Urban Policy in England and Wales and in France: A Comparative Assessment of Recent Policy Initiatives

In the past five years, Britain and France have introduced new policy initiatives with the purpose of tackling the problems of urban regeneration in a comprehensive and strategic fashion. City Challenge and the Contrat de Ville were announced as major policy departures in each country, and the respective governments launched them with the intention of achieving early results. Superficially, there is much in common between the two, and the purpose of this paper is to make a comparison of their stated intentions and of the process by which the two initiatives have been developed. In addition to secondary sources, the text of City Challenge bids for Barnsley and Kirklees and of Contrats de Ville for Dunkerque are drawn upon. It is argued that the two initiatives differ insofar as they are geared to the specific administrative and political circumstances of the two countries. There are, moreover, some distinct differences of scale. That apart, some significant similarities in the approaches emerge. Both, for example, lay emphasis upon partnership to achieve stated objectives. Both give a key role to local authorities. Both involve the integration of existing policies and programmes. Both raise the question of whether they are quite the major departure in policy that the two governments have claimed.