ABSTRACT
This chapter attempts to place some of the more theoretical accounts of global economic and political transformations, notably the supposed shift from a Fordist to a post-Fordist regime of accumulation, in a local context. It focuses on the cultural and political negotiations surrounding the night-time economy which emerged in Manchester at the beginning of the 1990s and which continue there and in other UK cities today. The chapter argues that developing theories of social, economic and political regulation of urban realm should not place greater emphasis upon deliberate rule making of local state but also pay closer attention to cultural negotiations currently emerging in revitalized city centres. It utilizes the language of The Regulation School(i) although some distance will be maintained from their particular methodological stance. Deregulation of the night-time economy represents not only a policy of informalization which has facilitated proliferation in this new city of pleasure.
