Comparative British Central-Local Relations

Abstract

This article examines three key, possible post-devolution trends relating to central-local relations in England, Scotland and Wales. First, the Scottish and Welsh cases indicate that devolution does not inevitably lead to regional centralism and that central-local relations at the regional or intermediate levels are less competitive and more collaborative where a power balance or symmetry exists between the intermediate and the local level. Second, post-devolution differences in how the public services are being restructured in England, Scotland and Wales suggest that the trend towards governance is not immutable but at least partly a matter of political choice. Third, even so the post-devolution policy similarities between the metropolitan centre and the two devolved territories remain pronounced with a pattern of continued policy tracking, through which the dominance of the metropolitan centre is maintained indirectly rather than directly.