Contradictions seem to beset current regeneration
practices and debates in the UK. National Ministers and civic leaders
lay claim to ‘turning corners’ and ‘seeing clear evidence
of success’, whilst research studies point to ever-widening gaps
between different regions and neighbourhoods in the country. These
are not new debates, since national government policies first recognised
uneven spatial development in the 1930s and integrated these responses
into wider national spatial policies after the 1950s. For the next
twenty years planned decentralisation and containment of the main
urban areas was complemented by a regional policy, the later designed
to attract mobile investment and to stem the outward migration of
labour. A new crisis associated with globalisation, de-industrialisation
and neo-liberal ideologies became associated with a ‘paradigm’
change in state policies and practices in the 1980s. This period saw
the extent, scale and scope of uneven spatial development increase,
and policy responses in all localities of the UK, and more widely
Europe, becoming characterised by competitive and free-market oriented
approaches. The purpose of this paper is to assess local practices
in the northern city of Sheffield in order to analyse the prospects
of localities that were seen as declining regions in the 1980s. The
paper in turn examines the nature of decline in Sheffield and the
current claims of an urban renaissance in that city. Until the end of the 1970s, Sheffield had an unemployment
rate below the national average (see Table 1) and was regarded as
a successful manufacturing city that produced internationally competitive
products (see Tweedale 1995). The city had long evolved beyond the
early ‘Marshallian’ industrial district, but the performance
of the urban economy was still associated with the continued importance
of processing specialised steels and making associated metal products.
Nearly half the city worked in manufacturing businesses in the early
1970s, but this period also saw a diversification of the employment
base including the movement of Central Government civil servants to
the city from London and new investment by the then Midland Bank (now
HSBC). Whilst this combination of conditions generally disengaged
Sheffield from the worst weaknesses of the country’s industrial
performance in the 1970s, the overly specialised economy was still
to be a critical factor in shaping the dramatic decline that was occur
after 1979. The clearest illustration of the city’s decline
in the 1980s was the sharp reduction in those employed in metal and
metal goods production by nearly a half between 1981 and 1991, a loss
of 33,500 jobs (see Table 2). This decline was to continue with a
further 10,700 jobs lost in these sectors between 1991 and 1996. Sectors
that contributed 29% of the city’s jobs in 1981 had been reduced
to providing just 13% fifteen years later. Substantial increases in
the number of people employed in financial and business services were
unable to off-set these large losses in simple quantitative terms,
and the city saw its employment base decline by 12.4% between 1981
and 1991, and by a further 5.4% over the next five years (see Table
2). Consequent selective economic migration led to a decline in the
population of the city from 548,000 in 1981 to 529,300 in 1991, although
it had increased slightly up to 530,400 by 1996. The rapidity of industrial restructuring in the city
can be shown by drawing comparisons with wider patterns of urban change
over the same period (see Table 3). Long-term trends in urbanisation
involve complex and varied processes of change but the overall drift
of employment and population has been away from larger cities and
towards smaller towns and rural areas, and from North to South. “Proximity
to London has been an advantage, while relative specialisation in
traditional industries has been a drawback” (Begg, Moore &
Altunbas, 2002, p129). The evidence from Sheffield fits this broad
analysis, but also exhibits two other noteworthy features: the decline
appears to have occurred later and quicker than in other major urban
areas (see Table 3); and by the mid-1990s Sheffield was classified
as a ‘steadily declining city’ at a time when some other
urban areas were exhibiting an improvement in their competitive position
as measured by differential growth rates in employment and population
(Robson et al 2000). The closure of businesses and the dramatic decline
of traditional sectors in the city left visible and measurable impacts.
The industries had been concentrated in relatively few areas of the
city (the Lower and Upper Don Valley, and the Sheaf Valley/city centre)
and had often occupied very large buildings. Many of these had little
intrinsic value and once vacated became derelict or they were demolished
leaving vast tracts of waste-land, very often polluted, inadequately
serviced and with poor road access. Unemployment in the city rose
dramatically in the mid-1980s as Sheffield’s decline coincided
with wider restructuring of the national economy, high levels of youth
unemployment and a deep recession (see Table 1). A labour market that
was generally readjusting towards greater levels of female economic
activity and more flexible and part-time working generated little
immediate demand for male ex-steel workers or the poorly qualified
young men that would have once entered the same industries. The extent of general social breakdown and the disintegration
of communities in some neighbourhoods at this time cannot be understated.
Data from the 1991 Census of population ranked Sheffield as the 36th
most deprived district in England, with multiple local deprivation
concentrated in the inner city wards and previous working class social
housing estates. Although the city did not experience the major urban
riots that occurred elsewhere, unemployment rates amongst black and
ethnic minority populations in Sheffield were nearly four times that
of the white population. An increasing divide between the rich and
poor areas of the city was exhibited in a number of measures: unemployment;
income; housing conditions; educational achievement; crime and health
(Sheffield First Partnership 2000). It is against this historical background that a recent
report on the English ‘core cities’ contained the claim
that “cities are back and the reasons are simple. They remain
centres for wealth creation, trade and culture…” (John Prescott,
Deputy Prime Minister, ODPM 2004, p.1). Specifically, Sheffield’s
economy was seen to exemplify the challenge of responding to economic
change. “Heavy reliance on steel production made the task of
modernising its economic base greater than in many cities of comparable
size… but since the mid 1990s has created 5,000 net new jobs
a year. Inward investors are now creating 2,000 jobs a year”
(ODPM 2004, p.10). The report also claimed that from 1996 to 1998
its GDP per head rose faster than in most regional cities, and in
2002 the city had an unemployment rate of some 5%, just above the
national average. What had happened to change a position where Sheffield’s
competitiveness in the mid-1990s was adjudged to exhibit a notable
underperformance as a result of having an underdeveloped asset base
that was not even harnessed to good effect (Deas & Giordano 2002,
p.204)? The answer to this complex question relies on eclectic
and impressionistic evidence in the absence of comprehensive statistics
that would provide a rigorous analysis of long-term patterns and comparisons
with other areas. There are many measures of successful regeneration
and urban development (see for example Savitch and Kantor 2002), but
a major five-year ESRC funded research programme in the UK concluded
there is “no simple or unambiguous way of measuring competitiveness,
especially at the level of the city” (Begg 2002, p.312). Even
the interpretation and use of the concept of ‘urban renaissance’
within current UK urban policy can be contested, but here simple measures
of investment, business development and employment are used to assess
recent change in Sheffield’s economic performance. A ‘tour’ of the city in 2004 clearly reveals
evidence of new investment in property and infrastructure. The main
traditional industrial area of the Lower Don Valley has benefited
from significant private and public investment in new roads, site
reclamation and preparation, and a range of retail, leisure, industrial
and commercial developments over the preceding ten years (Dabinett
& Ramsden 1999). The city centre has seen the construction of
a considerable number of ‘urban lifestyle’ and student residential
apartment developments over the last five years, some of which are
new build whilst others have involved the refurbishment of previous
industrial buildings. This is a feature of other cities, with Manchester’s
city centre population increasing from under 1,000 in 1991 to over
15,000 in 2004, and Liverpool’s growing from 2,300 to 9,000 over
the same period. The most spectacular developments have been public
space projects, with the Millennium Galleries, the indoor Winter Gardens
and the Peace Gardens, all part funded by the National Lottery and
part of the master plan of the ‘urban regeneration company’
- Sheffield One. The campuses of the two universities, to the north
and south of the city centre, saw considerable investment in new buildings
as the number of students in the city rose to over 30,000 in this
decade. During the 1990s public investment was also made in a ‘supertram’
system and road improvements. A continual and increasing stream of
state regeneration monies have underpinned many of these developments,
greatly enhanced over the 2000-7 period by EU Objective 1 status for
the wider South Yorkshire sub-region. Thus many of the city’s
physical assets show considerable quantitative and qualitative measures
of change. A significant feature of economic restructuring in
the city was the closure of many businesses and a reduction in the
already narrow entrepreneurial base. In addition, the city has not
attracted a constant inflow of ‘greenfield’ foreign direct
investment projects, although the international printing company Polestar
has recently decided to build new facilities in the city. Instead
business growth has emerged from three main activities: As with investment, it is possible to claim both
quantitative and qualitative changes have occurred in the industrial
base of the city between 1994 and 2004. The report on the core cities of Birmingham, Manchester,
Liverpool, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Nottingham and Sheffield
(ODPM 2004) presents data that indicates that the rate of employment
growth between 1995 and 2002 was greatest in the former ‘steel
city’. The core cities on average saw employment levels increase
by some 11% over this period, whilst Sheffield’s employment was
claimed to increase by over 25%. The report links this to the role
of all the cities in attracting and providing the conditions for employment
growth in ‘dynamic new sectors’. However local events suggest
that such an analysis needs to be treated with some caution in the
case of Sheffield. Firstly, employment diversification was occurring
in the city even in the worst period of industrial restructuring,
and the current growth exhibits a continued trend of increasing jobs,
often casual, in particular private and business consumption sectors
(e.g. retail, hotels and construction). As the cycle of decline is
reversed then multiplier effects become positive once more, the city
‘catches’ up with other urban areas whose performance is
linked to earlier increases in market confidence and disposable incomes.
Secondly, a change in national Government in 1997 coincided with an
extended period of economic growth and stability, linked to a new
‘welfare-to-work’ regime in the labour market and a national
minimum wage. National policies since 2001 have also supported increases
in public expenditure and investment, which have benefited employment
sectors well represented in the city such as health, education and
government functions. Whilst Sheffield appears to once again be a
provider of jobs at levels associated with the pre-restructuring period,
it less clear how these new post-industrial activities link with wider
urban well-being and social justice. The continued presence of deeply
deprived communities in the city would suggest that inequitable impacts
are occurring alongside the more obvious quantitative changes in the
employment base of the city. Property and labour are two assets that have been
found to underpin urban competitiveness in terms of their availability
and quality (Deas & Giordano 2002), and have clearly underpinned
many of the public policy efforts to respond to industrial restructuring.
In Sheffield both factors on first examination exhibit positive outcomes,
although a more critical examination exposes the diverse and contested
nature of any urban ‘renaissance’. Although levels of unemployment
have fallen and employment has increased within the city, this labour
market performance also conceals a residual inactive labour force,
reflected in 18% of those people unemployed in Sheffield being aged
over 50 years, and 36% being long-term unemployed in 2002. Particular
ethnic minorities also still experience higher levels of unemployment.
Similarly, educational attainment has generally improved in the city
supported by national programmes to improve the quality of labour
supply, but it still lags behind the more prosperous south east of
England and is deeply divided between different parts of the city.
In addition, despite the city now providing more employment in sectors
linked to the expansion university education, such as business and
financial services, Sheffield like most of the north of England is
a net exporter of university graduates. Thus employment has been created
within new industries, but job opportunities often reflect the divisions
of labour seen in previous rounds of industrial development. For example,
the availability of relatively cheap and skilled labour in the city
has provided one basis for call-centre developments. A similar disjuncture between local events and impacts
appears to have occurred within the property market. There has been
considerable new investment and cranes are seen on the city’s
skyline, with much of this development funded by public grants or
related to occupancy by public bodies. Displacement effects appear
to be occurring as the spatial pattern of land and property values
shift within the city without the overall performance reaching the
same level of property outcomes in other prime urban locations, such
as Leeds and Manchester. Similarly, the collapse of the ‘dot.com
bubble’ saw the scaling down and delay of an ambitious public
supported ‘e-campus’ in the city centre, and other major
city centre developments completed in the last five years are mainly
residential rather than commercial or retail schemes. The impact of
displacing potential employment uses with these ‘urban lifestyle
developments’ is unknown as yet. Whilst the provision of this
particular high-value private housing continues, the fragility of
renewal is exhibited in the need for central government to fund demolition
of social housing in areas of ‘low demand’ through its Housing
Market Renewal initiative. These reconfigurations of the city’s
urban spaces point towards more contestable and divisive impacts within
the city as the restructured economy aligns and continues to re-adjust
to new global economic patterns. These inequalities also extend beyond
the city to its hinterland and region (see Table 5), and nationally
the division between the rich and poorest in society has also increased
since 1997 despite consistent economic growth and government policies
that prioritise the reduction of social exclusion (IPPR 2004). The evidence in this paper, albeit limited, points
towards a quantitative and qualitative reversal to Sheffield’s
decline of the 1980s and 1990s. This pattern would also appear to
be similar to that in other equivalent cities in the UK. A reversal
that is likely to have been conditioned by a complex and varied mixture
of local and national policies and historical economic behaviours.
Pre-dominant in these must be the set of conditions that have sustained
a period of national economic growth that has outstripped other EU
states and regions, in particular with respect to employment creation.
These have been complemented by an explicit national urban policy
(HMG 1997) that has promoted, for example, housing construction on
‘brownfield’ sites, restrictions on ‘out-of-town’
developments, and innovative forms of urban governance such as Sheffield
One and Sheffield First, respectively the urban regeneration company
and the local strategic partnership, and the establishment of regional
development agencies dedicated to local economic development. Long-term
trends are as yet unknown so it is not possible to ascertain if these
changes will continue, but evidence points towards continued uneven
spatial development within the UK, in particular between regions (Dorling
& Thomas 2004). If there are particular local policies and developments
that have led to this reversal in the Sheffield’s cycle of decline,
it is those that have sought to affect the availability and quality
of labour and property in the city. Such measures extend to the educational
system and urban infrastructure, and have been supported by considerable
EU and national funding. If too much emphasis has been placed on these
traditional supply side measures at the expense of initiatives to
promote local assets and demand, such as the entrepreneurship and
innovation, is unclear. Despite the recent success in attracting investment
by Boeing to the city, the reversal of Sheffield’s decline has
not been able to address historical patterns in the spatial concentration
of the UK knowledge and wealth creation base in the South East of
England (Hepworth 2001). As a result, policies in Sheffield are still
seeking a balance between supporting a more diverse economy and the
development of specialist activities (advanced manufacturing and producer
services). Overall this snapshot of the city would suggest Sheffield
is now co-ordinating its current mix of attributes to attract new
investment and nurture growth to greater effect than twenty years
ago. Some local assets, although common to most other urban areas,
now have greater relative value such as the universities and ‘quality
of life’ factors, whilst others have been greatly enhanced by
sustained national programmes of support such as the skills base.
The potential for growth may now be constrained by the requirement
of Sheffield to ‘compete’ against a larger pool of equivalent
urban areas, and the weak performance of the northern regions relative
to the ‘core’ Euro- region of London and the south–east
of England. No evidence suggests that any national government since
1979 has been willing to implement regional policies or spatial strategies
that are designed to address this gap in any explicit or effective
way. Gordon Dabinett is Reader in Town and Regional Planning at Sheffield
University. His research interests focus on urban and regional policy,
uneven economic development and technical change. He is an honory vice-chair
of the Regional Studies Association (RSA). Begg I. (2002) Introduction. In I. Begg (ed) Urban
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trends in the competitiveness of British cities. In I.Begg (ed) Urban
Competitiveness, Bristol, Policy Press. Chapter 6, pp.101-134. Dabinett G. & Ramsden P. (1999) Urban policy
in Sheffield : regeneration, partnerships and people. In R. Imrie
& H. Thomas (eds) British Urban Policy, London, Sage. Chapter
7, pp168-185. Deas I. & Giordano B. (2002) Locating the competitive
city in England. In I. Begg (ed) Urban Competitiveness, Bristol, Policy
Press. Chapter 9, pp.191-210. Dorling D. & Thomas B. (2004) People and Places.
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economy in Britain. London, Local Futures Group. IPPR (2004) The state of the nation – an audit
of injustice in the UK. London , IPPR. ODPM (2004) Making it happen : urban renaissance
and prosperity in our core cities – a tale of eight cities. London,
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Press.Introduction
1. The Decline and Rise of Sheffield
2. An Urban Renaissance in Sheffield?
3. Managing the Dynamics of Urban Competitive Advantage
References