ACADEMIC OUTPUTS
2020, forthcoming
PLACE-BASED STATECRAFT AND CIVIC UNIVERSITIES
Headlam, N (2020, forthcoming) Place-based Statecraft and Civic Universities in Courage, C (ed) The Handbook of Placemaking: Sage
2019
AN UNDERPOWERED NORTHERN POWERHOUSE ?
Headlam, N (2019a) An underpowered Northern Powerhouse: infrastructure in the ungovernable North; The North East After Brexit: Impact and Policy: Emerald
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ABSTRACT The author sets out the development of the Northern Powerhouse initiative since it was launched by George Osborne in 2014. The chapter reflects on where the policy initiative and programmes are now in 2019 as we await Brexit. The new Conservative Boris Johnson premiership in 2019 has backed Northern Powerhouse Rail between Leeds and Manchester, and in advance of the major UK Spending Review after Brexit and the smaller towns have been promised investment funds. This chapter presents the wicked issues involved in seeking to address the North–South divide and re-balancing the UK at a time of increasing and deepening social and economic inequalities. The chapter calls for the strengthening of the Northern Powerhouse initiative due to its phenomenal brand. This requires greater collaboration between the public, private and voluntary sectors across the North of England to address the key strategic policy issues and yet there is no one organisation driving the Northern Powerhouse initiative. The author argues the Powerhouse may well be both underpowered and ungovernable and that Politicians and what she calls the Policy Qualgecrats, need more compelling Imagineers of the North, if we are to benefit and make more sense of this new pan-regional scale of governance and turn it into a real force for rebalancing the North as a whole.
2019
GENDER, SEX AND GOSSIP
Headlam, N & Courage, C eds (2019b) Gender, Sex and Gossip; Women in The Archers: Emerald
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The intrepid team of researchers who brought you Custard, Culverts and Cake: Academics on Life in The Archers return with a hard-hitting exposé on the lives of the women of Ambridge. In this new book, the Archers Academics are joined by former The Archers editor, Alison Hindell and real-life Academic Archer Dr Charlotte Connor (a.k.a. Susan Carter), to examine the power of gossip in Ambridge, portrayals of love, marriage, and motherhood, female education and career expectations, women's mental health and the hard-won right of women to play cricket. Gender, Sex and Gossip in Ambridge gives the reader a deeper understanding of the real life issues covered in the programme, an insight into the residents of Ambridge, and validation that hours of listening to The Archers is, in fact, academic research.
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2017
WHAT A DIFFERENCE A MAYOR MAKES
Headlam, N & Hepburn, P (2017a) What a difference a Mayor makes. A case study of the Liverpool Mayoral model Local Government Studies 21:5
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The city region devolution deals have ushered Directly Elected Mayors (DEMs) to the front and centre of the political and governance landscape within English metropolitan regions in the UK. DEMs are invested with high expectations to deliver a range of beneficial urban outcomes. Yet, there is little empirical evidence on the how such Mayoral leadership might act differently to other types of civic leadership to bring about these outcomes. This paper through the deployment of an innovative methodology, a diary analysis, examines how different this leadership model is when compared to its immediate predecessor; the council leader. It finds that the new Mayoral role is less about ‘city management’ and more about ‘city representation’ particularly on the national and international political stage. The paper concludes that this has implications for resourcing this particular leadership model and for the wider research agenda into political and executive leadership of our cities.
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https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03003930.2017.1333429
2017
NECESSARY BUT NOT SUFFICIENT TO TRANSFORM PLACES?
Headlam, N & Hepburn, P (2017b) Directly elected mayors: necessary but not sufficient to transform places?: The case of Liverpool Chapter 7 of Directly elected mayors in urban governance: Impact and practice edited by David Sweeting: Policy Press
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​https://policy.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/directly-elected-mayors-in-urban-governance
2017
CUSTARD, CULVERTS AND CAKE
Headlam, N (2017c) Kinship Networks in Ambridge Chapter 13 of Custard, Culverts & Cake: Academics on Life with The Archers: Emerald
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​Headlam N & Courage, C (2017d) Being Academic Archers Introduction to Custard, Culverts & Cake: Academics on Life with The Archers: Emerald
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Leading scholars combine their love of The Archers with their specialist subjects, in Custard, Culverts and Cake - a sometimes serious, but most often wry look at the people of Ambridge. A group of Archers Academics take on subjects such as food, geography, social media, faith. There is, naturally, an entire section dedicated to the Helen and Rob storyline.
With contributions from members of the Academic Archers network, the book blurs the line between fact and fiction - The Archers as a BBC soap opera, and Ambridge as a real place in a county called Borsetshire. Each chapter is ‘peer reviewed’ by a different Ambridge inhabitant.
Custard, Culverts and Cake gives the reader a deeper understanding of the real life issues covered in the programme, an insight into the residents of Ambridge, and validation that hours of listening to The Archers is, in fact, academic research.
2016
LOCAL GOVERNMENT AND DEVOLUTION
Headlam, N & Hepburn, P (2016a)‘The Old is Dying and the New Cannot be Born, in this Interregnum a Great Variety of Morbid Symptoms Appear.’ How Can Local Government Survive this Interregnum and Meet the Challenge of Devolution? Representation Volume 51:4
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Local Government in England has long bridled at the restraints on its activities imposed by an over centralised state. Yet now, with the Government proposing to devolve powers and responsibilities to newly established city region governance arrangements, is it a case of be careful what you wish for? In this paper we argue that the devolution from central government to local city regions marks the end of the old ‘politics as usual’ approach that has underpinned the resilience and effectiveness of the local government institution but failed to engage and energise local politics. In this context we pay particular attention to the Manchester model as the ‘poster city’ for devolution yet we question if even this model is sufficient to re-cast local relationships between market and state and state and citizen to enable devolution to bring real economic and social benefits to all in the city region. We conclude by suggesting there are empirical and theoretical grounds for alternative governance approaches more suitable to these times of interregnum
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00344893.2016.1165509
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2016
INSTITUTIONAL AND POLICY INNOVATION
Headlam, N (2016b) Manchester: Institutional and Policy Innovation Amidst Austerity, Chapter 9 of Unequal Cities: The Challenge of Post-Industrial Transition in Times of Austerity: Routledge Eds Roberta Cucca Costanzo Ranci: Routledge
2015
NETWORKED URBAN GOVERNANCE
Deas, I and Headlam, N (2015) Boosterism, brokerage and uneasy bedfellows: Networked urban governance and the emergence of post-political orthodoxy Chapter 9 for Paddison, R. and Hutton, T. Cities and Economic Change: Sage.
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This chapter explores recent experiences of city governance, focusing in particular on theemergence of entrepreneurial governance strategies and considering whether this represents anew orthodoxy in urban policy. Drawing upon its application in different contexts, thechapter attempts to identify the different elements of entrepreneurialism in urban governance,arguing that the evolution of governance in cities is more complex and multi-faceted than issometimes appreciated. The chapter concludes by considering the degree to which urban
governance can be considered ‘post
political’ and speculating on the scopefor a future deepening in the extent of neoliberal governance strategies.
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2014
INTER-MUNICIPAL CO-OPERATION
N Headlam
European Public Leadership in Crisis?, 47-61
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This paper seeks to describe some of the ways in which collaborations within the city-regions of Manchester and Liverpool have been achieved, making the case that there have been divergent governance experiments which may hamper the aspiration for extensions beyond their border and for intra-urban leadership and governance which combines the two great cities and their areas of influence.
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https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/S2045-794420140000003012/full/html
2014
POWER IN CIVIC PLACE BASED PARTNERSHIPS
Headlam, N and Rowe, M (2014b) ‘The End of the Affair: Abusive Partnerships in Austerity’ Journal of Urban Regeneration and Renewal 17:2 for special edition Regeneration and Austerity edited by Lee Pugalis, Joyce Liddle and John Diamond.
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The dominant governance model of the New Labour years was that of partnerships. For some, the collaborative arrangements that sought to join-up government represented the ideals of innovation, inclusion and efficiency. The extent to which these values outweigh the perceived problems (slow decision making, lack of clear impact) is now being tested in the absence of area- or initiative-based funding. If partnerships were a valuable model for local governance, one might expect to see them survive the withdrawal of funding. If they represented a necessary burden in order to access resources, one might expect to see them disappear rapidly in straightened times. This paper reviews the experience of partnerships as a form of local governance in the current austere climate. It reviews evidence from a range of partnerships, including Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs), their constituent ‘blocks’ and New Deal for Communities (NDC) partnerships. Taking forward the characterisations developed in a previous paper, the authors ask: What has become of the relationships in which so much was invested? Do those relationships endure, perhaps in different institutional settings? Or were they really little more than the ‘temporary suppression of mutual loathing in the interests of mutual greed’?
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​https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/hsp/jurr/2014/00000007/00000002/art00002
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2013
GOVERNANCE OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
Deas, I, Hincks, S & Headlam, N (2013a) Explicitly permissive? Understanding actor interrelationships in the governance of economic development: the experience of England’s Local Enterprise Partnerships: Local Economy, 28 (7:2)
2013
INSTITUTIONAL AND POLICY INNOVATION
Headlam, N & Harding, A (2013b) ‘The Case of Greater Manchester ; Institutional and policy innovation amidst emerging austerity’ for Economic Development and Social Integration in Europe: Urban Policies in comparative perspective ed. Constanzo Ranci: Polimi Press
2011
SOCIAL INNOVATION
Headlam, N & Hincks, S (2011) ‘Reflecting on the Role of Social Innovation in Urban Policy’ Journal of Urban Regeneration and Renewal, 4 (2), 168-179.
2008
PRAGMATIC LOCALISM
Coaffee, J. and Headlam, N. (2008) Pragmatic localism uncovered: The search for locally contingent solutions to national reform agendas Geoforum, 39 (4) 1585