Partnership in Economic Development: The Case of U.K. Local Enterprise Agencies |
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| Authors: | David Smallbone |
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| Affiliation: | David Smallbone is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Geography and Planning and a member of the Planning Research Centre at Middlesex Polytechnic. He teaches on a range of courses concerned with local and regional economic development and his research interests are focused on small and medium size firms. Current projects include "A Longitudinal Study of Adjustment Processes in Established Small and Medium Sized Companies" and a study of local enterprise agencies as partnerships. |
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| Abstract: | The rapid development of local enterprise agencies in Britain in the 1980s has been an important focus for the increasing involvement of the private sector in economic development. These agencies present themselves as locally oriented partnerships and the paper draws on evidence from a recent survey, undertaken by the author in Greater London, to show what partnership can mean in practice. A particular focus is the relation between enterprise agencies and local authorities. This leads to a discussion of some of the policy issues arising from the development of these agencies which is part of a wider growth of the non-elected state in Britain through the decade. It is argued that their development raises important questions concerning their lack of local democratic accountability. |
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