ABSTRACT
Martin Jones and Gordon MacLeod The Geography of UK Devolution and England’s ‘New Regionalism’ Throughout the last two decades, Britain – or The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland – had gained notoriety as one of the most centralized state-societies in Europe. Shortly after New Labour’s landslide sweep to power in 1997, this unitary but multinational state was granted a comprehensive programme of constitutional ‘modernization’ featuring an elected Parliament for Scotland, a National Assembly for Wales, an Assembly for Northern Ireland, an elected Assembly and Mayor for London, alongside Regional Development Agencies for the eight English regions. This devolution of institutional capacity from London has been couched in a language of democratic opportunity. Indeed for the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, the ‘government’s progressive programme of constitutional reform1 is now moving us from a centralised Britain, where power flowed top-down, to a devolved and plural state. [He adds that] A new Britain is emerging with a revitalised conception of citizenship’ (Blair, 2000, 1 emphases added). Devolution thus promises a more inclusive politics, helping to realign the relationships between the territorial organization of the state and civil society.
