CIVIL SOCIETY IN THE CONTEXT OF URBAN REGIME THEORY

But what, actually, we mean by the urban regime? According to Stone (1989), the regime is an informal yet relatively stable group with access to institutional resources, and which has a significant impact on urban policy and management. It is not a coherent organisation or association, but an informal group of influential persons who derive their power from different sources, who share some policy objectives like that of promoting the growth in their city, and who can gain some economic, political or social rewards from their involvement. The regime is formed as an informal basis for coordination and without an all encompassing structure of command. (Stoker 1995, 59; Anttiroiko 1996a, 66)

An important point to be made here is the view that the politics in different cities seem to be dominated by various types of governing coalitions or regimes. There are pluralist regimes in which strong political leaders bring together a mixed set of private actors. Elitist regimes are run primarily by cohesive business elite. Corporatist regimes, which we may assume to be relevant in the context of Northern countries, combine both strong political leaders and a relatively unified business elite. And lastly, there is a category labelled as the hyperpluralist regime in which any governing coalitions can hardly be identified. One assumption is, that the direction of change within urban governance is towards more pluralist models, though new elites which are able to manage with the informational mode of development may emerge. (Stoker 1995, 62)

The social complexity is central to this perspective. The urban policy is dependent on institutional arrangements, business interest mediation, and some degree of popular control. What is essential is the fact that all the key institutions and actors are involved in an extremely complex web of relationships. The social control and effective management is limited to particular aspects of local development and policy choices. This, in turn, limits the capacity of local government as an agency of authority at local level. Other kinds of limits are determined by the higher levels of government. This is to say that the autonomy of Finnish cities is constrained by two principal factors, those of limited economic resources and local economic conditions, on the one hand, and the political control of the state authorities and European Union, on the other hand. (cf. Gurr & King 1987, 56) This makes it easier to understand why in most of the western countries there can be said to be two groups which dominate the urban regimes, the business elite provided it has structured itself to have a single voice, and the political force which operates within wider institutional and corporatist setting (cf. Stoker 1995, 63). The social complexity, thus, shapes not only local authorities and city management but also the governing coalitions within the urban setting.