Moreover, despite some changes, the areas experiencing this spatial and social exclusion have remained remarkably consistent over the last 30 years and defied numerous attempts to `regenerate' them and reconnect them with `mainstream society'. Britain's cities thus exhibit a complex mosaic of economic growth and decline, affluence and poverty and social exclusion, segregation and integration (see Pacione (ed), 1997; Imrie and Raco (eds), 2003; Johnstone and Whitehead (eds), 2004 for examples).
More recently, in common with developments across Europe, there has been a renewed optimism regarding the future of cities based upon the desire to replicate the success stories of several European Cities. In England major cities such as Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham, and smaller cities such as Bristol, have developed various forms of city-region (or metropolitan) partnerships (on these see respectively Harding, et al 2004; Murie et al, 2003; Boddy et al, 2004). Increasingly cities are viewed as the "locomotives of economic and social progress" in the UK (Miliband, 2005, p1) and thus they have moved back up the policy agenda (see also Core Cities Working Group, 2004; ODPM, 2006a). In particular this new prominence for cities has been connected to their role in the development of a `knowledge-based' economy and the apparent need to ensure a certain quality of life is available in order to attract key knowledge workers (see Florida, 2000 and 2002). The city, as a collective actor, is allocated a key role in these developments.
In the 1970s and 1980s the city in Britain clearly was not seen as a source of `integration', indeed it was largely viewed as a source of problems. The question remains in this new situation where the city is viewed in a more positive light, can the city function as an integrative mechanism? In many ways today's cities are more diverse, fragmented and divided than they were 30 years ago and the drive to (re)create inclusive communities and neighbourhoods is a recognition of this reality.