is that work on the Northern Powerhouse continues, but the name might be quietly dropped. We may well see a more diverse range of future devolution deals, including for the first time some in the south of England, and a softening of the requirement for elected mayors. It will be difficult to do, but encouraging effective agglomeration more widely is a good move.

This blog is in three parts. Tomorrow we’ll look at how universities can help realise the benefits of agglomeration. And next week we’ll look at an international example of agglomeration economics in action.

Photo: ‘Salford Quay Apartments’ on Flickr

The future is local (and so are global challenges): the example of Rotterdam

Mayors are on the rise globally, but they need to be backed by a wide partnership inside and beyond their city

A recurring theme of this blog is how cities, rather than nations, will be on the front line tackling global challenges in the future.

I was fortunate to attend the European Social Services Conference in The Hague last week. The headline was ‘The future is local!’ and the event explored how public services can collaborate more effectively with local communities and their citizens in combatting poverty and social exclusion.

One of the headline speakers was Ahmed Aboutaleb, Mayor of Rotterdam. Across the world mayors are on the rise, not least in the UK with a recent raft of devolution deals including directly elected mayors for cities and regions, and likely to provide an alternate route to power for ambitious politicians.

Universities and colleges are included as partners for delivery, sources of expertise, and opportunities for sharing knowledge

Mayor Aboutaleb talked of the need to strengthen regional government, and of the opportunities higher education could provide for lifting the next generation out of poverty. I took the opportunity to visit Rotterdam, and it provides a good example of a city on the front line, gearing up to tackle large-scale problems. With 80% of the city below sea level and one of the largest ports in the world, Rotterdam is especially susceptible to climate change and has an ambition to become 100% climate-proof by 2025. The city’s adaptation strategy presents climate change as an opportunity for growth through developing smart solutions and making the city a more attractive place to live and work – and I found Rotterdam to already be an exceptionally well-designed city. Universities and further education colleges are included as partners for delivery, sources of expertise, and opportunities for sharing knowledge to other areas. Unsurprisingly, Rotterdam is also one of the 100 resilient cities (see my earlier post on resilience).

Rotterdam is a good example of a city with an effective mayor, backed by a wide range of partners, tackling international challenges. The self-styled Global Parliament of Mayors will have its inaugural meeting in The Hague (which is clearly the place to be) in September 2016, bringing together 125 cities – ‘large and small, from North and South, developed and emerging’. The group has the explicit purpose of crafting solutions to challenges, although, as a semi-critical Guardian writer notes, ‘what they might really be interested in is a global parliament of cities, rather than mayors, and that idea – a networked, global assembly of citydwellers, sharing hard-won insights into what works and what generally does not – strikes me as a far better plan’. Mayors are on the rise, but an effective mayor will need to be backed by a wide partnership inside and beyond the city.

Photo: Jurriaan Snikkers on Unsplash