Action for Cities: the Thatcher government and inner-city policy

Abstract

This article surveys the Thatcher administration's approach to inner-city policy. It uses recently opened archives to reignite the debate over how far these years marked a radical break with past practices towards market-oriented approaches. The first part explains why inner cities became such a central issue for the Conservative party, running through all areas of domestic policy and taking up a vast amount of legislative time. The second part details some of the transatlantic neo-liberal ideas that blamed inner-city ills on government intervention, which were increasingly influential amongst senior Conservatives. The third section shows how little free market ideology actually succeeded in directing government policy, which more often than not saw an expansion of the role of the state. Antagonism with local authorities is revealed to have been a much more important and influential factor. These themes are expanded in the fourth section, which charts the Action for Cities policy drive of Thatcher's final term.

Landscapes of Hope and Crisis: Dereliction, Environment, and Leisure in Britain during the Long 1970s

“…123 The Thatcher government had its own ambitious plans for derelict land, from urban development corporations and enterprise zones to garden festivals and industrial museums, as well as a large-scale expansion of the Derelict Land Grant; by 1984 an area the size of Grimsby was being reclaimed every two months. 124 Whether there was something fundamentally new, or Thatcherite, about the approach is a question beyond the scope of this article, although Sam Wetherell has recently argued that garden festivals pioneered a fundamentally new kind of urbanism. 125 Pierre Botcherby's account of Operation Groundwork in St. Helens suggests that the main development in government-sponsored renewal strategies during the 1980s was a greater emphasis on voluntary and community participation.…”

“…127 But the sheer number of government projects aimed at the issue throughout the 1980s suggests that, in common with many areas of 1980s innercity policy, there was an expansion rather than a diminution of the role of the state. 128 The famous photograph of Thatcher striding across a desolate wasteland in the Tyneside Enterprise Zone is indicative that derelict landscapes retained a potent symbolism. The representative reuse of derelict areas of this period was not for recreational uses, but instead distribution centers and out-of-town business parks.…”