Beyond devolution and decentralisation

Building regional capacity in Wales and Brittany

Alistair Cole

• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780719070921
• eBook ISBN: 9781847796240
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Democracy
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Beyond devolution and decentralisation compares the politics, policies and polity-building dynamics of devolution in Wales and decentralisation in the French region of Brittany. Empirically, the book draws conclusions from in-depth fieldwork within two regions and reports the findings of a comparative public opinion survey. Theoretically, it contributes towards our understanding of the comparative study of regions. Perhaps most impressive is how the case studies generally are based on, but also cast light back, to the nuanced theoretical framework on regional capacity established at the outset. The book uncovers the dynamics of devolution in Wales and decentralisation in Brittany through extensive face to face interviews: over 200 interviews were carried out from 2001 to 2004, a formative stage in the development of the devolved institutions in Wales and a period of expectation in Brittany as well. The book will be of interest to the professional research community and to practitioners in Britain, France and beyond, as well as to students on comparative politics, British/Welsh politics, French politics, European studies and public policy courses.

1
Regional capacity building in Europe

Much of the devolution debate in Wales has centred upon the uniqueness of Welsh constitutional arrangements and political traditions. There has been a strong temptation to resort to a form of Welsh exceptionalism to explain the emergence of the new Welsh quasi-polity. A comparative dimension facilitates a just appreciation of what really is distinctive within Wales and which trends are more generally applicable in similar regions. In Beyond Devolution and Decentralisation, the intention has been to deepen the understanding of processes of comparative regional governance by investigating two highly distinctive regions (Wales and Brittany) in two neighbouring European Union states. The term ‘region’ is used as a generic phrase to facilitate comparison within and beyond France and the United Kingdom, with the acknowledgement that in Wales, and to a lesser extent in Brittany, this term is a contested one. The binary Wales-Brittany comparison does not pretend to exhaust the possibilities of other comparisons. The empirical focus is only on two regions, and generalisation from two cases is hazardous. But there are compensatory advantages with the preferred binary method. Focusing on Wales and Brittany allows a mix of qualitative, quantitative and comparative analysis unavailable to a larger set of cases. From the outset, the position is taken that the comparative case-study method allows for in-depth comparisons which would be unrealistic with a larger number of cases (see Ragin, 1987).

The general context of the study is one of the reconfiguration of European states proclaimed in the abundant academic literature on governance (see Cole and John, 2001 for a summary). Though the state remains a key player, it has everywhere been undergoing a process of restructuring. In contemporary European societies, the classic institutions of government have had to adapt to new types of endogenous and exogenous demand, to the emergence of new stakeholders and changing political agendas (Keating, Loughlin and Deschouwer, 2003; Kooiman, 2003; Le Galès, 2002; Pierre, 2000; Rhodes, 1997). These changes have challenged the authority of central governments, even in traditionally unitary states such as France and the United Kingdom. All governments have been confronted with a weakening capacity to steer society by proposing solutions to the problems they have identified. Modern states of very different traditions have felt the need to develop new policy instruments and management philosophies to meet these challenges. There is an obvious link between the reform of the state and territorial capacity building. There has been a general tendency for states to institutionalise a meso-level of public administration, usually at first to achieve a more effective implementation of central government objectives. These meso-level public administrations have sometimes provided institutional capacity for the development of more autonomous forms of regional governance.

In this book, interest is primarily (though not exclusively) with the meso-level. Defining levels is, of course, a hazardous exercise, most especially in relation to regions which, more than localities, nation-states or international regimes such as the European Union, have a certain virtual quality (Le Galès and Lequesne, 1998). The identification of a European regional space consistently runs up against operational difficulties. There is no single level of regional government in Europe. For the purposes of the present comparison, ‘region’ is understood as being a meso-level of (actual or potential) public administration and site for political exchange.

This introductory chapter elucidates the general research question: that of regional capacity building, beginning with a brief overview of the literature on new regionalism, one of the most popular approaches over recent years. Next, a framework for studying regional political capacity is developed, followed by a brief presentation of regionalism elsewhere in Europe, focusing mainly on those countries which Breton and Welsh interlocutors declared to be their main comparators. Finally, there is a definition of the main dimensions of the Wales-Brittany comparison to be developed in subsequent chapters.

The new regionalism

The manner in which the regional question has been conceptualised, and political and public policy approaches to it, have varied quite considerably since the 1960s. In many European countries, regions were initially considered to be backwards, the antithesis of the modern nation-state building project. In the United Kingdom, one of the driving motivations of imperialism in the late nineteenth century was to cement a sense of British identity, over and beyond a feeling of belonging to the component nations of the Empire. Modern French identity was even more systematically founded upon a refusal to accept provincial or regional diversity. The French regions officially created in 1982 were the first new institutions created since the French Revolution of 1789. We observe similar trends in most other European countries. Germany was unified as a federation in 1871, but Prussia was so dominant that other states were cowed into subservience. Regionalism in Italy fell foul of national unification and later of fascism. Post-war Italy contained provisions for regionalisation in the 1946 constitution, but these lay dormant until the late 1990s. In Spain and Portugal, civil war and/or authoritarian political leadership crushed regional diversity. Only after Franco’s death did modern Spain reinvent itself as a decentralised, multinational state. Much earlier, west Germany had been resurrected as a semi-sovereign state in 1949 with a federal constitution, designed to check the re-emergence of a powerful central authority. After unification in 1990, Germany’s model of co-operative federalism was applied to the five Länder of the former East Germany, as well as the 11 remaining in the western part of the country.

New regionalism focuses upon the role of local and regional actors in constructing communities, building institutions and developing capacity. While the rich literature on governance above all emphasises structural change, new regionalism places more emphasis on human agency. Advocates of the new regionalism insist upon the importance of territorial politics in the emerging European polity. Keating, Loughlin and Deschouwer (2003) identify five general trends converging to underpin the new regionalism debate. As thorough an exposition as any other, these will be considered briefly here and referred to throughout the book.

The first trend identified by Keating, Loughlin and Deschouwer (2003) relates to the crisis of the model of top-down state territorial management. Almost everywhere, regions first emerged in the 1960s as units of administrative decentralisation. In the area of economic development, the emphasis was on state-led modernisation and planning. The State intervened to create regional development poles and direct industrial investment to regions in difficulty. The regional level was the one considered most appropriate at which to iron out territorial disparities, unacceptable in the context of the Welfare State. The State made few concessions to accommodate the cultural and linguistic specificity of regions. By the 1990s, the ‘regional question’ came to be formulated quite differently from that during the early 1960s. By this time, the top-down regional policies of the Keynesian state had given way to a new bottom-up model of regional development, based on notions such as the ‘innovative’ or ‘learning’ regions, where regions became political actors in their right. Although there was some early interest in the notion of a ‘Europe of the Regions’, this soon gave way to the more modest proposition that regions (and other sub-national authorities) are now key players in a wider system of European governance. New regionalism signifies first and foremost the development of regional capacity, whether conceived of in terms of stages of development (Loughlin, 2001), development coalitions (Keating, 1998), regional ‘regimes’ (John 2001) or powerful regional political institutions.

The second theme, introduced above, relates to the effects of economic globalisation. The classic nation-state was based on the idea of an all-embracing state national identity rooted in cultural and civic axes. Globalisation, as well as internal change, have corroded such a neat fit between state and nation. Summarising the complex and highly abstract debates about globalisation is not proposed here. Globalisation can be sub-divided into three categories: the ‘hyper-globalists’ argue that the nation-state is dissolving, faced with the pressures of globalisation (see Clift, 2003); the sceptics see not much difference (Hirst and Thompson, 1999); the transformationalists see globalisation as important, but difficult to predict. There are conflicting opinions between those who argue that globalisation is devoid of any link to territory and those who favour theses of ‘glocalisation’. Keating and McGarry (2001) argue that globalisation encourages the expression of new regional identities, as regions offer the most appropriate scale for a collective social consciousness to express itself. The increased importance of territory is not just a debate about distinctiveness, but also one about new forms of interdependence and co-operation within territories.

The type of regional capacity on offer links closely to the third theme: the rise of regional economic specialisation. The economic integration of Europe, competition from new regional centres of economic activity and changes in the concentration of multinational firms have all had an impact upon regions and localities. Increased economic interdependence has led to growing competition between and within cities and regions. Economic interdependence has arguably made economic management at the level of the nation-state much more difficult, but it can favour regional or sub-regional cohesion. Cities and regions believe they can influence investment decisions by deliberate strategic actions (Harding 1998). There is, it is argued, a direct link between external challenges and the internal quality of local governing coalitions (John, 2001). Cooke and Morgan (1998) talk of the ‘associational economy’ characterised by networks, associations, linkages between firms, social groups and government. Putnam (1993) goes furthest, linking local cultures of civic participation, prospects for economic growth and effective democratic performance. Quite apart from their institutional forms, regions are also a principle of organisation in civil society. Regional government works well when civil society is well developed, has a sense of identity, civic traditions, community life and relations of confidence (Putnam, 1993).

The fourth theme of the new regionalism is that of cultural regionalism. Everywhere in the old continent there has been a revival of the territorial identities at the local or regional levels (sometimes in competition with each other). Moreno and McEwen (2003) identify the emergence of a ‘European cosmopolitan localism’, as a new form of territorial mix of traditional and constructed identities. These imagined communities can take variable forms: city-states, regions, small nations. As regions have become socially constructed actors, so there has been a much closer interest in the link between regionalism and various forms of identity, especially culture and languages. In a number of states, minority languages have been revamped and multiple identities have prospered. Compound national identities are now the norm in most EU states. These compound identities can be cohesive or disintegrative, as we illustrate below in the case of Belgium and Spain. At the same time there has been a ‘deethnicisation’ of territory. Ethnic appeals have been de-legitimised, so the territory is presented as involving the experience of those living within it.

The fifth theme identified by Keating, Loughlin and Deschouwer (2003) is that of top-down functional regionalisation. There has always been a tension between political decentralisation and state regionalisation. Decentralisation ‘entails the exercise of autonomous decision-making concerning a set of political powers by sub-state governments, elected and democratically accountable to the citizens under their jurisdiction’ (Moreno and McEwen, 2003: 18). It requires elected Assemblies which can, if necessary, contradict the will of central government in specified domains. State regionalisation, on the other hand, implies no such democratic legitimation and is more concerned with co-ordinating the activities of the state at a local or regional level. Even states traditionally hostile to regional decentralisation (such as France and the UK) have introduced administrative structures to co-ordinate state activities at the meso-level. The Government Offices of the Regions in England correspond neatly to this description, as do the regional prefectures in France. Such efforts of co-ordination are essential if ‘regions’ are to become eligible for EU funding regimes.

Advocates of the new regionalism and new localism insist upon the importance of territorial politics in the emerging European polity (Keating, 1998; Parkinson et al., 1992). While globalisation and Europeanisation (arguably) challenge national state sovereignties, they might, through the concomitant process of enhancing regional governance systems, strengthen regional identities and vest a new significance to the concept of ‘territority’ (Loughlin, 2001; Keating, 1998; Cooke and Morgan, 1998). Regional actors assume new roles, functions, challenges and opportunities. The logical consequence of the new regionalism approach is to affirm common purpose through territorial differentiation.

While the governance literature opens interesting avenues of enquiry, new regionalism allows a more precise focus based on regional policy capacity, a theme now to be developed in more detail.

Studying regional political capacity institutions, relationships, identities, constraints

While governance is a useful descriptor for a set of complex processes, we prefer the concept of political capacity as a tool for comparing regions. Political scientists understand capacity in a variety of ways (John, 2001). We use capacity building as a generic term to identify a virtuous circle of resource synergy. Capacity building most obviously comprises regional political institutions, but also involves developing trusting horizontal and vertical relationships. There is a value-added dimension, insofar as good relationships are required to make institutions function effectively and to maximise policy outputs. Insofar as it involves relationships, capacity building is linked with trust and interconnectivity (Brown, Green and Lauder, 2001; Randles, 2001; John, 2001). Capacity is also rooted in identities, which we understand as a compound term for describing historical narratives, representations of community, beliefs and values. Regions are the classic imagined communities in which identities are constructed. Capacity building, finally, takes place within overarching sets of constraints and opportunities, first and foremost that of the relationship with central government.

Thus defined, we understand regional political capacity as an interactive process encompassing institutions and institutional processes, actors and their relationships, socially constructed identities, and forms of overarching regulation (Kooiman, 2003; Le Galès, 2002; Loughlin, 2001; Keating, 1998). Analytically, political capacity can be conceptualised as comprising four closely related but distinct components: institutions, relationships, identities and constraints. Each of these themes is now developed in more detail, a prelude to the in-depth comparative case study.

The study of political institutions is arguably the major growth area in contemporary political science. Political scientists have always studied institutions. Old institutionalist frameworks would generally describe organisations in terms of their formal rules and their legal rights and responsibilities (Finer, 1970). There was a sociological variety of old institutionalism, especially well developed in France. In the 1960s, the French Centre for the Study of Organisations (CSO) developed a series of innovative (for the period) ‘actor-centred’ studies of regionalism and local government. The emphasis of these early studies was upon the strategies adopted by actors within organisations, especially upon how actors were able to bypass formal rules by building networks and developing high-level contacts (Worms, 1966). There was some emphasis on relationships between organisations, but this fell short of what would be understood today as a policy community approach (Jouve, 1995).

What has become known as the ‘new institutionalism’ was launched by March and Olsen. New institutionalism developed as a reaction to the behaviouralist and rational choice theories that had dominated American political science since the 1960s. It is still running strong in spite of its inherent limitations. There are a number of somewhat contradictory ideas associated with the new institutionalist literature. In various accounts, institutions are understood as organisations, beliefs, historical understandings, incentives for human action or forms of appropriate behaviour (Peters, 1999; March and Olsen, 1989). There is a great deal of elasticity with the concept. Hall and Taylor identified three new institutionalisms in 1996. By 2000, Guy Peters presented six analytically separate versions of new institutionalism. Following Guy Peters (2000), normative institutionalism emphasises the overarching values and prescriptions of appropriate behaviour that provide stability for organisations. Historical institutionalism points to the historical determinants of the life of organisations. Sociological institutionalism stresses actor strategies within and across organisations. Ideational institutionalism emphasises the role of ideas within institutions. Pluralist institutionalism emphasises how groups attempt to occupy positions within institutions. Finally, rational choice institutionalism focuses upon how individuals use organisations in pursuit of their own goals. The value of the new institutionalist debate is to go beyond simply describing institutions in terms of their legal responsibilities. Its main disadvantage is that of concept-stretching: there has been such adjectival inflation that the new institutionalist debate has lost much of its early focus.

However we interpret them, institutions lie at the heart of regional political capacity. The present study draws upon old and new versions of institutionalism. Consistent with old institutionalist traditions lies an interest in the rule-making potential of regional political institutions and their ability to edict norms. From the new institutionalist framework comes an interest in the part played by regional political institutions in the broader development of regional public spheres (especially through their role in embodying collective beliefs and their linkage with popular identities). This approach, then, concerns institutions both as independent and as dependent variables. As independent variables, the intent has been to discover how the selected institutions have made a difference upon policy outcomes and the operation of regional political societies. The chosen institutions are even more interesting when they are seen as dependent variables: has the development of regional political institutions acted as a focus for territorial identities? Have institutions become arenas for the mobilisation of social and economic actors, as argued by Nay (1997) concerning the French region of Aquitaine? How is the operation of institutions shaped by patterns of social capital? These are difficult questions, which can only be investigated by using the comparative case-study approach.

Even with such an expansive definition, institutions do not cover everything. A comparison of regional political capacity must include relationships, identities and constraints, to which attention is now turned.

However far their meaning is stretched, institutions do not explain everything. In terms of building regional political capacity, relationships are every bit as important as institutions, perhaps more so. In normative terms, effective regional governance is predicated upon good relationships and shared values, as well as upon powerful institutions. Such presuppositions are present in much (but not all) of the literature on policy networks (Marsh and Smith, 2000; Marin and Mayntz, 1991), on territorial forms of governance (Le Galès, 2002; Keating, 1998; Putnam 1993), as well as in regime analysis (Stone, 1989) and the advocacy coalition framework (Sabatier, 1999). These concepts all involve shared visions and values amongst political, economic and societal decision-makers. Relationships are important since the co-operation of a broad range of actors is required for effective decision-making. Policy stakeholders in complex sectors such as education or economic development are engaged in a series of interdependent relationships. While good horizontal (and vertical) relationships can increase governing capacity, negative-sum inter-organisational rivalries can have a detrimental effect on the quality of policy outputs. If policy networks represent new forms of policy-making to deal with the complexity of modern governance, Richardson (1996) makes good sense in saying that the metaphor of community best captures the close personal linkages between actors involved in relationships in specific policy sectors and/or territories. The early policy-community literature was developed to explain stable i...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of tables
• Preface
• 1 Regional capacity building in Europe
• 2 Comparing France and the United Kingdom
• 3 Wales and Brittany: history, politics, society
• 4 Devolution and polity building in Wales
• 5 Decentralisation and political capacity building in Brittany
• 6 Political institutions, public and elite opinions in Wales and Brittany
• 7 Policy communities, public policy and policy learning in Wales and Brittany
• 8 Regional political capacity in Wales and Brittany
• Bibliography
• Index