Birmingham: Narratives of Neighbourhood Transition

Abstract

Economic and social changes and the policies adopted by a succession of governments have left British cities more unequal than their counterparts in other European countries (Musterd et al. 1998). The postwar welfare settlement in Britain had been significantly eroded before 1979 and was further weakened by neo-liberal policies after 1979. Consequently the differences between key features of the British welfare state and the more generous welfare states elsewhere in Europe increased. The UK is left not with the liberal welfare system suggested by Esping-Andersen (1990) but with a very unevenly developed, hybrid, welfare system with elements both of universal redistributive and liberal approaches (see, e.g., Murie, 1997).