ABSTRACT
A core feature of early enterprise policy emerged regarding the regional focus of many interventions, especially in relation to the mounting unemployment crisis of the early 1930s. This policy agenda centred on a recognition of regional disparities and included the opening up of a second core area of enterprise policymaking, its support for regional development. As we will discuss in this chapter, regional policy was not primarily focused on small businesses and the small business elements of regional initiatives tended to focus on providing alternative sources of finance. There were some interesting innovations and moves towards deeper engagement with the businesses that we highlight throughout the chapter but, as we will discuss, these tended to be limited in scope and often significantly underdeveloped. To explore these themes, we first discuss in detail the development of the ‘Special Area’ approach to regional policymaking and its implications for enterprise policies and then outline the years of relative neglect of enterprise policy in the 1950s and 1960s.
