Lessons to be learned on both sides of the pond
Author: Adam MarshallDate: 01/12/2008
Publication: Public Servant
In our globalised world, importing successful policy ideas is every minister's dream. Over the past two decades, the process has been pretty much the same: a quick trip to the US - meet with mayors and governors, go walkabout, and bring home the latest policy initiative.
There's a strong market for trans-Atlantic policy imports - at least insofar as urban issues are concerned. But having spent my formative years on the other side of the Atlantic, and my professional career in the UK, I'm often struck by the one-way nature of the traffic.
It's true that UK ministers and city leaders can learn lessons from their US counterparts. But places like Manchester and Newcastle have a lot to teach the likes of Chicago and Minneapolis on issues as diverse as city-centre regeneration and cross-boundary collaboration.
While successive American administrations turned away from urban policy issues, Conservative and Labour governments have both made cities a policy priority in the UK. Senior ministers like Michael Heseltine and John Prescott have used their positions to raise the profile of cities and urban issues in policy debates, unlike their little-known counterparts in Washington.
So when should we in Britain cherry-pick ideas from American cities - and when should we stand up and shout about our own successes?
Many UK city leaders look wistfully at the financial powers held by their US equivalents. Big cities in the US have wider tax powers than UK urban areas, and often use them to develop innovative financing models - like Tax Increment Financing, where cities dip into the expected tax receipts from a project in order to pay up-front costs.
However, there's a downside to US cities' relative financial independence. While cities reap the benefits of growth at the peak of the cycle, their tax receipts decline sharply during economic downturns. Local councils across America are now feeling the pinch - and cannot rely on a comprehensive system of central government grants to make up the gap.
When it comes to financial power, UK and US cities lie at opposite ends of a spectrum. UK cities and city-regions do need far more financial power - such as greater control over business rates and Tax Increment Financing - in order to invest in local infrastructure and to deal with the consequences of economic shocks.
But British cities also benefit from being part of a national grant system that targets resources far better than Federal and State authorities in the US. Policymakers in Washington are keen to learn more about how ‘smarter' grants could be used to achieve better outcomes in cities - and we in Britain may be in a position to help.
Together with financial powers, US core cities often have charismatic mayors, with a strong vision and a range of policy tools at their disposal. Often, however, US mayors face an even bigger governance challenge than council leaders in the UK.
While Peter Smith and Richard Leese work to co-ordinate policy across ten councils in Greater Manchester, the Mayor of Chicago faces the nearly impossible task of linking up five hundred separate jurisdictions. In many parts of the US, fragmented governance is one of the key barriers preventing big urban areas from taking decisive action to improve the local economy.
The UK has some emerging lessons to teach the US here. For example, there is growing acceptance of the need for a city-regional approach to economic development in the UK policy community - and an evolving understanding that transport, planning, regeneration and training need to be delivered across economic rather than administrative areas. London's Skills and Employment Board and emerging cooperation in other areas are evidence of this.
City-regional policy has also been facilitated by stronger cooperation between Whitehall and town halls. English Multi-Area Agreements - the frameworks signed by central government and city-regions on cross-boundary economic development priorities - could serve as a model for US urban areas seeking to cooperate across existing local government boundaries.
The list of potential UK urban policy exports doesn't end there. As the Centre for Cities and the Brookings Institution argued earlier this year, some British cities could teach their US counterparts some valuable lessons on congestion charging, containing urban sprawl, re-using brownfield land and supporting their most vulnerable residents. Members of the Government and the Shadow Cabinet could play an important role here, using their visits to Washington to promote our cities' recent achievements.
With cities and towns on both sides of the Atlantic now facing tougher economic times, it's time to step up trans-Atlantic policy learning, and to ensure that the flow of ideas goes both ways. Both UK and US cities face further job losses and restructuring as a result of the global financial crisis, and should exchange ideas on how best to respond. As the US chooses a new president - and the UK's political parties develop new policies ahead of the next General Election - ministers and city leaders need to link up - now more than ever.
A version of this article first appeared in Public Servant
