Download or read book Local Governance in Western Europe written by Peter John and published by SAGE. This book was released on 2001-12-20 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text provides a comprehensive introduction to local government and urban politics in contemporary Western Europe. It is the first book to map and explain the significant processes of change characterizing local government systems and to place these in a genuinely comparative context. Students are introduced to the traditional structures and institutions of local government and shown how these have been transforming in response to increased economic and political competition, new ideas, institutional reform and the Europeanization of public policies in Europe. At the books core is the perceived transition from local government to local governance. This key development is traced thematically across a w