Table of contents

2. Context: The European urban regeneration experience
– challenges past and present

Urban regeneration is neither new nor unknown to European cities. It has been part of them over the centuries. Hence the themes and task of ENTRUST must be seen in the context of urban regeneration since the late 19th century, thus putting current trends towards partnership led regeneration in a historical perspective.

European urbanisation as we know it today was triggered off by market force led industrialisation. The emerging labour and housing markets in the 19th century changed and shaped urban development in Europe. Where unfettered market forces failed, uneven development became particularly marked and gave rise to urban planning. Early examples of urban renewal and regeneration responded to such market failures.

During the second half of the 20th century, and particularly after the Second World War, Europe, urban planning for transportation, housing, and social services became identified with the institutional 'cores' of regeneration policy. Redistributive social state traditions mellowed uneven development within the cities. However, redistributive state policies created different types of problems and inequalities in the urban realm: bad provision of services and mismanagement became apparent. The price of compensating for the shortcomings of the markets appeared to become the deficiencies in the state provision and management of services – in short, state failure.

Currently, we witness the development of 'twin track' cities, where some urban neighbourhoods either develop at a much slower pace than others or not at all, taking a different path of development altogether. Some neighbourhoods are particular threatened as they begin to lose touch with the city as a whole. Here, the threats of economic and social exclusion loom large. The massive effects of globalisation, deindustrialisation and increasing cultural diversity in the city as well as downgrading public spending and restructuring of the welfare state are particularly felt; they contribute to the ‘downward spirals‘ of these neighbourhoods. This applies in particular to formerly mixed use inner-city neighbourhoods, but also to large housing estates.

In these deprived neighbourhoods, urban regeneration becomes fundamentally a response to the problems of poverty and social exclusion. New neighbourhood based policies emerged to tackle their problems. They are geared to compensate for both market and state failure, making the best use of civil society/private actors as well as public organisations and instruments of urban regeneration. The term local partnerships becomes the epitome of such a new approach – which is what ENTRUST is about.

In the future, such new approaches to regeneration will become ever more important. They are beginning to bring down some of the previous barriers between different sectors of policy, state and the economy, as well as the barriers between different actors in regeneration. New policies are emerging specific for neighbourhoods, for their cities and in response to how respective countries will deal with uneven development. However, social and economic exclusion becomes a multilevel issue: not just on the local level, but also for a more partnership-led regeneration process at regional, national and international levels, including the European Union. That is why trans-national learning is important.

Consequently, those undertaking regeneration today set themselves a difficult, double task: to change both neighbourhoods and policies. This requires new forms of governance – partnership led regeneration that manages to avoid the shortcomings, traps and deficiancies involved in onesided market or state approaches.