Whether or not the city can be a new source of societal integration is a moot point.
Urban Policy, Area Based Initiatives and the search for a `Joined-up Approach'.
In this section we discuss the urban policy developed by the Labour Government since its election in 1997, focussing on the priorities it attached to developing a `joined-up' approach to urban problems, encouraging community participation and tackling social exclusion. However, to place this in context we first of all outline New Labour's policy inheritance before going on to discuss the post-1997 period. Throughout the period since 1945 all governments have developed policies to address the problems facing Britain's urban areas (see McKay and Cox, 1979; Atkinson and Moon, 1994; Blackman, 1995 for historical detail). As Table 1 indicates it is possible to identify `distinct periods' in urban policy based upon problem definition and policy responses2; although the division between periods should not be seen as watertight. Until the late 1960s/early 1970s these policies were largely concerned with the physical reconstruction of cities, mainly by replacing slum areas with new housing in tandem with policies that sought to create new modern city centres and road networks. In both cases this involved demolition and rebuilding and represented a `physical approach' to the problems of Britain's cities (see Atkinson and Moon, 1994, chs.2). .
From the late 1960s onwards government gradually developed an approach to urban areas that sought to tackle social and economic problems. By 1977 this had developed into a full-blown policy that sought to tackle urban economic and social decline and regenerate .
Table 1 Periodisation of English Urban Policy. 1968-2006.
Period.
Problem Construction.
Policy Response.
1968-1977.
Social Pathology Approach - limited to small areas of towns.
Small scale area-based initiatives - largely experimental, reflecting lack of knowledge.