ABSTRACT
The historical dimension is essential to understanding the present context of centre-local financial exchange. A major indication of this interdependence is the growing importance of centre-local financial exchange in achieving economic and social objectives. Paradoxically, the high rates of economic growth in the 1960s that fueled the welfare state also generated a closer relationship between national and local resource allocation. The growth of the welfare state is the independent variable in the equation of changing centre-local relations. Growth meant that national economic and social goals must be brought into closer relationship with local capabilties and resources. The early growth of the public sector tended to brush them aside, but the welfare state may now need their co-operation and assistance more than ever before. The chapter also presents some closing thoughts on the key concepts discussed in the preceding chapters of this book.
