ABSTRACT
Much of land use planning operates through the agency of local government. American practice (with extreme local autonomy) has been discussed at length in previous chapters. In this chapter, the objective is mainly to give a comparative account of the local government systems in Britain and Canada, together with a discussion of the prevalence of corruption in American local government. This provides a necessary background to the discussion of comparative planning systems in the following chapter. American local planning is characterized by a great variety: it ranges from local governments with no zoning, to those with highly active (or reactive) land use controls. American local governments have a small number of elected members, and operate with a marked sensitivity to local feelings: that, after all, is what they are elected to represent. (As we shall see later, British local governments operate in a significantly different way.) Policies may be directed to serve the wishes of the local landowners (who may take it for granted that they should be able to make the maximum profit from their property), and to promote the growth of the area. Alternatively, they may be directed to implementing the desires of the electors to maintain the character of the area and exclude all new development, or at least all development which does not harmonize with the character of the area.1 Whatever the policy, it is typically determined by the local government itself, not by a higher level of government. Furthermore, unlike Britain, there is no political party control (as indeed is also the case at the state and federal levels); nor is there any system of control by a higher level of government as there is in Britain and Canada.
