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Area-based Poverty and Resident

Empowerment
Citation Detail
Title: Area-based Poverty and Resident Empowerment.
Authors: Power, Anne
Source: Urban Studies (Routledge); Nov96, Vol. 33 Issue 9, p1535-1564, 30p, 15 charts, 2
diagrams
Document Type: Article
Abstract:
The gap between the poorest people in Britain and the average has grown significantly
since the late 1970s. People in the lowest income groups are increasingly overrepresented
in council housing. Most council housing is built in large, separate, single-purpose
estates. Therefore area-based poverty has grown. In these areas, housing, income and
social factors interact to create steep decline. As conditions became more extreme, local
authorities and central government developed special experiments in localisation which
had a measurable impact on conditions, involving residents and attracting management
effort towards local problems. Estates with the least favourable conditions and most
polarised populations received more intensive estates services and often improved
through concentrated, long-term support. While residents were involved in and
influenced these developments, in only a few cases did they actually take responsibility
for or control over services to their area. Where they did this successfully it had the most
far-reaching impact on the process of renewal. Localisation, coupled with strong outside
support and links to the city, appears to offer a way out of spiralling conditions and
growing alienation. Evidence that this change is happening in Britain is borne out by the
European experience of estate decline and estate rescue. If localisation of housing
services, along with policing, social services, health and education was extended to all
large, separate, low-income estates, it would maximise the impact of collective provision
on vulnerable communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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ISSN: 00420980
DOI: 10.1080/0042098966493
Accession Number: 9612150020
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AREA-BASED POVERTY AND RESIDENT


EMPOWERMENT
Contents

1. 1. Introduction
2. 2. Background: Evidence of Problem
3. Poverty
4. Area Concentration
5. Scale of Council Housing
6. Difficult Estates
7. Housing Associations
8. 3. Are the Changes Significant?
9. Area Segregation
10. Three Examples
11. 4. Does the Existence of Marginal Estates of Social Housing Matter to the Rest of
Society?
12. Violent Trends
13. Wider Reasons for Government Concern
14. Chasing the Problem Around
15. 5. Does Local Action Work?
16. The Priority Estates Project
17. Local Authority Decentralisation
18. A Role for Tenants
19. Multi-faceted Programmes
20. Police, Schools, Health, Social Services, Shops, Transport
21. 6. The Localisation Process
22. Consultation
23. Resources for Local Services
24. Front-line Staff and Local Employment
25. Enticement of Services to Estate Level
26. Cooperation Between Services at the Local Level
27. 7. How Localisation Works
28. Resident Organisation
29. Preventing 'Dumping' and Criminal Behaviour
30. Protecting and Sustaining Fragile Change
31. 8. Lessons of the 1980s
32. Resident Take-over and Local Control
33. Social Instincts, Pooling Effort and Local Leadership
34. Barriers and Effects
35. 9. Requirements for Success: European Models
36. A Patchwork Approach
37. Constant Renewal
38. 11. Conclusion
39. References

[Paper first received, July 1995; in final form, May 1996]

Summary. The gap between the poorest people in Britain and the average has grown
significantly since the late 1970s. People in the lowest income groups are increasingly
overrepresented in council housing. Most council housing is built in large, separate, single-
purpose estates. Therefore area-based poverty has grown. In these areas, housing, income and
social factors interact to create steep decline. As conditions became more extreme, local
authorities and central government developed special experiments in localisation which had a
measurable impact on conditions, involving residents and attracting management effort towards
local problems. Estates with the least favourable conditions and most polarised populations
received more intensive estates services and often improved through concentrated, long-term
support. While residents were involved in and influenced these developments, in only a few
cases did they actually take responsibility for or control over services to their area. Where they
did this successfully it had the most far-reaching impact on the process of renewal. Localisation,
coupled with strong outside support and links to the city, appears to offer a way out of spiralling
conditions and growing alienation. Evidence that this change is happening in Britain is borne out
by the European experience of estate decline and estate rescue. If localisation of housing
services, along with policing, social services, health and education was extended to all large,
separate, low-income estates, it would maximise the impact of collective provision on vulnerable
communities.

1. Introduction

This paper will examine the problems of area segregation, concentrations of poverty and social
disadvantage, the impact of these problems on the wider society, and the role of self-help in
disadvantaged communities. There are four main questions: to what extent are the concentrations
of poverty and related problems in identifiable areas significant and getting worse; does the
existence of marginal areas and a growing gap within society affect society as a whole; what if
anything has been shown to work in addressing these problems; can people in poor areas control
their own conditions and shape their own future? In attempting to answer these questions, eight
studies of unpopular estates, seven in Britain, one in northern Europe, are used as a source of
detailed information and evidence of the issues involved. The surveys are: Power (1984,1987b,
1988b, 1991a, and forthcoming); Power and Tunstall (1995 and forthcoming); and DoE (1995).

2. Background: Evidence of Problem

The Income and Wealth Inquiry of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation has exposed substantial
evidence about the problems of poverty and the growing gap between rich and poor (Barclay,
1995; Hills, 1995). The Inquiry lends detail to relatively inaccessible government statistics
showing the strong link between poverty, social problems, council estates and certain
disadvantaged groups such as lone parents, unemployed, minorities and welfare recipients of all
kinds. Some well-recognised facts are important for this discussion.

Poverty

We define people in poverty as those with less than half of average incomes, after allowing for
housing costs. By this and other definitions, more people are poor today than 15 years ago
(Barclay, 1995). A higher proponion and far greater numbers of children are growing up in
poverty today than 15 years ago. The gap between the bottom 10 per cent and the top has grown
significantly in the last 10 years. Afro-Caribbean house-holds are strongly overrepresented
among lone parents, among council tenants and among those accepted as statutorily homeless.
Many more people are unemployed than in 1979. Table 1 illustrates the trend in poverty on this
definition; other definitions show similar trends.

Area Concentration

From Table 1 we can see that the concentrations of poverty, of children in poor households and
of unemployed people, are much greater in council housing than in society overall. It may be
that poverty 20 years and more ago was concentrated in a different way in old, private-rented
areas in inner cities. But 70 years of government intervention led to the virtual demise of private
renting, very rapid expansion of owner-occupation and the creation of large council estates to
replace older, private-rented areas. Large areas of land were consolidated, creating dormitory
estates with few, if any, other functions than housing. This rigidified the separation of poor
households from economic activity, cutting many .people off from work opportunities (Daunton,
1984). As council housing became more dominant, it became more polarised, housing mainly
people dependent at least in part on the state.

This area-based view of poverty was contested by Peter Townsend in his influential study of
poverty (Townsend, 1979). But his analysis of the "structural causes" of poverty and its
widespread incidence across many different types of area does not contradict the case presented
here that large sections of the lowest-income groups are concentrated in the council tenure
(Murie, 1983) and therefore as a result on large separately built and located estates (Holmans,
1987; Daunton, 1984; Dunleavy, 1981).

A recently completed study for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation shows how extreme these
concentrations of deprivation are on unpopular estates (Power and Tunstall, 1995). Census data
for 1981 and 1991, covering 20 unpopular estates and the 18 urban local authorities in which
they are located, reveals the differences between the national average, the local authority
averages and the estate average. Table 2 summarises that evidence.

Scale of Council Housing

The Right to Buy reduced the council stock by over 1.5m but it mainly affected better-quality
council housing in better areas, particularly houses rather than flats; and stock in suburban and
semi-rural areas. Therefore it has largely failed to increase the social mix or social stability of the
least popular estates in major urban areas and it has made council housing generally poorer, as
better-off households have bought where they could (Forrest and Murie, 1988). As an illustration
of this, the incidence of Right to Buy sales ranges from 26 per cent nationally, to 19 per cent
within the 18 study local authorities, to 5 per cent on the 20 estates (Power and Tunstall, 1995).

Other government strategies to transfer council housing to alternative owners have failed either
to break up large council landlords or, by and large, to reduce concentrations of poverty on large
estates. Although over 1.5m council properties have been disposed of, there are still over 5m
council properties in Britain, more than half of them in major cities, and about three-quarters of
them on identifiable estates or separate areas of public housing, nearly 40 per cent of them flats
or maisonettes (Power, 1984). Therefore, in spite of sales and transfers, the largest cities still
have very significant stocks of council housing which dominate the rented market (Table 3).

Britain still has a higher proportion of social rented housing than other European countries of
comparable size, level of urbanisation and industrial development, such as France or Germany,
although unification has greatly increased the German social housing stock (Power, 1993).

Difficult Estates

There are around 2000 large, unpopular council estates, of 500 units or more, housing almost
entirely low-income, dependent households (Power, 1991b). Extreme problems abound on these
estates, including cases where over 80 per cent of the population is unemployed, over half the
families with children have lone parents, crime is four or more times the average, and the
majority of young people leave school with little prospect of work (Welsh Office, 1987a). Such
bleak areas have been constantly portrayed in the media as 'no-go' areas, housing an 'underclass'
of dependent and alienated people with no stake in society but who are a burdensome and
troublesome charge on it. These problems, though they may have got worse in the 1980s,
certainly existed in the 1970s (see Burbidge et al., 1981).

Housing Associations

The problem of estate decline was a major reason for government switching support to housing
associations which were seen as smaller, more sensitive, more community-based and more
dispersed within the urban fabric (Young, 1993). Housing associations have more than doubled
their stock to nearly l m units since 1979, although they still own only one rented property for
every six owned by local authorities. But as their growth has accelerated in the last few years,
they have increasingly copied the mistakes of local authorities, making their role much more
controversial. Large associations have built large, separate, single-class, single-function estates,
housing almost exclusively low-in-come households.

In a small way, housing associations are beginning to compound the problems of area
segregation, strengthening the overlap between poverty and social housing. They, too, are
becoming a polarised sector with severe management pressures (Page, 1993). Based on this
repeated pattern, it seems clear that some of the problems of area polarisation and decline are
intrinsic to urban change and urban settlement rather than directly related to social housing
ownership.
3. Are the Changes Significant?

The changes in income and wealth, the changes in council housing and in housing associations,
have had mutually reinforcing consequences. Tenure has become far more tightly tied to income
and economic activity. Since the whole rationale for social housing is to help those in need who
cannot independently house themselves adequately, it makes sense--both in basic justice and in
using subsidised housing to greatest effect--to concentrate on helping the poorest and most
vulnerable households. However, this has serious long-term implications for the management of
social housing. Being a landlord for households in great need carries with it many wider
implications through a combination of factors, such as more children and young people, higher
turnover, fewer resources. The management difficulties include: difficulty in paying rent;
shortage of funds for repairs; greater wear and tear on property; non-vi-ability of services, such
as shops; need for specialist social support; unstable community relations.

These problems are not new in poorer areas (Steadman-Jones, 1994; White, 1986). Traditionally,
housing in these areas was rented privately. As owner-occupation has become the dominant
tenure and as private renting has shrunk to less than 6 per cent, social landlords, particularly
councils, have become landlords of last resort. This has led to the growth in area segregation and
area decline because of the way social housing has been built, largely in separate and often
disfavoured areas.

Area Segregation

Tenure, housing conditions, income and social need increasingly overlap to make area
segregation extreme. We will try to plot the housing, income and social factors that are mutually
reinforcing in separate areas or estates of social housing. These factors do not apply to mixed
areas or owner-occupied areas in the same way, since the concentrations are less uniform and
therefore less intense.

Housing factors. Housing factors can be divided between physical and management factors.
Physical factors include: the quality of the housing; its location in relation to transport, jobs,
services; whether it is built in the form of 'estates'; the size of estates; how separate and
identifiable they are; their design and lay-out. Management factors include: who gets housed and
what demand there is for the housing; who owns the housing; how it is run; what role tenants
play; what scope there is for resident involvement; what priority is accorded to estate-level
problems and tenant needs.

Social housing estates are often immediately stigmatised by being built in recognisable
concentrations, as illustrated by the damaging experience of some new housing association
estates (Page, 1993). Council housing is often in the poorer and more marginal neighbourhoods
with poor transport links. The more physically separate, large, identifiable and undesirable a
social housing area is, the greater its management problems (Power, 1984). The weaker its
management, the more housing, repair and lettings problems will mount, pushing up costs and
reducing services to tenants. Therefore the physical structure of estates is directly linked with
social stigma and management difficulty.
Although there has been significant decentralisation of housing management services, most
estates have far too few front-line managers, caretakers or ongoing repairs. Many do not have
offices on the estates. Bureaucratic, procedure-led management still dominates and the power of
the town hall and central government over budget decisions is strong. Therefore, front-line
management is generally without sufficient leverage (LSE Housing, 1993). This leads to weak
control over area conditions and intensified area problems.

Income factors. Income factors include: the proportion of households on benefit or out of work;
the type of work available and the type of jobs residents do; the level of employable skills among
residents; the nature of the local economy and the changes over the previous generation.

Most council tenants have come from a manual and unskilled work background. They therefore
generally command low-paid work. Even where the local economy is flourishing, tenants are
disadvantaged, partly because of low skills, partly because of the location of estates and their
reputation (which can deter employers), partly because whole categories of work previously
available to unskilled and semi-skilled manual workers have shrunk dramatically--mining,
textiles, shipbuilding, steel, engineering. Slum clearance and decline in cheap private-renting
areas have concentrated the victims of industrial change in council housing.

These groups are seriously disadvantaged in the education system and have few qualifications.
Our study of 20 unpopular estates highlighted the serious lack of educational qualifications
among school leavers, compared with the national average, as a direct cause of future
employment problems. Table 4, based on the performance of secondary schools serving
unpopular estates, shows this problem clearly.

The high proportion of tenants without work leads to much lower average household incomes
which affects the morale of communities by creating an atmosphere of dependence. Large
numbers of low-income people, a majority dependent on state support, when concentrated in
particular areas, cannot command quality services (Donnison, 1994). They pay more for shops,
transport, insurance; they have low school attainment; and they suffer many social consequences
of poverty. McArthur (1993) discusses some of these elements in area decline in his study of
community business. When low income is combined with housing design, location, scale and
management problems, social housing then becomes rejected by households who can escape.
Many will accept overcrowding, insecurity and inferior accommodation rather than move to
stigmatised, poor estates (LB Hackney, 1994). Therefore a lettings spiral is set in motion from
which many social consequences derive as Figure 1 shows.

Social factors. Social factors in part result from lettings difficulties, but in part cause them too.
Social factors include demographic change and polarising trends, which separate certain groups
and concentrate them in disfavoured areas. The following are among the most significant: the
age structure of the population and the proportion of dependent people--children, elderly,
disabled; the proportion of young people between 16 and 25; the proportion of ethnic-minority
households; the proportion of lone parents and of children from broken families; poverty; the
performance and problems of local schools; the role of social services and support agencies; the
levels of crime, vandalism and police activity; the level and quality of social facilities; turnover,
rehousing problems and community instability; the number and intensity of neighbour disputes
and other forms of social conflict and breakdown; racial tensions and other community tensions--
for example, between families with different child-rearing patterns; local leadership problems;
'dependency culture' and lack of local control over the area or conditions (Reynolds, 1986).

The age structure of households on estates is often different from the average with more children,
more young people, and occasionally more elderly, all dependent within predominantly poor
households. This creates an added burden for already marginalised areas (Page, 1993).
Particularly important is the low proportion of identifiable adult males because of the
concentration of lone parents, who are primarily women (Power and Tunstall, 1995). The 1991
Census shows that the concentration of lone parents on unpopular council estates can be as high
as four times the national average. This not only reduces the proportion of able-bodied adults to
children and young people, but it also leaves lone parents with a major responsibility for care,
supervision and authority. Adult males may have a shadow presence in female-headed, lone-
parent households. For fear of losing benefits, relationships are often not declared. With no
financial or legal responsibility, it is more difficult for men to play a strong father or husband
role, even if they are the fathers. This also happens (as is increasingly the case) if the woman has
part-time work but the man is unemployed. (Beatrix Campbell explains the marginal role of men
in such households in her graphic book, Goliath; Campbell, 1993). In this respect, more than any
other, a diluted form of the American welfare syndrome may be emerging in Britain. These
mutually reinforcing effects are certainly significant (Dahrendorf, 1993).

Poor areas have a much higher concentration of social problems than other areas, through
cumulative competitive pressures leading people with disadvantages to fail. Failure compounds
itself by pushing weak individuals into disadvantaged areas which successful, ambitious and
hopeful people try to leave or to stay out of. This process can be termed "the double handicap of
the weak" (Power, 1992), where unsuccessful, failing or disadvantaged individuals become
concentrated in unsuccessful areas. The barriers to progress are then doubled.

Three Examples

If we take three estates with serious problems, we can show how housing, income and social
factors worked together to create a spiral of decline.

All of these highly stigmatised estates reached such a state of crisis in the 1980s that their future
was in jeopardy. All three estates were considered 'no-go' areas by the wider community and
were regarded by the police as in serious danger of break-down. They did not decline only for
physical or design reasons. In all cases, the management of the estates had been totally
inadequate until the 1980s--in the Tyneside case, 50 years after the estate was built! The lettings
in all cases had from the outset been to households with little choice. Therefore the estates
combined serious physical problems with poverty, major social stigma and an almost complete
lack of ground-level management. Over time, these problems compounded each other to the
point of virtual collapse in management. All the local authorities recognised the serious wider
consequences of the loss of control (Power, 1987b).

The three estates serve only as illustrations of the problems. Many other examples could be used
(see Power, 1991a; Burbidge et al., 1981; or DoE, 1990-94). We will return to these three estates
when considering why area segregation and decline matter to the wider society and whether
anything can be done about it.

4. Does the Existence of Marginal Estates of Social Housing Matter to the Rest of Society?

In 1991 and 1992, there were serious disturbances amongst disaffected youth on at least 13
mainly outer-urban, low-rise estates in virtually all-white areas (see Table 6).

There had been intermittent riots over the 10 previous years in a string of inner-city areas--
Brixton, Haringey (London), Bristol, Liverpool, Manchester and Birmingham--involving poor,
multi-racial and seriously declining communities, often closely linked with unpopular estates.
The 1980s' riots appeared to reflect a sense of injustice and discrimination, unresponsive systems
of policing, inadequate local representation or accountability, an assertion of citizenship rights
and a claim for equality, albeit through violence and destruction of property (Scarman, 1981;
Gifford, 1986).

The 1990s' riots were far more puzzling--they were often about conflict within communities
between alienated young men and boys and community activists. They often broke out over joy-
riding. They seemed to reflect deep alienation and reckless self-annihilation--indeed, several
young joy-riders were killed in suicidal get-away attempts. The police seemed powerless and,
unlike in the 1980s, community leaders began to denounce their own young men, as well as the
outside world. The actions of the youth were an attempt at short-term power against long-term
hopelessness (Campbell, 1993).

A particularly noticeable and puzzling feature of the 1990s' riots was that most of the estates
comprised houses with gardens. They appeared fairly acceptable in design, condition and
standards of accommodation. In at least half the cases, conditions on the estates were not
extreme in the way that media reports had portrayed the more explosive examples. However,
they all experienced very high unemployment and dependency levels, serious alienation among
groups of young people and high proportions of lone parents (Campbell, 1993).

The riots of the 1980s and 1990s affected the country as a whole in several ways. Media
attention brought images of police vulnerability and impotence before the nation, creating fear
and loss of confidence. Faith in government, police and in democracy was undermined. Many
people in the wider community had uneasy consciences about what was happening to our society
and to poor areas. There was a feeling that reducing services, youth clubs, social housing
programmes, was having serious social consequences. Community leaders saw their efforts,
hopes and morale wrecked, at least temporarily. Property was damaged including many
communal facilities and the bill for the riots was high.

Unemployment and idleness were seen as major threats to social cohesion. There was talk of
American-style ghettos, underclass and violence. Young rioters momentarily seized the national
stage and clearly sometimes enjoyed the instant fame (Power and Tunstall, forthcoming).

Violent Trends
The riots were coupled with other trends that greatly alarmed the wider community. Serious
crime affected people from all walks of life. Police were unable to control conditions. This was
epitomised by John Harvey-Jones trouble-shooting at a Sheffield police station (Harvey-Jones,
1992). On 1 of the 20 estates in our study, children under 14 were so out of control that the
police and residents were powerless to stop them burning property, wrecking cars and generally
holding the community to ransom.

Conflict between government and teachers, government and councils, government and other
public services was undermining the coherence of the welfare system, while the growing
incidence of lone parenthood was creating additional anxiety. There was clear evidence of poor
British educational standards and low investment in training, made worse by an extremely
serious and long recession creating anxiety over future work and economic stability. The rising
social spending seemed to have little effect as most of it was consumed by benefits to
unemployed people who nonetheless remained poor. There was a sense of being swamped with
problems, loss of confidence and lack of direction (Hutton, 1995).

These deeper trends were picked up by the media during and after the riots. They indicated
profound unease with the state of the nation, provoking strong statements from government
ministers about the need to return to core values. Riots are the most extreme manifestation of the
failures of democracy. Therefore, preventing disorder and reacting to riots are intrinsic to
democratic government.

For all these reasons, the existence of increasingly marginalised areas of social renting not only
created violent eruptions. These in turn proved to the wider society that such areas could not
simply be left to fester (Turner, 1992). Government cannot stand back, in the face of incipient
social breakdown; it is obliged to intervene where the established social order is threatened.

Marginal estates, like the old slums, subsisted alongside more successful areas for a long time,
but today their problems are seen to reflect growing society-wide problems. Marginal estates
threaten social cohesion by reflecting back to the wider society some of its most entrenched
problems. As a country we seem beset with loss of rank, loss of confidence, inertia and rigidity
(Briggs, 1987). The problems are general, rather than simply the problems of poor areas.
Marginal estates also matter because they are public property, expensively subsidised by the rest
of society to the tune of around 25 bn a year (Maclennan et al., 1989; Power, 1992). Reducing
support clearly creates the conditions for violent conflict. Therefore the costs are inescapable but
a better return might be attainable.

A further reason for doing something about marginal estates is the sheer scale of the problem. At
least 5 m people's lives are affected. Hundreds of thousands of jobs are at stake. The investment
already made in schools, hospitals, roads, as well as housing, in those areas is irreplaceable. It is
too expensive an investment to be repeated in the foreseeable future. Therefore it cannot be
wasted and most of the homes are needed (Power, 1993).

Wider Reasons for Government Concern


Many government policies have made the problems of marginal, separate areas worse by
increasing polarisation and poverty. But the creation of segregated areas and the growing
polarisation of state-subsidised housing is part of a much wider trend across Europe, linked to
growth in long-term unemployment, family change, migration and rising standards for the
majority. Far from being alone in these matters, Britain shares with her European partners the
problems of 'social exclusion' and increasing polarisation (Power, forthcoming).

Governments feel obliged to respond to the problems of segregated areas for several reasons:
first, their policies helped build them; secondly, in the case of Britain, it owns most of them
indirectly through local authorities or other social bodies; thirdly, governments pay very large
subsidies for their support through housing benefit, income support and other social services;
fourthly, extreme area decline leads to empty housing units alongside continuing need, an
obvious contradiction, a waste of resources and a damaging indictment of social housing
management. Most importantly, in a democracy, governments are forced to respond to minority
pressures and to attempt the integration of marginal groups, even when their own declared
policies--and in some cases, laws--created or enhanced sharp divisions. The American Civil
Rights movement, equal opportunities legislation and German unification are conspicuous
examples of the pressures on democracies to act for unity even where the costs are high.

Table 7 summarises why extreme conditions in the three example estates already discussed
mattered to the wider society and influenced government to take action.

Chasing the Problem Around

Previous action in marginal areas that led to the building of social housing estates simply moved
the problem on--from poor private-renting to slum clearance; from slum clearance to council
housing; from council estates to housing associations.

We might now be at the end of the road. Moving the problem around is expensive and wasteful.
It might solve very little and recreate a similar set of problems. In the past, pressures for radical
redevelopment overrode the need for community involvement in decision-making, but total
redevelopment may have added to problems by breaking up existing communities. Now there
simply is neither the public money nor the public will to chase the problem on--where to next?

Therefore we need to identify localised solutions: upgrading physical conditions; better


management and use of resources; increased income within areas; social support and
development; a re-emphasis on urban linkages. All these elements require an area focus and a
local organisational approach. There is powerful evidence that action on marginal estates works--
not always and everywhere, but often, and even in the most difficult circumstances (Power,
1987a, 1987b; Power and Tunstall, 1995).

5. Does Local Action Work?

In the late 1970s, both central and local government became so worded about spiralling
conditions on estates that they jointly mounted experimental projects (Priority Estates Projects)
to address these conditions directly with the explicit involvement of residents. Landlord services
were pivotal because of their direct responsibility for area conditions. Housing therefore was the
lead service but it also provided a model for other services.

The Priority Estates Project

The Priority Estates Project during the 1980s worked on some of the most marginal, stigmatised
and segregated estates in the country. In most cases, the impact was significant and measurable
to residents, to local authorities and to government. This is borne out by a number of independent
resident surveys and other studies measuring performance, costs and benefits, spreading from
1984 to 1993 (Hedges et al., 1980; SCPR, 1984; Young et al., 1986; Gifford, 1986; Glennerster
and Turner, 1993; Hope and Foster, 1993; Capita, 1993). The main reason for success was that
resources were drawn out of the central system and down to estate level. Organisationally it
became possible to tackle problems directly and to put into reverse neglect and decay. The
harnessing of resident energy and the localisation of staff created a totally new dynamic on the
estates which rapidly affected conditions (Power, 1984). Local authority housing departments
were the pioneers of this approach (LB Islington, 1978).

There were four elements to the approach to estate problems. Locally based management offices
were opened on estates and other services were drawn down to estate level. Tenant and resident
involvement lead to detailed consultation at all stages of development. Cooperation between
central and local government was reinforced by high-level political commitment to change and
experiment. In all cases, an outside catalyst worked alongside a supportive community
facilitator, residents and local staff.

These four elements made it possible for front-line services to expand and reach people directly;
for residents to have a real say, resulting in improved performance; for political divisions to
become less important than service delivery; for new ways of addressing problems and managing
scarce resources to emerge, so that benefits outstripped costs. Figure 2 shows how the four
elements of localisation created an impact on estate conditions, thereby winning the support of
central government, local authorities and residents of marginal estates.

Local Authority Decentralisation

Local authorities, alongside the PEP experiments, decentralised their housing management at a
fairly dramatic rate. They increasingly accepted the need to provide a local base for direct
services and to involve tenants if action was to be properly targeted and if staff motivation,
morale and performance were to be increased.

Housing had often provided the leading focus for decentralisation because by 1980, difficult-to-
let council estates had become the most problematic housing areas. Social and community
experiments in the 1970s had failed because they had not addressed housing organisation and
management problems directly, although they had underlined the growing problems of council
estates (Community Development Project, 1976; Burbidge et al., 1981). There was evidence that
remote, large-scale, bureaucratic management was rapidly generating slum problems in social
housing that had previously only existed in private housing (Burbidge et al, 1981). Some
problems were made worse by political interference and by highly polarised lettings (Corina,
1974).

Housing formed the basis of change because the core landlord functions of rent collection,
repair, letting property and tenant liaison were essential prerequisites of estate improvement
(Power, 1991a). Therefore localisation was seen as a possible remedy. Pressure for action on
council housing had become irresistible by 1979.

The alternative idea that physical conditions on estates shaped the behaviour of occupants, thus
creating the essential core of the problem, was expounded by Professor Alice Coleman
(Coleman, 1985), but was disputed by practitioners, professionals and academics alike. It was
clear that while inhuman design played a part, far more complex social and economic pressures
were at work, making "design determinism" an over-simplified escape from the long-term
landlord task of management (Coleman and Power, 1984).

However, housing provided only the organisational framework for a much bigger set of actions
on problems, linked to income and social conditions as well as housing. Only where the wider
problems were addressed as well as housing, was it possible to make a real difference to the
worst areas (Power, 1989). This made the role of tenants become more significant.

A Role for Tenants

On most estates, some tenants' organisations and tenants' activity exist. Quite often there is a
large range of fluctuating groups, some of them providing direct services. However, tenants are
rarely in control of significant resources, receive little training in running organisations and are
rarely supported in a sufficiently long-term or sensitive way. The gap between tenants and the
main system is often the biggest obstacle to success.

Tenants come to be seen as useful allies when landlords feel threatened. As a result, tenants play
a growing role in council housing. Nationally, over 150 tenants' groups have taken over the
management of their estates, as Tenant Management Organisations, and the whole idea of tenant
participation and control has become accepted by left and right as a way out of alienation, loss of
control, community disintegration and joblessness.

Evidence has been collected, not just from Priority Estate Projects, but also from local authority
estate-based initiatives and from continental programmes of estate rescue, to show that a multi-
faceted programme of physical renovation, management localisation, social initiatives and
resident involvement can transform an estate from a situation bordering on chaos to relatively
stable conditions (Power, 1991a, 1993).

Multi-faceted Programmes

A report prepared by the author for the OECD showed that every estate of 1000 units received
around 10m revenue funding a year in publicly supported services and cash benefits. This very
large sum should support at least 300 jobs, at least half of which should be locally based.
Potentially, many others could flow from this activity (Power, 1992).
The services this public subsidy supports can be made to work in poor communities by linking
their input with resident representation and involvement; by creating a local budget so that the
service can respond directly to local circumstances; by having a visible presence on the estate
that is directly accessible to users; by abandoning the minimalist stance of unidentifiable officers
and adopting a customer-oriented, problem-focused, result-oriented accessible stance.

Police, Schools, Health, Social Services, Shops, Transport

The role of the police illustrates this point. Difficult estates usually require more police time than
other areas, yet often earn the police a negative reputation for failing to curb crime and disorder
(South Wales Constabulary, 1987-91). As soon as a line of communication with the community
opens through a localised housing office, police often move out to the estate, work with the local
office, meet residents and make themselves visible. Beat policing is popular on estates and
certainly reduces fear, making other community development more possible (see Hope and
Foster, 1991, 1993, for full study of this; also Downes, 1989). If the police were re-oriented
towards the front-line, each estate of 1000 dwellings would have 8 full-time policemen, allowing
24-hour, 7-day cover with 2 police permanently on duty. There is evidence that localised,
resident-linked policing stabilises or reduces crime. On two-thirds of the estates in our survey of
20 highly unpopular estates, crime and security problems had stabilised or fallen according to
residents and local staff (Power and Tunstall, 1995).

Schools are increasingly being pushed into community building, as parent governors become
more important and as failing schools are threatened with closure. A challenging study of
Birmingham's inner-city and outer-estate schools offers strong grounds for supporting self-
government and community-based education, coupling budgets, targets, tests and national
curriculum, with parental involvement, student and staff motivation, and greatly improved exam
results (Atkinson, 1994).

Health visitors often play a vital role with mothers and young children, the elderly and the
disabled. Estates have many vulnerable health groups. Where estates have clinics and chemists,
residents can gain vastly better services. Where the health service is consolidated and localised,
far more can be achieved. An estate of 1000 units with young families can have three full-time
health visitors (Welsh Office, 1987a). On the Tyneside estate in Table 5, a special women's
health project has helped over many years. On the Welsh estate, after 25 years, residents had a
local doctor for the first time; and eight dispersed health visitors consolidated their cover into
three locally based full-time staff.

Social services' social work is a very expensive, specialised and often thankless profession,
pouring effort and resources into picking up society's broken pieces. Many attempts have been
made to convert spending on support into more positive programmes. Community care
complicates even further the problem for deprived areas, while representing a serious attempt to
help the most vulnerable. At the very least, localised budgeting, home-helps, voluntary support,
fostering networks, family and parenting support and community development, can be
encouraged, measured, costed and developed. There is probably more scope to extend services
by redirecting existing resources in this field than in any other.
Shops on estates are usually expensive, poorly stocked, sometimes barricaded and beleaguered.
Poor shops with high prices were the trigger for the Ely riot in Cardiff and also for disorder in
Lancashire (Power and Tunstall, forthcoming). There were of course other factors. In France and
Germany, on estates, shops are encouraged at the base of blocks. This makes a visible difference
to the atmosphere of estates as well as services. A large Islington redevelopment area lost 90
shops when it was pulled down; 6 were provided in the new estate, with high rents due to the
superior conditions. They soon become unviable. The area has fewer services, fewer jobs and
less variety or interchange as a result.

Transport links to estates are often poor. It is a rare estate that is both hard to let and on a good
transport route. Poor transport has a major effect on access to work, training opportunities and
the atmosphere within estates. In Easterhouse outside Glasgow, the inadequate bus service means
that private taxis largely replace them, but high transport costs lead to the chronic isolation of 40
000 people. A well-organised bus service could almost certainly be made to work.

This brief discussion of services illustrates the potential for localisation on many fronts.
However, models for transformed services need to be developed rapidly (Osborne and Gaebler,
1992). One useful finding from the European and British estate surveys is that full localisation of
housing and related services encourages and generates other activities at estate level, leading to
improved local conditions. There was a steady increase in locally based activities and services on
the 20 unpopular estates studied over the period 1982-94. This change related directly to the
change in housing and support services linked to tenant involvement. Table 8 illustrates this.

6. The Localisation Process

Many of the central ideas that emerged from successful experiments in estate regeneration are
not new. But the process of localisation involves a major restructuring of service organisation
and a different approach to area-based renewal. The process of disaggregation from the centre
and coordination at ground level is complex, unorthodox and usually incomplete, limiting the
potential for viable local services (Glennerster and Turner, 1993). Combining inputs and support
locally to target area-based problems is a logical outcome of the greater area segregation and
polarisation on estates. The most salient elements are outlined in the next section.

Consultation

Local residents have a clear perspective when consulted on problems and priorities. Involving
them will be a precondition of cooperation and support for any local initiative. It will give local
managers insight into what is needed and what might work. It is the essential first step in
developing local representation and long-term change. Tenants register much higher satisfaction
levels with services and conditions if they are involved in the process of decision-making and if
they identify with the changes (Hope and Foster, 1991; Glennerster and Turner, 1993).

Racial minorities are often left out of the process unless special efforts are made. So are young
people. Yet the involvement of these two groups is central to healthy communities and to
avoiding disorder and breakdown. Novel and informal methods of consultation work better than
traditional methods (see Power, 1991b; Bell and PEP Consultants, 1991). Children and young
people are the greatest source of energy, optimism and potential for growth, while at the same
time creating demands and causing problems, if not made part of the process of renewal. Yet
government and academic reports, particularly relating to crime and vandalism, use the number
and proportion of young people as a measure of difficulty. This not only reflects the damage they
actually cause (see Wilson, 1978), but the problems families face (see Utting et al., 1993). On the
other hand, the most successful Priority Estates Projects, such as at Broadwater Farm, involved
young people in a dynamic and direct way, thereby reducing crime and danger, increasing work
and restoring community relations (Gifford, 1986).

The work of the Balsall Health Community Education project in Birmingham (see Atkinson,
1994) reinforces the belief that schools have large, unrealised potential in poor areas and that
children regarded as early and lasting failures can often succeed in totally unexpected ways.
Progress in areas of low educational achievement hinges on linking children and their families,
however imperfect, with schools and the surrounding community. Using children as a negative
measure undermines the future. Engaging tenants in the future of estate children--as has
happened, for example, on the Stockwell Park estate in Lambeth--can transform their self-image
and their ability to contribute (presentation by J. Fawcett, to Rowntree meeting, London, 1995).

Resources for Local Services

Based on housing experience, it is likely that less than half of the public resources targeted at
poor areas are actually used to provide direct services locally (Power and Tunstall, 1995). The
central bureaucracy not only consumes disproportionate resources, but can cripple action on
problems and can divert professional skill away from the front line into centralised power elites
talking to each other about distant problems. By identifying how much is officially allocated for
an area--e.g. rent income, the school capitation budget, the per head cost of policing and health--
it is possible to see what resources are available to tackle an area's problems. These existing
allocated resources will be fought over. Capita, in its study for the DoE on the costs and
effectiveness of housing localisation, analyses the problems of local budget creation (Capita,
1993). Yet this is essential if the local services are to be funded for the local area; if wasteful
central administration is to be cut; and if local problem-solving is to become possible. Glasgow
City Council has found it possible to reduce overall costs in the course of creating a large
network of neighbourhood offices (Interview with Director of Housing, 1994). It is possible to
direct more resources to front-line services and less to central bureaucracies.

Front-line Staff and Local Employment

If more available resources can be localised, it then becomes possible to deploy more front-line
staff, such as caretakers, guards, cleaners, communal maintenance and open space workers,
home-helps, play and nursery assistants. Roughly two front-line workers can be employed for the
price of one town-hall-based senior worker. Opportunities for local residents also open up as the
local initiatives take root (see Power, 1988a). The recent success of the Waltham Forest Housing
Action Trust in securing 25 per cent of their jobs for local residents illustrates this point (Inside
Housing, June 1995).
But skills gaps need to be identified and training provided for local services and local
responsibility. Work that we commonly think of as unskilled, such as cleaning, acquires new
dimensions when part of the cleaner's role is to report any damage or missing part, to trace
tenants causing unreasonable and illegal nuisance through anti-social rubbish dumping, to win
the confidence and cooperation of children in keeping the estate clean, to build pride in the daily
repetition of a normally despised task--cleaning up after others (Burbidge, 1992). The continental
approach to estate-based caretaking and custodial services is significantly more successful than
the British because it involves detailed training, close supervision and many more locally based
jobs (SCIC Gestion, 1995).

The same principle of job enhancement can be applied to making good and finishing off simple
repairs, responding courteously and calmly in threatening situations, resisting the pressure to
cover-up over low standards of work, and so on. Making estate-level jobs a real contribution to
quality is a critical challenge for localisation. The training of senior caretakers on the Broadwater
Farm estate, Haringey, London, in the early 1980s turned the estate into a teaching model for
groups from all over the country and Europe (Gifford, 1986).

Enticement of Services to Estate Level

The viability and impact of localisation should encourage moves to ground level in the police
and social services which tend to suffer from the twin problems of overdemand and inadequate
front-line support (Harvey-Jones, 1992). Health authorities, with their own large structures and
commitments, can localise some services if they see the benefits and feel the pressure (Mid
Glamorgan Health Authority, 1985). Schools are geographically local anyway and it is a matter
of emphasising a positive approach to the community such as is now being advocated by Labour
leaders. Inspiring heads to have faith in the children, rather than to assume a battle stance in the
face of overwhelming problems and failing performance will of itself help to change the
educational climate. Primary schools on estates often succeed in this, but the system frequently
breaks down at secondary level (Power and Tunstall, 1995). One pivotal and virtually
undiscussed factor is the size of most comprehensives. There may be a case for making some
beleaguered secondary schools in difficult areas smaller and more community-oriented
(Atkinson, 1994).

Cooperation Between Services at the Local Level

There are many techniques for increasing the volume and raising the quality of local services, as
long as the transfer to the local area is a true transfer and is not expensively backed, as happened
in authorities like Islington, by tiers of senior managers and by sectional heads for every part of
the local service. This duplication eventually becomes unfundable (LB Islington, 1994, 1995).

Housing provides the basic structure and physical conditions of an area. The landlord service has
immediate resources of rent income and the stock itself around which local bases can be created.
Therefore housing can take the lead. The other obvious services to link with housing are
education, social services, police and health. The police have long admitted that they could only
police housing estates effectively if there was a local housing office to control lettings, run the
core custodial services and provide links to tenants and other local workers (Power, 1980). The
same is true of social services, though their historic relations with housing departments have
usually been poor, bordering on hostile.

The two major advantages of localisation are that it brings skills and service to the place where
they are needed, making the service accessible, responsive and direct; and it forces service
workers to give priority to the local area, as only by performing well locally is it possible to
demonstrate effectiveness. This contrasts with centrally based administrative jobs, where
producing the fight pieces of paper or operating the right part of the procedural system is the
main measure of success. These increasingly computer-based tasks may be important for overall
organisation, but they are virtually meaningless unless the core tasks relating to housing, income
and social factors which we identified as so damaging are also tackled directly. In order to make
a real difference on the ground, localisation has to be permanent. It is a method of delivering
services and essential services such as housing management, policing and education are required
permanently and locally.

On the 20 estates in our study, the localisation of housing services since 1980 had provided a
stable and responsive base for the improvement of physical, social and organisational conditions.
The local offices were funded from revenue, were sustained on a permanent basis with full-time
locally based staff, involved policing and other services, had close links with residents, and
addressed wider social as well as physical and housing management issues. The impact of such
sustained, localised inputs on lettings, rents, environment, physical conditions and community
relations was positive in a majority of cases (Power and Tunstall, 1995). The effects of these
changes on the attitudes of residents and local managers are underlined in Tables 9 and 10.

7. How Localisation Works

In order to illustrate how localisation as an approach is converted into practical solutions on the
ground, we return to one of our example estates outlined in Table 5. Table 11 shows how
localisation addressed acute problems and helped to create better conditions on one example
estate. A similar chart could be drawn for the other two estates we described earlier.

The changes did not come easily or quickly. No single element was decisive in making estate
conditions better. Rather, a complex chain of local initiatives, services and jobs were created. In
all, over 100 local jobs, many of them part-time, were generated on the estate over 5 years.

A crucial element was the link between estate residents and the outside world, the local services
and the wider urban area, the local offices and local customers. A complex web of new and
direct relations were built up which helped people connect together in a new and dynamic way.
Problems did not go away but were addressed. Conditions were measurably better after than
before, in spite of increased poverty. The estates needed permanent local structures and long-
term, locally based services to remain viable. With these in place, conditions become more
acceptable and more normal (Power and Tunstall, 1995).

Resident Organisation
One important key to the positive changes on the estates is the interrelationship between the
localisation effort and the development of resident initiatives and organisation.

In Wales, the local council was willing to fund the estate tenants' association with money for a
full-time worker, an office and projects. Tenants went all over Britain to conferences, visiting
special projects and on training courses. They were put in touch with businesses, credit unions
and cooperatives. They contacted schools, doctors and health visitors. They organised sponsored
hikes, slims and 'No smokes'. They raised money for charity and from charity. On the estate,
networks of support and mutual aid were constantly forming and re-forming. After a first
generation of intense instability, a second generation of tenants was formed largely from the
children of the first. Turnover remained high but a core of committed tenants remained.

All three estates survived and managed to improve significantly. However, the deep underlying
economic problems caused severe population loss in these and other major urban areas.
Eventually they will only survive if wider urban decline is reversed. According to Census data
for 1981-91, many inner London boroughs and other major cities lost nearly 10 per cent of their
population. This is a factor that cannot be countered at the local level alone.

Preventing 'Dumping' and Criminal Behaviour

'Dumping' is a crude housing term for allocating empty property in unpopular areas to anti-social
or uncoping households, whose behaviour may involve crime and statutory nuisance, against
which the law would be enforced in more 'normal' areas. The numbers of such households are
small but their impact on unpopular estates with communal public areas and major social
problems is out of all proportion to their numbers. This issue cannot easily be escaped if services
are to work on a highly stigmatised estate. Intimidation, abuse, gang attacks, harassment,
criminal damage and physical attacks form part of the descent into chaos, if lettings and
enforcement are not carefully controlled (see Power, forthcoming).

On one of our three example estates, a large criminal family literally led the crime wave. When
the two oldest young men were imprisoned for grievous bodily harm, crime plummeted. When
they were released after two years, it rose again (Zipfel, 1992). The second example estate
became notorious as 'Crack City' until the police finally cracked down--some say displacing the
drug-dealing to other estates. The third estate was racked with violence in the late 1980s, due to
two warring criminal networks, leading to one-third of the housing becoming empty.

A fragile community with weak social controls cannot absorb the exiles from more controlled
areas. Yet people who are difficult to house or to live next door to invariably end up in the most
marginal housing areas. This subject requires fuller discussion, but allocations policies and
lettings control to very vulnerable communities to exclude rather than to concentrate disarrayed
and disruptive households are central (Power, 1989). Helping the needy is not synonymous with
housing violent and out-of-control individuals who require special treatment and who threaten
community security. The London Borough of Hackney's recent resort to civil injunctions, in face
of court and police incapacity, has highlighted the gravity of this issue.

Protecting and Sustaining Fragile Change


Any improvements on estates resulting from changes in the way services are organised are under
constant pressure. Marginal, segregated areas do not become integrated, prosperous and stable
through the changes we have outlined. Services improve; jobs on the ground expand; resident
participation grows; conditions stabilise. But all these changes occur in a situation of near social
and management collapse. Estates can be brought back from disintegration, but can they become
fully integrated? What would make marginal, segregated areas become part of a seamless urban
web of successful neighbourhoods?

8. Lessons of the 1980s

Over the 1980s, four lessons have become clear:

--the poverty, social isolation and disorder of unpopular council estates have grown rapidly;

--localisation of housing management, beat policing and other services have had a significant
impact on estate conditions where they have been introduced in a coherent and concerted
fashion;

--resident involvement is now widely recognised as an essential prerequisite to successful


programmes of estate rescue;

--residents can only succeed if their efforts are linked to the wider community and if they receive
sustained, consistent and sensitive support.

Extraordinary measures are needed to make good the serious consequences of area segregation.
Disadvantaged residents cannot on their own take on and solve the much wider problems of area
segregation and social breakdown; links to society as a whole, access to training and long-term
support from the wider community are all required for real change in people's lives to become
possible.

Table 12, based on the findings of the survey of 20 unpopular estates in 1994, shows the
continuing social problems, the positive impact of changing local services and the lasting pattern
of area segregation on these estates. It underlines both the problems and the potential for
progress. Extraordinary measures will continue to be needed to counter the polarisation that was
coupled with area segregation. One underlying reason for success in these estates lies in the
continuing consistent effort over 15 years both within the estates and from the outside, in spite of
continuing social problems and built-in disadvantages of location and structure.

The more fundamental changes that would lead to integration would require shifts in the
distribution of power in order to allow the participation of excluded groups. There are three
essential strands to such change in power relations; strong ground-level movements with local
leadership; legal backing through parliament; and education. The movements for labour
protection, for the emancipation of women, for the integration of refugees and immigrants, for
racial equality have all worked in this way. Similar pre-conditions are almost certainly required
to change the acute problems of area segregation-local leadership, government backing and
educational support. The seemingly special feature of today's problems lies in the fact that over
several generations, more successful people have been sifted upwards and less successful
downwards, making disadvantaged areas even more marginal and more fragile. In spite of this,
there is little evidence that most people in poor areas cannot succeed. On the contrary, there is
evidence from many stigmatised areas, that human talent and energy abound alongside
dedication, generosity and ability to learn. This is demonstrated by some of the examples of
resident control that emerged through the 1980s.

Resident Take-over and Local Control

The most radical experiments in localisation are experiments in resident control. There are
situations where residents in very marginal areas have taken over major responsibility for their
areas in difficult conditions and have brought about remarkable improvements through local
organisation. This process enriches individual lives and transforms collective conditions
(Nicolson et al., 1985; Clapham et al., 1991). Working examples of resident control are not
common. They are usually based in cities where the local authority has taken the lead in
encouraging resident involvement, such as Glasgow, Rochdale and Islington.

The closer the local initiatives are to sharing three essential conditions of change--strong local
leadership, government (local and central) backing, and access to wider support such as
training--the more likely they are to succeed. Only with a combination of unusual commitment
from both tenants and the local authorities, is it possible to overcome deep-set problems. Table
13 sums up the level of problems which instigated local and outside action, the essential
conditions of success, and the visible impact of resident control in three estates; Clover Hall
Tenant Management Cooperative, Rochdale; Hornsey Lane Estate Management Board,
Islington; and Hawthorn (Possil Park) Cooperative, Glasgow.

Social Instincts, Pooling Effort and Local Leadership

While the vast majority of low-income communities do not show signs of such positive change,
there are constant efforts and enterprises emerging in conditions that would deter most successful
people. One reason for this is that problems inspire a struggle to find solutions. Within people
there appears to be a strong social instinct, telling those in danger that survival is not just about
individual struggle or self-protection, but about pooling efforts to tackle community problems,
thereby removing a common threat to survival. For example, older residents in Chell Heath,
Stoke, help children to learn to read in the local school. Younger residents in Broad-water Farm
help to run the pensioners' club and the nursery. Tenants in Cowgate, Newcastle, have developed
a successful credit union. Tenants in Ballymun, Dublin, run the concierge system for the new
security works. Disabled residents in Digmoor, West Lancashire, run a restaurant and holiday
centre on a barge. Volunteers on the Brackenhall Estate, Huddersfield, run a creche for young
mothers. Mothers on the Stockwell Park Estate, Brixton, run a youth club.

There are some circumstances in which survival and progress only become possible through
shared initiative--for example, combating intimidation and crime. The more extreme the
problems, the more likely this is to be so. Therefore in marginal areas, attempts at community
initiative and collective problem-solving are often more common than in more stable, successful
areas. Such efforts often flourish only for a short while, then become swamped by the instability
and other problems that seem so intractable. These efforts should attract maximum support at the
crucial growth phase, in order for local leadership to grow and to be rewarded by real change in
government support and educational opportunity. For this to happen, there must be a local
infrastructure to support changing conditions such as we have described and shown to be
successful. Thus localisation of core services becomes both a conduit for resources into an area
and a bridge to wider support for embryonic initiatives among residents themselves, most of
which will involve less than full local control. This results from the obstacles that poor
communities have to overcome even to begin to succeed.

Barriers and Effects

Local leadership and initiative face a number of significant barriers to progress. These barriers
are the defining characteristic of area segregation. Therefore, acknowledging and then reducing
them becomes vital to change. The most significant barriers to progress in segregated areas stem
from the intrinsic nature of the area and from the impact of area conditions on who moves in,
who stays and who goes.

These barriers can generate so many problems for residents as to entirely defeat their efforts.
They also have a directly negative effect on rescue attempts, particularly after the early
enthusiasm for change wanes. Table 14 summarises the barriers and the effects we have outlined,
showing why successful integration remains an illusive goal in most marginal areas, even where
localisation and resident leadership help to stabilise and improve conditions.

9. Requirements for Success: European Models

The barriers to progress not only undermine residents' attempts at solutions but undermine public
confidence in the value of trying. However, abandonment of large areas of needed housing is
impossible to contemplate and the costs of leaving such areas to decay are potentially greater
than the costs of rescue (Dauge, 1991; Capita, 1993). Finding ways of breaking down the barriers
to success is therefore essential.

Governments in France, Germany, Denmark and Ireland, as well as Britain, faced with millions
of unpopular housing units in increasingly segregated and marginal areas, launched experimental
rescue programmes over the 1980s with a more or less common set of ingredients. These
essential common elements appeared to have an impact in spite of different ownership and
rehousing patterns, showing that even the most intractable area problems can be reduced through
area action programmes leading to service transformation.

We found 10 important features of successful area rescue programmes based on a study of 20


unpopular estates in 5 countries:

--upgrading the physical conditions and encouraging mixed uses;

--rehousing a broader mix of people and reducing the concentration of extreme dependence and
disarray;
--increasing community stability and reducing the exodus of committed residents by increasing
the attractions of the area;

--involving the police and the community in local security programmes;

--providing special support for the integration of minorities;

--creating a dedicated resource from existing budgets (housing, education, health, social
services, police) to provide a locally based, long-term service structure;

--maximising the bridges between the area and the outside world, both physically,such as
transport, and organisationally through locally based workers, external training, visits to other
projects, representation, and so on;

--encouraging all sorts of activity, such as shops, churches, voluntary agencies, credit unions, in
order to create 'social buffers' with the wider community (Wilson, 1987). These organisations
help development skills and commitment to the area by people with talents, potential and
experience;

--engaging schools, adult education and vocational training since they should reach all
households with children and young people and they can potentially transform the community's
self-image. Education may be the central vehicle for reconnecting disadvantaged areas into the
social and economic system. At the moment it is hard not to conclude that much of the
educational effort is wasted. This last point may be the most crucial, the most widely supported
and the most amenable to change. Where successful it may have the most long-lasting effects--as
the American Head Start Programme showed (Utting, 1995).

--Finally, it was important to create as many different channels for change and support as
possible.

A Patchwork Approach

Far from there being a single, successful approach or solution, difficult areas are made up of
multiple problems, requiring a wide range of solutions, many of them small in themselves but
woven together to provide a complex 'patchwork' of area solutions. It is this 'patchwork
approach', based on bottom-up experiments and services, that is radically different from earlier
approaches to urban problems. The postwar optimism about top-down strategic solutions--
clearing slums, building high-rise, mass-producing, equalising, systematising--was belied by the
experience of rapid urban decay (Dunleavy, 1981). These broad-brush impositions on variegated
and highly sensitive community patterns had some positive effects on overall conditions and on
average standards--less overcrowding, more amenities--but blanket policies misunderstood the
nature of cities, with their myriad interlocking but constantly changing and moving parts, mostly
small and almost insignificant in themselves but together forming adynamic, moving and
changing whirlpool to which they all add force.
Each area within the complex urban network needs a similar set of interlocking activities.
However, social housing estates became so disadvantaged precisely because so many of those
varied elements were either missing from the beginning or disappeared over time.

Constant Renewal

All over Europe area-based rescue programmes have had some positive effects (Jacquier, 1991).
The pattern of the rescue programmes was clear, involving government money for physical
improvements, localisation, resident activity, diversification of rehousing, stronger social control,
increased security, training initiatives and economic activity. Pulling together the experiences of
this approach from the most extreme cases in northern Europe, it became clear that many
separated social housing areas had become a major problem in all countries; their condition and
decline threatened the wider urban community; their rescue was possible if enough different
strands were pulled together coherently and locally.

The rescue was a matter of intervening in steep decline and putting in place a series of buttresses
to support the community and the outside agencies working with that community. It resulted in a
complex edifice of internal and external relations. It was never a mechanism for the clear
transformation of the areas from marginalisation to prosperity. And there was no overarching
solution.

Area decline and stigma are endemic to urban growth and change and therefore disadvantaged
areas usually tend to remain disadvantaged or to re-create themselves. They must therefore
generate a constant approach to renewal, rather than a constant search for the final solution
(Power and Tunstall, 1995). Table 15 summarises the argument we have developed using estate
experience as evidence of the potential for change.

11. Conclusion

Three aspects of area-based improvement stand out from the study of experiments in restoring
unpopular estates: localisation of key services is possible and effective in improving conditions;
resident involvement forms an important part of the approach; and area-based services work over
time as long as stronger bridges to the wider urban community are created as a result. There are
many failed experiments in urban regeneration, as McArthur's study of community business and
a recent report on sustainability demonstrate (McArthur, 1993; Fordham, 1995). It is therefore
important to recognise the linkage between quality services, local initiatives and long-term
support.

There is a continuum from steep area decline and chaotic conditions, through area improvement
with resident involvement, to resident control. Only a tiny minority of estates reached the final
stage of the process over the 1980s and early 1990s (Stewart and Taylor, 1995). However, many
areas were tackled in a local, responsive, lasting and consistently supportive way. On the whole,
they improved under the impact of care and targeted resources (Power, 1993; Proven, 1993).
There is therefore the potential for improving conditions significantly, within limits that do not
eradicate or adequately address the wider pressures of change which are pushing more
vulnerable areas to the margins of society (Reich, 1992; Wilson, 1987).
We live in a highly interdependent world and history has thrown up unforeseen urban problems.
Working at these problems from without and within in an attempt to contain them and giving
people who have been spent by the wider system the possibility of exerting influence and even
control over their lives offers some promise of new forms of area renewal.

Table 1. Poverty in Britain and poverty among tenants

1979 1988 1990/91

Numbers in poverty[a] (m) 5 12 13.5


Percentage of population in poverty 9 22 24
Numbers of children in poverty (m) 1.4 3.1 3.9
Percentage of all children in poverty 10 25 31
Numbers of tenants in poverty (m) -- 7.4 --
Percentage of tenants in poverty -- 43 --
Numbers of children of tenants -- 1.8 --
in poverty (m)

Percentage of all children of -- 50 --


tenants in poverty

Percentage of heads of household 75 -- 69[b]


other than social tenants with
income from work

Percentage of council tenant 59 -- 41


and housing association heads
with income from work

Sources: Department of Social Security (1993); House of Commons Social Security Committee
(1990-91); General Household Survey 1991; The Economist, 12 September 1992.

a Poverty is defined as those with less than half average income (after housing costs).

b Figures for 1991.

Table 2. Socio-economic change, 1981-91: characteristics of


population summary (percentages)

Legend for Chart:

A - No heading
B - No heading
C - Residents of Great Britain
D - Residents of 18 local authority areas
E - Residents of the 20 estates

A B C D E

Unemployed[a] 1981 9 11 28
1991 10 13 34

Economically 1981 39 34 39
inactive[b]
1991 36 32 44

Under 16s 1981 21 21 31


1991 19 20 31

Under 24s 1981 37 37 50


1991 33 34 46

Pensioners[c] 1981 18 17 13
1991 18 16 11

Minority 1981[d] 4 9 21
ethnic
1991[e] 6 19 26

One-parent-headed 1981 3 3 9
households
1991 4 6 18

a Registered unemployed residents as a proportion of economically active residents aged 16 and


over.

b Economically inactive residents as a proportion of residents aged 16 and over--including those


over retirement age.

c Residents over retirement age--60 for women, 65 for men--as a proportion of all residents.

d Residents living in households headed by a person born in the New Commonwealth as a


proportion of all residents.

e Residents defined by the head of household as being of minority ethnicity as a proportion of all
residents.

Sources: Census 1981 and 1991.

Table 3. Housing stock in large cities

Number of
local
authority
City properties

Birmingham 100 000


Glasgow 130 000
Liverpool 60 000
Manchester 80 000
Newcastle 60 000
Tower Hamlets, London 55 000

Source: DoE (1994).

Table 4. GCSE performance, 1994 (percentages)


Legend for Chart:

A - No heading
B - England and Wales
C - Local authority average
D - Estate-linked schools

A B C D

No GCSE passes 8 5.5 23


5 + GCSE grade A-C 43 30 20

Source: Published examination results, quoted in Power and Tunstall (1995).

Table 5. The spiral of decline

Legend for Chart:

A - No heading
B - Housing, Physical
C - Housing, Management
D - Income
E - Social

A B
C
D
E

Wales Modern, concrete design Industrially


built, mono-pitch roofs Some flats and
maisonettes Large--980 units Very isolated
Built on steep, windswept site Hard to
heat or maintain Lots of open spaces Very
poor facilities

No local office till 1984


No maintenance of open spaces 'Dumping'
of social problems Very poor repair
services Very high arrears Hostile
attitude to tenants No budget No one's
responsibility Very expensive to run
Blurred responsibilities with
Leisure/Borough Treasurer Also split
authority, District/County

Eighty per cent unemployed


Very high level of disability (nearly half
of benefit recipients) Almost everyone
dependent on benefits Regional decline
because of closure of mines Low
skills/education on estate Few training
opportunities Lack of adjustment to pit
closures Strong dependency culture
One-half of families lone parents
One-third of population under 16 Many
unemployed youths Very few elderly Several
very disarrayed households Very high crime
(8 x rest of area) Serious vandalism and
intimidation Poor quality, expensive shops
and other facilities Surplus housing,
therefore very low demand High stigma

South Very large--1600 units Modern,


East high-rise, very high density
London

Surrounded by major roads and rail lines


Very unpopular design Very harsh
environment Difficult to let from outset
Quickly discovered physical problems

Very poorly managed--no local office till


1980 Very low demand, so let to low
priority 'Dumping' of social problems
Difficult to maintain common areas
Expensive to repair Too large to manage
easily

High benefit dependency Low skill Many


unemployed

Many young out of work Low income

Became drag-dealing centre High turnover


Lone parents

Minorities Bad reputation drove out stable


families High stigma from outset

Tyneside

Old slum clearance estate on


periphery--1000 units Nice houses but far
from centre Gardens destroyed during war
Urgent need of modernisation Common areas
very run-down

No local management till 1980 No


caretaking/warden Serious disrepair Fences
removed in war so gardens became communal
but no maintenance

Very poor Very little work Three


generations without employment in some
families Very dependent on the state Poor
shops, etc. Local economy collapsed

Stigma from outset of slum clearance Many


very difficult families Very high crime
Fear of intimidation Conflict and disorder
on estate Feuds between families One-third
of population under 16

Table 6. Disturbances: location, date and type of estate

Legend for Chart:

A - Place
B - Estate
C - Outer/Inner urban
D - Date
E - Type of estate

A B C D
E

Cardiff Ely Outer 1991


Houses

North Tyneside Meadowell Outer 1991


Houses

Newcastle Scotswood Outer 1991


Houses

Oxford Blackbird Leys Outer 1991


Houses and
new flats

Rossendale Wallbank Outer 1991


(Whitworth) Houses

Coventry Woodside Outer 1992


Houses

Bristol Hartcliffe Outer 1992


Houses

Salford Ordsall Inner 1992


Flats and houses

Bumley Stoops Outer 1992


Houses

Blackburn Inner terraced Inner 1992


streets

Houses8

Kirklees Brackenhall Outer 1992

Houses

Carlisle Raffles Outer 1992

Houses
Stockton Ragworth Outer 1992

Houses

Table 7. Common problems on the three example estates which


affect wider society

Legend for Chart:

A - Problems affecting wider society


B - Problems affecting government directly

A B

Heavily dependent population Owned by local authority


High crime, policing Designed and built under
problems, fear of disorder government guidelines
Disorder and with
government subsidies

High proportion of lone parents Built as large, separate,


marginal areas (driven by
High proportion of young people cost constraints, pursuit of
numbers, desire for
Almost constant media attention large scale)

Stigmatised from the outset by


rehousing policies, therefore
seen as a liability

Government implicated in design,


location and lettings problems

City or urban area


disproportionately affected by
estate

Large housing resource

Too expensive to replace

Table 8. Activities and services available in the estates

Legend for Chart:

A - Number of estates with activities and services


B - 1982
C - 1988
D - 1994

A B C D

For the elderly 10 13 15


For the under 5s 11 17 18
For young people 11 17 18
For adult women n/a 3 4[a]
For ethnic groups n/a 6 5
Economic support and n/a 7 10
self-help, e.g. employment
resource centres, credit
unions, food cooperatives

Total 35 58 65

a Also one men's group. Source: Local managers and residents on 20 estates.

Table 9. Changes in estate conditions, 1988-94

Legend for Chart:

A - No heading
B - Improving
C - Steady/Mixed
D - Deteriorating

A B C D

Resident assessment (based on 18 9 4 5


estates)

Managers' assessment 10 7 3
(based on 20 estates)

Note: Improving denotes continuing improvements over period; steady/mixed denotes a


levelling-off of improvements without a reversion to previous levels of problem; deteriorating
denotes a marked decline in conditions after initial improvements.

Source: Local managers and residents' groups on 20 unpopular estates.

Table 10. Elements in improvement of estate


conditions, 1981-94

Legend for Chart:

A - Perceived changes in estate conditions under different


elements
B - Physical
C - Management
D - Community resident involvement
E - Overall impact of combined elements (percentage)

A B C D E

Positive 14 9 11 55
Mixed 5 9 4 30
No improvement 1 2 5 15
Total number of estates 20 20 20 100

Note: Numbers denote estates where the element had each impact. Source: Local managers and
residents on 20 unpopular estates.
Table 11. The impact of localisation on the sample estate
in Wales

Date
Localisation event
Impact

1983 Decision to open Backlog of repairs cleared


local office Voids dropped from
Tenants' association over 100 to 20
consulted

Small-group meetings Local staff became


to identify problems committed to
estate residents
1984 Local office opens
in community centre
Local budget Estate became cleaner
Local control or repairs Residents formed self-help
Resident caretaker groups
introduced Council became strong
supporter
Open spaces cleared of resident involvement,
regularly devolved all its council
Lighting improved housing
Links with beat to local bases
policeman with residential
1985 Social Services move involvement resident
to local office involvement
Council persuaded to Crime dropped after increased
upgrade footpaths policing and resident crime
and lighting patrol

Leisure Services Young people were more


persuaded to improve involved
community facilities Social services, health
services
New youth club set up directly accessible
1987 Survey of estate showed About 100 local jobs created
serious physical
and structural problems Tenants were linked to wider
1989 Major refurbishment with community
central
government funding Community projects
Voluntary garden and facilities
project on open spaces
1990 Interdenominational But: estate remains
Church Project, leading vulnerable due
to: literacy scheme, to low regional housing demand
launderette, cafe, lack of employment, poverty;
second-hand shop,
drama groups, etc.--all
run by volunteers from
the estate
1990-92 Demolition of unpopular maisonettes transport links
remains poor;
1991 Credit Union set up Unemployment remains high;
1992 Food Cooperative Shop and estate will only
project launched become viable
by group of women if economy picks up
residents
Church (converted
maisonette block)
officially opened

1992-94 Partnership Project


launched with health
centre, new estate
office, cooperative
food shop

1994 Cooperative shop


opened in Partnership
maisonettes
Community Centre
project to be upgraded

Table 12. Presence of characteristics which led to the


development of estate-based management
Number of estates

Social characteristics 1981 1991

Social composition compared


with local authority:

Higher than average unemployment 16 20


Higher than average percentage 16 20
of one-parent households

Higher than average child density 15 20


Higher than average ethnic minority 9 10
Characteristics affected by local Start of project 1994
management:

Neglected, rubbish-strewn environment 20 1


Poor repairs and maintenance 20 7
High levels of crime and vandalism 19 9
Higher than local authority 16 14
average rent arrears

Higher than local authority 14 10


average voids

Difficult to let 15 5
Little resident involvement 14 7
in management

Characteristics that could


not be changed through
local management alone:

Location 11 11
Structural repairs 10 6
Difficult and unpopular design 7 6
Stigma from original slum clearance 6 5

Sources: Power (1984,p. 8); Census 1981 and 1991; local managers and residents.

Table 13. The problems, preconditions of success and


outcomes
in three successful examples of resident control

Legend for Chart:

A - Problems
B - Preconditions for success
C - Outcomes

A B
C

Strong stigma, due to Local leadership


poverty and rehousing Strong and enthusiastic tenants'
Dumping of very leaders
difficult households
Self-help, local control
Attractive, restored
estates
Empty property/difficult Locally driven initiative
to let Seriously Ambition of local control
run-down, decayed Community initiatives, e.g.
conditions
Very high tenant
satisfaction
Very poor management and food cooperative,
other services Community centre

Stable, strong local,


leadership

Much better local


services

Complete failure of Backing from government


wider system, Responsive council
resulting in chaotic Showpieces/local pride
conditions
Very high crime and
insecurity

Severe decline conceals Re-investment in physical


potentially upgrading
attractive assets Access to funds for local
minitiatives

Visitors, part of self-


help promotion

Access to support Supportive


community development and training
Strong links to outside organisations

Sources: Rochdale Metropolitan Borough Council; Glasgow District Council; Islington Borough
Council.

Table 14. Barriers to progress and their effects

Barriers Effects

Instability Weak community links


Lack of mutual
support Desire to escape

Low standards Rubbish and environmental decay


Poor repairs
Poorly motivated, poor-performing staff

Lack of services Expensive basic services, e.g. food


Exclusion from wider system

Poor education Sense of failure


Lack of confidence
Hostile, alienated youth
Beleaguered teachers

Little training Low skills


High unemployment
Lack of investment

Area isolation Observable poverty among residents


Stigma

Overcomplex system Inability to control or affect decisions


Opting out through loss of confidence
Alienation and apathy

Concentration of Mutually reinforcing


social problems disadvantages, e.g. lack of male adult
supervision/high youth crime
Too few households with capacity or
reserves
Young people lacking positive models
Strong social stigma

'Dumping' of uncoping, Disproportionate burden on weak and


disadvantaged unneighbourly households
community
Overloading of social services
Major ripple effects on crime and disorder
Destruction of residents' and staff
commitment

Loss of control Services disintegrate


Staff recruitment becomes very difficult
Disorder/clashes/police conflict
Poor motivation Poor performance, therefore poor rewards
Demoralisation and depression
Growing difficulties in galvanising
support for change

Table 15. How localisation, coupled with wider links and


long-term support, can facilitate change

Legend for Chart:

A - Preconditions
B - Essential steps
C - Barriers to progress
D - Requirements for success
E - Key lessons

A B
C
D
E

Local leadership Identify services to


Government localise
support (central Consult residents
and/or local) Separate out resources for area
Education Deploy front-line staff
Identify skills, organise training
Entice other services
Involve children and young people
Build cooperation between services

Area instability
Low standards
Lack of essential services
Lack of education and training
Poor motivation
Isolation
Overcomplex system
Overconcentration of problems
'Dumping'
Loss of control

Upgrade conditions, mixed uses


Rehouse broader social mix
Increase community stability
Link police with community in security
measures
Integrate minorities
Diversify activities
Identify long-term support and community
development
Build and strengthen bridges between area
and outside
Make schools work
Multiply channels for change
Neglect spirals into loss of control
Small-area focus makes organisational
sense
Areas must be linked to wider community
Bridges between marginal areas and the
main stream encourage higher standards
No single approach works in isolation
Resources for localisation can be
identified
Resident involvement and local decisions
help
Self-help and mutual aid grow through
need: they require support
Reducing isolation will encourage
self-reliance
Education is the key to change
Permanent local services should have no
exit strategies

DIAGRAM: Figure 1. The lettings spiral.

DIAGRAM: Figure 2. The PEP model of estate rescue. Note: According to this model, local
management itself has ten key ingredients: a local office, local repairs, localised lettings
operation, local rent-arrears control, an estate budget, tenant participation, coordination and
liaison with other services, monitoring of performance, training, and residential caretaking.
Source: Power (1987a).

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~~~~~~~~

By Anne Power

Anne Power is in the Department of Social Policy and Administration, London School of
Economics and Political Science, Houghton Street, London, WC2A 2AE, UK. Fax: O171-955-
7415. This article is based on a background paper prepared for the Joseph Rowntree
Foundation's Income and Wealth Inquiry. The author would like to thank the Foundation for
supporting this investigation; David Piachaud, John Hills and Howard Glennerster for reading
the draft and making helpful suggestions; Becky Tunstall for doing invaluable background
research, checking and editing; Jane Dickson for word-processing and correcting the text. The
author would also like to acknowledge earlier support by the OECD and the Nuffield Foundation
which enabled her to work on the issue of area segregation.

Copyright of Urban Studies (Routledge) is the property of Routledge and its content may not be
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