Bourgeois Theories of Local Government
| Author | Warren Magnusson |
| Date | 01 March 1986 |
| Published date | 01 March 1986 |
| DOI | 10.1111/j.1467-9248.1986.tb01869.x |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Political
Studies
(1986),
XXXIV,
1-18
Bourgeois Theories
of
Local
Government
WARREN
MAGNUSSON*
University of Victoria, Canada
This paper offers an historical analysis
of
the principles
of
local government
organization that have been accepted in Britain and the United States. The central
thesis is that these principles express an ‘economist’ conception
of
politics and the
state. Local governments have been variously conceived-as business corporations,
consumers’ cooperatives, and institutions
of
the state-but in each case they have
been assigned a restricted, essentially instrumental purpose. This purpose is
connected to economic welfare, which, it is supposed, requires centralization
of
government. Thus the prevalent economist conceptions
of
local government
condemn the local polity to a tenuous existence.
Discussions of local government are often framed in terms
of
the high ideals
of
our civilization: liberty, equality, and fraternity; pluralism, social justice, and
democratic participation.
No
doubt such ideals find partial expression in our
local institutions and our policies towards them, but we see what we have and
what we do through an ideological veil. This is the veil
of
bourgeois ideas.
These ideas are not confined to a particular class, party,
or
nation, although
their predominance may be an effect
of
class hegemony. They structure our
understanding, and
so
lead to particular interpretations
of
ideals given in
advance. To explore this process in relation to the theory and practice
of
local
government
is
particularly fruitful,
for
this is a field little disturbed by the
transcendent insights
of
great thinkers. The very conventionality
of
most
thinking about local government makes the lineaments
of
bourgeois thought
stand out in sharp relief.
What follows here is not a complete account
of
bourgeois theories of local
government.’ In the first place, it focuses on the English-speaking countries,
especially Britain and the United States. Insofar as these countries have the
longest and best established traditions
of
local self-government and repre-
sentative democracy, such a focus can be justified. The present analysis,
however, would have to be altered
to
take account of continental European
*
This article is based on a paper entitled, ‘The State and Local Government: Anglo-American
Conceptions’, delivered at the Canadian Political Science Association Annual Meeting, University
of
Ottawa, 9 June 1982. The author is grateful to Professor A. H. Birch
for
his helpful comments
on the earlier paper.
I
I
have dealt with other aspects
of
these theories in ‘The New Neighbourhood Democracy:
Anglo-American Experience in Historical Perspective’, in L.
J.
Sharpe (ed.),
Decenlralisr Trends
in
Wesfern Democracies
(London, Sage, 1979), pp. 119-56; ‘Metropolitan Reform in the Capitalist
City’,
Canadiun
Journal ofPoliiicolScience,
14
(IYSI), 557-85; and ‘Urban Politics and the Local
State’,
Sizrdies in
Polifical
Economy,
16
(1985).
I1
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1986
Poliiical
SiudieJ
2
Bourgeois Theories
of
Local
Government
experience.* In the second place, the analysis concentrates
on
the phenomenon
of
‘economism’-the tendency
to
understand local government in economic
terms and to make economic welfare the main criterion for assessing political
arrangements. This tendency reflects the utilitarian bias
of
bourgeois thought.
It
finds expression not only in the obsession with efficiency among local
government reformers, but also in their concerns about redistribution and
economic development at the local level. More fundamentally,
it
is expressed
in the common conceptions
of
the municipality as a business corporation, a
consumers’ cooperative,
or
an agency of the welfare state. One
of
the claims
implicit in the following argument is that these varying conceptions all lend
support to the ostensible sovereignty of the central state, and hence
to
the
process
of
centralization that has been
so
marked in this century. In any form,
bourgeois theories
of
local government condemn the local polity
to
a tenuous
existence.
Local
Business
Corporations
In Anglo-American practice, the municipal
corporation
is the primary unit of
local government. Local government was municipalized in the 19th century.
Before
1835,
municipal boroughs in England were only one element in a
complex system
of
local government and probably
not
the most important.
However, they were corporations established by and
for
urban businessmen,
and as such became the model for local government organization in the
bourgeois age.3 The reforms made between
1835
and
1929
standardized
arrangements for local government, and eliminated whatever could not be
assimilated to businesslike
principle^.^
The old county courts and parish
vestries that once had been at the centre
of
English government were stripped
of
their main functions. All the new local authorities were organized as
businesslike corporations, with elected councils, the right
to
levy rates
on
property, and a range
of
powers and duties specified by national legislation.
Parliamentary supremacy was decisively re-affirmed, and the principle
of
elective local government was established in face
of
claims from some that
local authority was an aristocratic privilege, and from others that it belonged
to
the people
en rn~sse.~
Under the new regime, every local government would
2
Kenneth Dyson,
The Stale Tradition
in
Western Europe
(Oxford, Martin Robertson, 1980),
considers this.
3
Local improvement commissions, rather than municipal corporations pioneered the main
urban services in England.
S.
and B. Webb,
English Local Government
(London, Frank Cass,
1963),
Vol.
4,
pp. 2-3, 235-6. However, these commissions
too
were business organizations, and
their functions were gradually taken over by the reformed municipal corporations after 1835.
On
the municipalization
of
local government generally, see especially
D.
Fraser,
Power and Aufhority
in the Victorian City
(Oxford, Basil Blackwell, 1979).
There are various accounts
of
this process: J. Redlich and
F.
W. Hirst,
The History
of
Local
Governmenr
in
England
(2
vols) (London, Macmillan, 1901); Webb and Webb,
English Local
Governmen/,
Vol.
3,
Ch. 11;
H.
J.
Laski, W.
I.
Jennings, and
W.
A. Robson (eds),
A
Cenrury
of
Municipal Progress: the Last Hundred Years
(London, Allen
&
Unwin, 1935); and
V.
D. Liprnan,
Local Government Areas,
1834-1945
(Oxford, Basil Blackwell, 1949).
5
Although Fraser is conventionally sceptical
of
the claims
of
radical democracy, he makes clear
that there was popular democratic resistance
to
the municipalization
of
local government.
See
his
Power and Authority in the Victorian City.
pp. 62-3,
84,
130-48. Municipalization threatened
parish institutions that were, in many urban centres, susceptible
to
mass democratic control. See
D.
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