Level best? The levelling up agenda and UK regional inequality

Mark Fransham, Max Herbertson, Mihaela Pop, Margarida Bandeira Morais and Neil Lee

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: ‘Levelling up’ - a policy agenda focused on reducing regional inequalities - has become the new mantra in British politics. This paper critiques the policy programme from its emergence in 2019 to the publication of the 2022 levelling up white paper. While it is a welcome recognition of gross regional inequality, local institutions lack capacity to deliver, there has been little genuine devolution and our analysis shows that little new funding has been committed. “Levelling up” could simply become the latest in a list of politically useful but empty slogans which are used as a substitute for resources and devolution.

Keywords: levelling up; inequality; regions; cities; funding; policy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O18 R10 R11 R12 R58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 14 pages
Date: 2023-11-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-geo and nep-ure
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Published in Regional Studies, 1, November, 2023, 57(11), pp. 2339 - 2352. ISSN: 0034-3404

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http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/117569/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Level best? The levelling up agenda and UK regional inequality (2023)
Working Paper: Level best? The levelling up agenda and UK regional inequality (2022)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:117569

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