We draw much of the evidence in this book from evidence relating to England, as this is the jurisdiction we are most familiar with, the site of most rapid and intense reform in the UK, and perhaps as a consequence of this, the subject of a great deal of attention from scholars. In this chapter, however, we compare England to the other parts of the UK – illustrating both the opportunities and constraints offered by the UK's lack of a written constitution, and how urban governance in England is at the same time similar and very different to Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

City governance is an area that offers a great deal of scope for variation at the national level. The structures put in place by national governments can act to give a great amount of flexibility to the approach taken by others tiers of governance, or they can constrain and frame those tiers in various ways. In the UK the devolution agreements with Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland allow this variability, and this chapter considers their respective developments with regards to city governance. This includes how the UK government, responsible for England, has changed its regime of funding and policy for cities. Key aspects that will be discussed are the introduction and implications of urban austerity measures, and an overview of the other funding arrangements that have been made available for cities. The chapter then explores how the devolved administrations of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are proceeding in different and similar ways. Key differential factors including the scope of devolved powers and contextual differences are discussed, along with how the political contexts of the different nations have led to a variety of policy choices. Finally, the chapter reflects on how the latter developments in the devolved administrations have affected English governance arrangements.

The United Kingdom

The ways in which the UK are governed can be complex and often difficult to follow. Across the following chapters the ultimate aim of this book is to discuss the UK focusing specifically on the sub-national scale, that is, everything from regional development (Chapter 3), to cities and local authorities (Chapters 4 and 5), and neighbourhoods (Chapter 6).