features of rural life. It is taken by many to be the epitome of 'Middle England' -- certain residents have described themselves as 'middle, professional,.
Journal of Rural Studies, Vol. 12, No. 4, pp. 353-364, 1996 Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd Printed in Great Britain. All rights reserved 0743-0167/96 $15.00 + 0.00
Pergamon S0743-0167(96)00037-X
The Social Construction of 'Middle England': the Politics of Participation in Forward Planning Simone Abram, Jonathan Murdoch and Terry Marsden Department of City and Regional Planning, University of Wales, Cardiff CFI 3YN, U.K.
Abstract -- In this paper we wish to examine how social actors represent the rural community and the rural environment in the context of the planning system, specifically within the review process of a development plan. In particular, we focus on the role residential, environmental and amenity groups play in stabilizing certain features of rural society and environment and their reasons for seeking such stabilization. We explore their motivations for engaging in political activity of this kind, some of the constraints they encounter along the way and how they attempt to overcome these in order to shape their own local environments, and, in the process, their community. Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd
Introduction
The idea of a changing countryside seems central to contemporary analysis of rurality in England. As the effects of 'counterurbanization' begin to appear ubiquitous, it seems ever more inappropriate to try to define a 'traditional' rural society. Rurality, as a category, has become increasingly fluid and contingent, as spatial and social categories form and reform before our eyes. Yet some things also remain the same: for instance, it is still quite easy to discern stable features of the rural landscape, and many of the elements often associated with a traditional, 'timeless' English countryside remain intact. So pervasive is the perception of change however, that we are now required to explain stasis, as though this is somehow surprising and unexpected given the dynamic trends which have become so familiar to us [see Smart, 1992). Increasingly, the things that stay the same become of even greater interest that those that are constantly shifting. We have grown accustomed to the latter; it is the former that need accounting for. This dichotomy between continuity and change, however, is usually overdrawn. Studies of tradition alert us to the complex inter-relationship between the two, showing how continuity can encompass
change, so that traditions may retain certain characteristics while their overall form alters significantly over time (e.g. Mach, 1992; Poppi, 1992). Marilyn Strathern (1992, pp. 2-3), for instance, argues that the antithesis between change and continuity should be disarmed so that we might think how each depends on the other to demonstrate its effect. In this paper we wish to consider one aspect of this disarming process: the relationship between social change in one rural locality and the fight to maintain the rural shape of this locality. We will develop this theme within the examination of how social actors represent the rural community and the rural environment in the context of the planning system, specifically within the review process of a development plan. In particular we focus on the role residential, environmental and amenity groups play in stabilizing certain features of rural society and environment and their reasons for seeking such stabilization. We explore their motivations for engaging in political activity of this kind, some of the constraints which they encounter along the way and how they attempt to overcome these. The material is also presented here in the hope that it poses some serious questions about the opportunities for public participation in one of the lastremaining public interest systems of regulation, and one which is becoming much more significant for
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Table 1. Timetable for the Buckinghamshire Structure Plan review 1990 Feb 93
April 94 Nov 94 Feb/Mar 95 June 95 Oct 95 End 95/early 96
the delivery resources.
Position Statement Draft Structure Plan published for public consultation (Deposit Draft) ~amended in response to the consultation Revised Draft Structure Plan placed on deposit (Consultation Draft) Examination in Public (EiP) Report of EiP panel submitted to County Council County Council published proposed modifications to plan Consideration of objections to proposed modifications Adoption of new plan by County Council
of
environmental
and
amenity
Our case study area is Buckinghamshire, a prosperous county with a long history of middleclass in-migration to the rural areas (see Murdoch and Marsden, 1994). The Buckinghamshire County Structure Plan Review began in 1990. The broad timetable for the review process set out by Buckinghamshire County Council (shown in Table 1) included three periods of consultation and the Examination in Public (EiP). As a result of the consultations, several hundred responses were made to the Plan and these could be broadly categorized into the following groups: professional planning consultants, pressure groups, local authorities and parish councils, Government departments, business organizations, local residents organizations and individuals. From this range, we approached a number from each group and conducted lengthy semi-structured interviews. We also interviewed planning officers at the County and District Councils, and a number of County Councillors, as well as attending meetings of the Structure Plans panel, the Planning and Transport Committee of Buckinghamshire County Council and the EiP. In what follows we draw upon this material in order to examine both the constraints on participation and the motivations of those involved. Buckinghamshire is a particularly appropriate locality in which to analyse how middle-class action is oriented towards the stabilization of certain features of rural life. It is taken by many to be the epitome of 'Middle England' - - certain residents have described themselves as 'middle, professional, comfortable England' (Interview) - - and it has long been subject to the dynamic economic and social processes which now seem to shape rural areas. The county is centrally placed within a buoyant region
(the South East of England) and the tensions generated by development pressures and preservationist aspirations are intense. The potential for the development sector to reach a relatively buoyant housing market is circumscribed by acute concern amongst residents over the maintenance of areas of protection against development pressure. The south of the county is marked by Green Belt and Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) designations and these areas have become home to groups of residents keen to uphold the 'green' spaces that characterize their neighbourhoods. These designations play a crucial role in maintaining those idyllic conceptions of rural settlements which motivate many residents in both their search for, and behaviour in, rural environments (Thrift, 1989). In what follows, we firstly outline (rather selectively) the relationship between social change - - in particular evidence of a growing middle class presence in rural England - - and political action undertaken to stabilize aspects of rural life and the rural environment. We then turn to the planning review process and examine the representations made by those who became involved. In the course of this analysis we will note the problems encountered by many residents and groups in making such representations. This recognition that, even for the most able of participants, constraints on time, money and other resources curtailed effective participation leads us on to the issue of motivations: given the problems they faced, why were people driven to put their efforts into the planning participation process? Three main sets of motivations were emphasized by our respondents: first, awareness of planning issues and particularly the role of forward planning; secondly, the need to conserve communities and to make this need known in the planning process; and, thirdly, a profound distrust of local government and its workings. We consider these motivations in turn and conclude with a few comments on the likely outcomes of planning participation in such areas as rural Buckinghamshire. The middle class and rural England
It has become something of a commonplace to assert that rural areas of England are 'middle-class territory' (Buller and Lowe, 1990, p. 27), a view which Phillips believes is becoming an 'emergent orthodoxy' (1993, p. 131). Early studies by Pahl (1965) and Newby et al. (1978) alerted rural sociologists and geographers to the increasingly influential role of middle class in-migrants within the rural arena. This earlier work has been supplemented through more recent studies conducted in Berkshire by Barlow and Savage (1986) and Short et al. (1986)
Social Construction of 'Middle England' which further highlighted an increase in the number of middle class conservation and residential groups, particularly in the prosperous South East of England. These groups - - which involve mainly 'the middle-class and upper-income residents' (Short et al., 1986, p. 209) - - are overwhelmingly concerned with thc physical and social aspects of their immediate environment. Short et al. record this phenomenon as being particularly strong in villages, where they argue 'there is a powerful ideology which sees in a village location the hope of reasserting a moral arcadia away from the anonymity of mass urban society' (p. 209). The political mechanisms through which middle class influence is exercised have been examined in some detail by Lowe (1977) who argued that the rise in localistic environmental protest has been closely related to the continual development of national and local legislation associated with conservation. It is the decisions and actions of local authorities that the majority of such middle class groups are aiming to influence. More specifically, he argues, local groups appear to have arisen in response to the planning system and the rapid rise in the number of groups coincides with official encouragement for public participation in planning (around the time of the Skeffington Report, which placed particular emphasis on the importance of group representations, in the late 1960s). The existence of the planning system, therefore, would seem to provide an arena for middle class political representation. Moreover, within this arena decisions are taken which have real material effects. Planning thus provides not only a focus for middle class representation but a means whereby these representations can be translated into material forms. The role of political representation in maintaining the dominance of the middle class is also illustrated by Jo Little (1987). Little believes that the increased middle class composition of rural villages, and the specific forms and styles of political representation in rural areas, are actively encouraged by state policies, particularly planning, which are concerned with environmental conservation and resource concentration. The prevailing ideology, she argues, is essentially anti-development and she concludes: It is clear ... that planning cannot be disregarded as a definite force behind social change and that conservative anti-development ... policies not only protect the interests of the middle classes but actively disadvantage the least affluent. This will result in the continuing (possibly accelerating) social polarisation of rural areas in the future and a reinforcement of middle class exclusivity in the countryside (1987. p. 198). Cloke and Little (1990) go on to show that this process may well become self-reinforcing, for as
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more middle class incomers take up residence they will tend to become involved in local politics and will work to ensure that restrictive planning policies remain in existence. Furthermore, they argue that the planning system itself is structured in such a way as to demand a relatively high standard of education from those who choose to participate in it. Thus the middle class will be favoured as its members are likely to have the social, technical and communicative assets required to make successful representations, allowing it to dominate not just particular forms of housing, labour markets and communities, but also political institutions. It follows, therefore, that participation in the planning system - - as an ostensibly public-interest activity of the state - - is a critical arena for middle class political activity to emerge. In short, it is crucial to the making of 'Middle England'. The thrust of these studies is that the middle class through the activities of well-organized action and amenity groups - - is coming to dominate the politics of rural areas. We have shown elsewhere that middle class actors can be highly effective within the development process and can markedly influence the physical and social shape of various localities through their use of planning provisions and discourses that were originally established to provide environmental protection (Murdoch and Marsden, 1994). Such political activity is part of what Savage et al. (1992) characterize more generally as a 'defensive politics' oriented to the protection of economic, cultural and property assets. The aim is to protect the properties and neighbourhoods which form the core of middle class space from unwelcome development and, by extension, unwelcome social groups. -
-
Within the planning arena, middle class action is usually focused on precise issues and must be adapted to the formal rules of participation. Its effectiveness, however, will depend on the resources and commitment available to these middle class actors. While the trend towards increasing middle class activity organized around rural environmental issues has been well-documented, it is often assumed that members of the middle class are powerful simply because they are increasingly present in large numbers. The actual difficulties that arise in mobilizing resources and maintaining political influence are often overlooked. Yet it is clear that a crucial component of the ability middle class actors have to further their political dominance in rural areas is the extent to which individuals are able to enter into associations with others in order to establish or protect patterns of social and spatial privilege. The making of such associations is too often taken for granted and deemed to arise rather
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unproblematically from the 'shared interests' of middle class actors. In practice, however, shared interests have to be recognized and asserted (Hindess, 1987). It is within the context of middle class actions that these interests will crystallize, as actors enter into political relations with one another and seek to achieve certain aims. Often these interests may be interpreted and expressed through a whole host of issues which have only a partial class dimension. Moreover, mobilization around these issues may well be something of a struggle: a struggle against lack of resources, such as time, money, commitment and so on. Thus the making of middle class dominance may be a more precarious process than previously assumed. The uneven nature of participatory capacity is inferred in recent work by Cloke and Thrift (1990) and Cioke et al. (1995). Here the emphasis is upon differentiation within the middle class. Cloke and Thrift (1990, p. 166) argue that it is extremely unlikely that a coherent and distinctive middle class group will have evolved in rural England: 'Instead, we should expect to encounter different fractions of middle class presence, and if these fractions bring with them characteristic behaviour patterns then they are likely to have a powerful influence on culture, society and community in rural localities'. Five fault lines running through the middle class are then identified by Cloke and Thrift: public/private sector; gender; life cycle; consumption practices; and type of locality. In order to understand the actions of middle class actors and groups in rural areas it is thus necessary to study the relations between such fractions. However, as Cloke et al. (1995, pp. 236-238) take up this analysis they argue that further differences may emerge within the class fractions. They generalize these as: a local gentry, whose links to the locale span generations; village regulators or community leaders, those people who live in the village and take a keen interest in planning controls; 'move in and join in' residents, which refers to those wishing to take a full and active part in community life; and 'move in for self and show' residents who wish to live a privatized lifestyle against a rural backdrop. Clearly the resources and motivations which are available to the different groups will vary and thus the amount of representational activity going on in any particular rural locale will depend on the mixture of these types. From our previous work (Murdoch and Marsden, 1994), we are aware that in Buckinghamshire, village regulators and 'move in and join in' residents would seem to be present in abundance. In these previous studies, we have examined the involvement of such groups in particular development processes. In this work, we are concerned with their role in plan-making. Therefore, in what
follows, we outline how such middle class actors attempt to influence structure plan policies. In short, we will show how they seek to make 'Middle England'.
Structure plan making The structure plan review process is a useful arena in which to observe contemporary patterns of middle class political activity, particularly as it impacts upon rural areas, for in the wake of the 1991 Planning and Compensation Act, forward planning has been granted an enhanced role in the governance of rural development. This legislation can be understood as part of the distinctive role played by concerns about the rural environment in mediating Conservative neo-liberal impulses (see Marsden et al., 1993, especially Chapter 5; Murdoch and Marsden, 1994). Such impulses were given impetus by the crisis of agriculture in the early 1980s which coincided with government concern to rejuvenate the rural economy through the unleashing of market forces. For instance, the Alternative Land Use and the Rural Economy (ALURE) working group, composed of officials from a range of government departments, was established in the mid-1980s to explore the scope for non-agricultural economic development in rural areas. An increased emphasis on a laissez-faire approach was evident in DoE planning circulars at this time. Particularly significant was the draft circular Development Involving Agricultural Land (DOE, 1987) which suggested that farming should be seen as a land use only on a par with environmental and other economic considerations. However, the circular was seen by conservation groups as lowering the barriers to development and a storm of protest followed its publication. The final version of the circular thus promised to protect the countryside 'for its own sake' (DOE, 1987, p. 3). This effectively marked the end of moves to free up the planning system at this time and, by the end of the decade, a strengthening of planning in rural areas was evident. The pressure on the government from 'natural' Tory voters in the countryside (most clearly demonstrated by the 1989 Euro-election vote for the Green Party) had swung the tide against deregulation. The 1991 Planning and Compensation Act thus strengthened the role of planning by bringing all rural areas under the local development plan-making process for the first time. The plan was now to be paramount, with all development control decisions being made in accordance with the plan unless material conditions indicate otherwise. It is also worth mentioning in this regard the DoE's emerging policy on environmental sustainability
Social Construction of 'Middle England' which further implicates planning as a major mechanism for the delivery of environmental goals. One question this raises is whether planning should -in the broader public interest - - represent regional and national environmental resource concerns over the tendency towards much more locally asserted environmental values (often characterized as 'NIMBYism'). Structure planning - which has now to take sustainability criteria into account - - is located at the heart of this tension for it must consider broader strategic objectives and reconcile these with local demands and needs. Strategic forward planning takes on a new significance for it sets the terms upon which individual planning decisions will be made in rural areas (again for the first time), and this has put more pressure on the system and those who operate it (the professional planners and politicians) to deliver the environmental 'goods' that local residents now demand within the context of national and regional policies. Professional planners, elected political members, parish councillors, local amenity and environmental groups, residents and developers, all now see development planning as an arena in which they might achieve their respective goals. With the enhanced status of forward planning, issues of public participation become more urgent. In the next section we illustrate how a generally well educated and knowledgeable public seeks to make a meaningful contribution to the development of strategic plans, and we outline some of the reasons for their involvement in the consultative process.
Making
a response
The review of the Structure Plan began with a group of planning officers putting together a series of papers on the contemporary state of Buckinghamshire, in terms of housing, employment and transport, and summarising national policies and Policy Planning Guidance Notes. These papers were then submitted to a County Council Planning subcommittee, composed of ten members, to provide the political member input to the review process. A synthesis of the available information was subsequently translated into a 'Position Statement', which summarized the elements which would be included in the new plan. Prime amongst these were the twin objectives of protecting the Green Belt and the AONB. Given that this also stood as a position statement of the political members, it is clear that the general direction of the plan was fixed from the start, as these primary objectives appeared in the consultation draft and remained central to the plan as it progressed through the review process.
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With the consultation draft complete, the County Council was faced with the task of involving the 'general public'. Extensive publicity followed publication of the consultation draft, when the County Council produced over a hundred thousand copies of a tabloid style newspaper 'which was a sort of simple layman's guide to what it was all about' (Interview with planning officer), distributed through libraries, shopping centres and community centres. Adverts were placed in local newspapers, interviews were given on local radio and an exhibition travelled around the county, and in places where major change was proposed, public meetings were held. According to a county planning officer: 'there was a very wide coverage for the public consultation stage. We didn't just put an advert in the paper and publish the plan and say, 'get on with it chaps'. We really made strenuous efforts to inform and involve people in the process by a wide number of different ways.' (Interview). This planning officer recognized that the coverage was not comprehensive, but felt that it was always going to be difficult to get responses for the abstract issues inherent in strategic planning. He explained that despite their efforts to involve more people in the consultation process and to publicise as widely as possible, there were logistical limitations: We had to keep within manageable proportions. You know, our members' time is limited. We can't possibly hope to involve everybody who we might wish to involve, we have to just try to narrow down, we involve the Districts, interests and so on. We would have liked to have involved more; it was just the logistics and time that prevented us. At the consultation stage you might say 'it's just consultation' but we did do far more than we were required to do at the consultation stage, you know, we really went out of our way to try and advertise the plan through every medium possible, to tell people what was going on, to solicit their views. We didn't try to structure their opinions in any way. We might have been able to do it better. No doubt there are better ways of doing it. It seemed to us a fair and reasonable way of going about it. (Interview). The dissemination of information on the Structure Plan relied on a network of communication channels through the county, including libraries, community centres, parish councils and shopping centres, as well as certain pressure groups and agencies with whom the County Council were familiar. In some cases this dissemination strategy was successful, provoking individuals to comment. As one said, 'somehow or other there was a form inviting comments on the structure plan. It was in response to an invitation, rather than I suddenly got hold of the structure plan and thought I must write about this, my goodness.' (Interview). Some individuals also wrote responses under 'several hats'. In other words, they either wrote objections on behalf of several organizations or used the knowledge gained
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from working with an organization to inform their personal comments. One person responded in their role as chair of a Parish Council but also represented a county voluntary organization. Another respondent explained: 'I wrote three letters actually, to planning, one in my capacity as clerk of the Parish Council, one in my capacity as secretary for [this] district of the C P R E county branch, and one as personal.' (Interview). Another wrote-as a representative of a large pressure group and on behalf of clients as a planning consultant. In other cases, personal comments were sacrificed for organizational ones: 'because I was so tied up with doing all these other things and because I've got a family, who are growing up and a husband who works all hours that God sends, I didn't actually have time to do my personal response and that's happened more than once.' (Interview). Another strategy was for one organization's comments to be allied to another's, often because of lack of resources, as the following comment indicates: Because I'm a parish councillor first, as a Parish Council we get asked if we want to comment. We actually managed to get a free copy! When you have all these councillors you really need two, so we had to go and spend twenty pounds to get a second copy which, when it's only a draft, you really rather resent them the money. And then because I'm on the preservation society, we make comments or otherwise, but as the people on the preservation society, we make comments or otherwise, but as the people on the preservation society [who respond to planning matters] are the same people doing the parish council, we tend to - - I mean I can't put two different heads on me, to make two different lots of comments, so on the whole at the moment the preservation society tend to support the parish council's comments. It seems to me the only logical way to do it. (Interview). For individuals, however, it was often even more difficult just to see the plans. People complained that if they worked during the week it was impossible for them to get to the planning offices and then it was difficult to find the time to make comments. As one respondent said: you come home from work, well if people work in London they don't get home until 7, 8 o'clock at night, they're not feeling like sitting down and really getting into hassle about local government. There's no way in which you could get the time to really get stuck into it because it's a complex and difficult process to understand. (Interview). Thus some respondents experienced difficulty in gaining access to information about the plan. For instance, one village society which organized a campaign to protect their area from inclusion into Milton Keynes, felt that they were disadvantaged in their ability to respond to development plans by not being a parished village. As one representative said:
Because we're not a parish council, automatically we don't get circularized with this information. However, the point is that we are in constant contact [with the County Council] - - they know who we are. They probably hear more from us than a lot of parish councils but they don't actually let us know what's happening. So there's always a feeling that we're being kept in the dark. (Interview). The village society had not received a copy of the plan, nor had they found copies of the newspaper in the local library: 'it wasn't actually available through the travelling library even ... It was available in central Milton Keynes, on request. So what we did, we went and we just took armfuls of them. We took virtually all their copies and we then circularised it.' Nor were they satisfied with the travelling exhibition, organized by the County Council to publicize the plan: '... there was an exhibition when it went on deposit, in the food hall of Marks & Sparks in central Milton Keynes for 3 days, from the date it was published. So unless you happened to be shopping on those 3 days you wouldn't have known.' (Interview). A respondent from another village society was more forthright: 'They give everybody half an hour to respond. And then they say 'oh, we haven't had any replies, nobody's interested'!' (Interview). Time and access to information were, therefore, regarded as constraints. Cost was also cited at an issue by the same respondent: 'I think they've [the County Council] made as much effort as they've ever done but it's like everything else; you've got to pay ten pounds for this, five pounds for that. Or else you've got to crouch about in the library, try and copy things out' (Interview). In general terms, Buckinghamshire is not a poor county, yet raising funds to allow effective participation was not always easy. In order to facilitate such participatory activities, some of the action groups sought to raise funds. One of the groups mentioned above combined their social fund raising schemes with their political activities, and another invented an ingenious scheme, run along the lines of Lloyds, whereby 'Names' in the village were invited to guarantee a certain sum in the event of losing a court battle or such like. In some cases access to the plan appeared to rely heavily on local knowledge or pure chance. One individual respondent explained how she heard about the proposals for her village: It was nobody in particular - - there's not a residents' association or anything like that. I think the parish council, obviously, were originally notified about the plan. I don't think they stimulated any action. I think one or two local residents got to hear about it on the grapevine and rumours started flying around. I think the thing is that very often things which are in officialese - they come through your letterbox and they go straight in the bin very often. I think everybody lives such busy lives that anything vaguely official very often tends to
Social Construction of 'Middle England' end up in the bin, but I think one or two people did take note and look further into what was being proposed and there was a great strength of feeling within the village. (Interview). A m o n g the statutory recipients of the draft plans are Parish Councils. The chair of a Parish Council in Aylesbury Vale described the process of consultation: Basically what happens with something like the county structure plan is that the clerk will receive it, its draft form or whatever, she will then give it to me and I will then go through it and discuss it with the vice-chairman who will also be given the opportunity to go through it. It will also be sent round - - hopefully we will actually be sent two copies so that one can stay with the vicechairman and me and the other copy can go round to the rest of the Parish Council who may or may not have time to look at it. (Interview). T h e constraints on participation begin to emerge, as this respondent went on to explain: This is one of the major problems with things like the structure plan. People who are on Parish Councils are usually either working full-time of part-time and have busy responsible jobs, or they run their own businesses and possibly they are involved in other areas of voluntary work. It's very common for a parish councillor to be a magistrate, it's very common for a parish councillor to be on the parochial church council which I'm not but one of our parish councillors is. (Interview). It is also very clear that the b u r d e n of consultation on many different issues limits the ability of Parish Councils to respond as thoroughly as they might: We organize ourselves, but the amount - - we've had the most tremendous number of consultation documents about planning in Aylesbury Vale in the last 5 years because not only have we had the structure plan which you have seen in all its various stages, but we've also had the rural areas local plan and that was the second thing we had to go through. (Interview). As with all the groups we have studied, a great deal of time and effort was expended on these activities and the resources of time and commitment, more than any other, are put u n d e r continual pressure. Feelings of being overwhelmed by the work load involved in making respresentations on plans were particularly keenly felt. O n e respondent, responsible for dealing with planning issues within an intercounty conservation group, described the problem in the following way: We have been [responding to all plans] but we're pulling out of that now because we just can't deal with it, physically - - well, I have in the past had 3 part-time assistants but I haven't any more, so you just can't do everything - - it's just impossible. So really we're looking at this end of things [the Structure Plan] to try to get this end of things right and just get it to feed down
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through the system so that planning applications will be sensible. (Interview). A n o t h e r large inter-county conservation group had limited their responses to the Structure Plan as they had a local plan review and two public enquiries to attend within the same three months. Whereas the former group could afford paid employees, the latter used full-time volunteers. But without professional planning advice it was difficult for them to compete in planning reviews. This was even m o r e of a problem for small groups of residents. The chair of one such group summarized the feelings of many: These chaps doing these plans, it's a full-time job. You're doing it as a part-time job and it'd be nice to have a rest, but really you've got to keep at it all the time and it's a lot better getting in at the front end and getting the policies right and then you don't have all these particular problems and that's what we've been doing. (Interview). Persistent groups use their initiative to make sure that they do find out about policy developments in the County and District Councils, but they have to go to some trouble to be informed of the latest developments. In one of the larger southern villages, the chair of the village society illustrated this, explaining that the society had, itself, to keep disseminating information to its members: I think partly by keeping people informed, we write to them, and we send them newsletters and we call public meetings, you know, when the local authority wouldn't call a public meeting. It's quite strange - - Aylesbury Vale if they had something to say would call a public meeting in Aylesbury and Winslow and somewhere else. They won't have one [here], so we used to call our own and invite them to come! Well they couldn't turn it down you see! (Interview). In this case, the group was acting as a source of information for local residents on planning matters, publicizing any implications for the local area and mobilizing opposition to unwelcome provision. Given the efforts the respondents took to participate in the review process, we can now consider why they were prepared to go to such lengths. In the following sections we consider their motivations under three broad headings: planning awareness, conserving communities and distrust of local governance. These headings are derived from the concerns expressed most frequently by our respondents.
Motivations (I): Planning awareness It is clear that, in the wake of the 1991 Act with its increased emphasis on forward planning, there is a need to be involved in planning at a more strategic level than simply the planning application stage or
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even the local plan level if local residents are to have an effective voice. Many community leaders or village regulators recognize that they must be constantly alert, and are aware of the many layers of procedural administration involved in the planning system. Often, this awareness has been forced on them by bitter experience of fighting particular development proposals. One consultant acknowledged that this is a valid concern and pointed to the way that policies adopted in development plans can reach residents after the fact: I've got a site which has been allocated for development in a plan since about 1982 and a lot of local people were unaware that it was allocated in this plan, they just didn't know about it. We put a planning application in and all helrs broken loose. People have said, 'you can't do this, this is a wonderful little wood, and it's important' and all the rest of it and we've simply pointed out that 'well, it's allocated in the plan and what we're doing is strictly in accordance with the plan'. (Interview). He went on to state quite clearly the separation between the moral and procedural implications of this situation, in the process acknowledging that the system is quite clearly biased by the unequal distribution of information: The idea was that the plan would be all-encompassing. It's totally idiotic, but that's what it says, and so our site is in a statutory plan, it's been through the whole process of public enquiries and the lot, it's been adopted and approved formally and we should expect to be able to get planning permission for the site because it's in the plan. And all the locals are jumping up and down and saying 'this is disgraceful', and it might well be disgraceful, but they should have said that when it was going through the earlier process, you know. It's a very difficult situation now because they don't understand really that we're so far down the line, that my client has committed a lot of expenditure to it on the basis that it was an allocated site and he took his decisions based on the knowledge that it was in the plan, so it is actually unfair on him if it's now refused because locals don't like it. They should have said they didn't like it before. (Interview). Many individual residents were clearly responding to the Structure Plan after prior experience of such planning issues. As one said 'I think the reason for my irritation is that time after time I have been concerned with appeals against refusal for planning permission.' (Interview). Similarly for the non-statutory bodies it was often the experience of fighting a local development issue which led people to an understanding of the implications of strategic planning, and thus the need to try to influence the Structure Plan. In the case of the following village society, it had fought a crucial battle over a local development proposal to build a large new housing estate on the fringes of the village. The society objected, as the chair of the society explained:
When ]the planning application was] put in we as a society got quite excited and we lobbied all the planning committee and we had a chairman of our local parish council, who was also a district councillor, and I went to see him and [he] said I'm against building on [The] Park, I always have been and I always will be, you can rely on my vote', so I thought, great. So we went to the meeting of this development control or some committee and it was going to be about eight-four against it, when our bold councillor got up and said well, he thought it would be a good idea if there was some building and he proposed that it be accepted ... 'as long as there was no more building before 1990', So, the woman next to him said 'oh well if there isn't going to be any building until 1990, I'm in favour of it and I'll second him', so it was a casting vote, six-six and it wasn't the normal chairman it was a chairman from somewhere in North Bucks and he just said 'oh, I think we'll be able to build in ]the village], it'd be quite a good idea. Passed,' you see, just like that. (Interview). It did not take long for the chairman, and thus the society, to recognize that planning permision had been given because the area was identified for development in the Local Plan: this question of this land at [The] Park came up, so I said 'well what's the procedure? What controls this, what runs it?' you see. So, we eventually found out there was a thing called a structure plan, I mean no-one in the ]Village] society knew anything about structure plans. So I said right, let's get hold of a copy of that. We got a copy of the structure plan and then the modifications and alterations, and we went through it and modified it and brought it up to date. Eventually we seemed to know more about the structure plan than a lot of people in county hall, but it was really my saying 'what are the rules? Let's find out the rules before we start going off in one direction or another, let's find out what the rules are under which we're operating'. So once the committee, or the working party really, we had a working party of five, saw what it was all about, they've tended to follow that since, you see, so when a new structure plan comes out, 'let's get a draft, let's comment on it, let's follow it through', and the same with the rural areas local plan. Oh we had a heck of a fight about that. (Interview). This is not an isolated experience and all of those residents' groups who were represented during the EiP had b e c o m e aware of the Structure Plan because of previous involvement in planning issues. The concern expressed was that if a Structure Plan were a d o p t e d which did not give certain assurances then it would be extremely difficult to argue for these in the local plan, and local plan reviews were acknowledged to be much more formidable arenas in which to change strategic policies. Respondents were, therefore, generally people who recognized the strategic nature of structure planning, and the relevance of participation in it. As the officer of a conservation group put it: 'I think structure plans are important because structure plans have a significant impact because they set the scene for local plans and local plans set the scene for planning
Social Construction of 'Middle England' applications and planning applications are what generates 90% of my pains-in-the-neck type scenarios' (Interview). A village society's chairman also recognized this: it's so important. I mean I learnt that lesson very quickly when I came in and they said 'oh well no one objected when we were consulting about the plan, therefore there's nothing you can do now'. I think that's where we are different from most societies who are just looking at the end results and then complaining when it's tended to be a bit too late you see. If someone's decided they're going to build, and [this village] is a place for expansion, it's no good then objecting when someone says they're going to build fifty houses. You've got to get in the front and say [this] isn't a place for expansion, it isn't a dormitory town, this, this and that. So that's what we tried to do anyway. (Interview). In other words, a recognition of the strategic functions of the plan seems to be an increasing concern underlying participation in the review process.
Motivations (2): Conserving communities While these respondents were involved in the consultation process because of their increasing awareness of d e v e l o p m e n t issues and the significance of d e v e l o p m e n t plans, their aims were often m o r e complex. Many of the village societies sought to use the planning system to shape the village in accordance with ideal images of the rural community. For example, one village society was formed: to try to keep [the village] a pleasant place to live rather than be anything too left-wing or 'green-oriented' ... You go into the village, it's friendly, you meet people you know, the centre is just right for serving the population. (Interview). A n o t h e r village society was f o r m e d in the 1960s, with formal aims: to encourage high standards of architecture and town planning in [the village]. To stimulate public interest in and care for the beauty, history and character of the area of the village and its surroundings. To encourage the preservation and improvement of features of general public amenity or historical interest and to pursue these ends by means of meetings, exhibitions, lectures, etc. (Interview). Having been founded as a means of engaging with the planning system, m a n y of these village societies have taken on b r o a d e r concerns. Notions of ' c o m m u n i t y spirit' or 'neighbourliness' are incorporated into the ethos of the societies which then b e c o m e much m o r e than planning campaign groups, turning into social groups with a desire to foster
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some notion of 'belonging'. T h e s e village societies were, however, as one r e s p o n d e n t described: 'middle class type organizations', representing, in the words of another, 'middle-professional, comfortable England', and the societies p r o m o t e d this as an ideal. As one of them claimed: 'middle class values are not altogether too bad. If everybody had them it would be a lot better than if everybody doesn't have them.' The values of the groups trying to preserve their villages have been considered to some extent elsewhere (Cloke and Thrift, 1990; Lowe, 1977, Matless, 1994; Short et al., 1986; Thrift, 1989), but it can still be argued that there remains a strain of the Romantic ideal of a pastoral England which incorporates a fair a m o u n t of nostalgia, as in the following c o m m e n t from a m e m b e r of a village preservation society: The centre of the village is a very attractive old conservation area and it's probably, I don't know, one of the older conservation areas in the county and there's some beautiful thatched properties there and the guiding factors for the preservation society are that we look at the planning applications that come to the Parish Council and we comment on ones which are likely to affect the village from a preservation aspect. (Interview). A n d more specifically, Well, we don't want to see it spoilt, probably, so we tend perhaps to look at things slightly differently from the Parish Council. (Interview). Further into the conservation, m o r e hints at the aesthetic of the village appeared: this village was chosen in 1953 as the typical English village, in the year of the Queen's coronation, and if you've seen some of the pictures: Nat West (Bank) had the village on its Christmas cards a few years ago. Down by the church there's the Henry Vth courthouse, very attractive. (Interview). So what kinds of threats are there to this chocolatebox village? We're having trouble in the village at the moment about the fish and chip shop and the revolving sign and you get the older people in the village, or the people who have been living in the village all their lives, don't like being told what's right and wrong by what they call 'newcomers' to the village. And I, personally, think this revolving sign in the middle of the conservation area looks ghastly, but, you know, they say, they can't see that, anything would go to bring a bit of life into the village ... (Interview). However, it would not be fair to claim that all these groups blindly resent change. On the contrary, as we have stressed, they do wish to change their environ-
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ment but not in the way envisaged by most of the major building conglomerates that would be likely to build in their areas if planning permission were available. There are villagers who recognize that, 'every house that comes on the market is bought up by some London commuter or Wycombe executive, and we aren't actually a rural community at all, we're actually a commuter dormitory ...' (Interview), but still insist their villages need protection against the spreading of what they see as large numbers of houses in rural areas which would 'damage' small hamlets. Ironically, one village society chairperson expressed his disgust with the present housing shortages for which he put some of the blame on the inability of councils to build public sector housing. He would be happy to see more council houses: Council houses get a bad name because they tend to build them in estates of a thousand or two thousand. There's some pleasant little places with eight and ten council houses in [the village] which are fine, why not just infill with it? And integrate them into it, don't just built a whole housing estate where everyone consists of people who can't afford houses! It tends to divide doesn't it? (Interview). Despite the strong community values of the groups, however, it is clear that without a committed core of activists, the groups simply fade away (and we heard of several which had). As Parish Councils can also fade into inaction, and in order to provide an effective representation for residents, these groups must be constantly alert and aware of the many layers of procedural administration involved in the planning system.
Motivations (3): Distrust of local government Another motivation underlying participation was a belief that statutory lines of representation are not reliable in conveying the concerns of the residents in the review process. This perception is perhaps a little surprising given the point mentioned earlier, that the county councillors ensured, right from the start, that rural protection was central to the plan. Quite simply, those people who responded to the Structure Plan review felt that their representation through local councillors was inadequate. They distrust the workings of local government: In recent years I have a feeling that one's influence becomes less and less. I get the feeling that even the elected representatives at district level and county level, that they don't feel that they have a great deal of influence. They have been overridden by the officials at local level, at county level, and then the government of
course have got all the strings to which they are holding on tight. (Interview). According to another respondent, the calibre of local politicians was the problem: you've no say about the qualifications of these people, you can't say oh I'm not going to vote for him, you generally vote for a label like Conservative, or Socialist, or something. So what qualification has this chap got to be a councillor? And then you find that when they get on the council, like he's now the county council's man, he's not representing our views to the county council, he's now joined The Club, which is a mixture of officers and elected representatives who form this council, and you know you're either for the council or you're against them, not are you for the people who put you in there. (Interview). Nor were the political implications lost on other respondents, including a major landowner, Lord and former member of the Thatcher government: You know, the curious paradox of all this is that the Conservative government of 1979 came in with the intention of taking the government off the backs of the people and doing much less in Westminster, of decentralizing, and actually what's happened is the exact reverse. Everything is more centralized, they've taken away the powers of the councils, no no, it's all gone. (Interview). For many respondents, local governance is both over-burdensome and unrepresentative, and thus new local government plans provide a stimulus for new social and political groupings. These concerns were highlighted during 1993 and 1994 during a massive and widely publicized campaign which was launched in opposition to the proposed widening of the A418 road across Buckinghamshire which was perceived as amounting to the construction of a motorway by stealth. During the furore over the proposal, the County Council was suspected of acting on behalf of the Department of Transport in proposing the scheme rather than representing the people of the county who overwhelmingly objected to it. It seems that the councillors were hoping to use the scheme to fund bypasses around towns such as Aylesbury, while the DoT saw the route from a strategic perspective, i.e. they were proposing a complete East-West transnational route from the East coast ports to the M40 which would relieve pressure on the M25 and complement the development of the East Thames corridor. The leader of the campaign against the road widening suggested that: The Department of Transport and Buckinghamshire County Council were in a, what I would have said was a very questionable constitutional arrangement; the DoT had staff operating within Buckinghamshire County
Social Construction of 'Middle England' Council office and staff from the County Council were actually seconded to the Department. (Interview). One of the planners at the County Council gave his perspective: It was part of the transport scheme, the trunk route. Obviously we were doing the design of it so by implication we were just as much culpable as the DoT was. We always wanted a southern by-pass for Aylesbury and as this was going to be designed as part of the East-West trunk route we could get 100% government funding for it and people were saying, 'that's the only reason why you support this scheme - - if you support the EastWest route you'll get the by-pass paid for by the DOT.' You can make your own mind up whether that's true or not. (Interview). Whatever the arrangement, the public perception was that the County Council had been acting for the government and against the interests of the county's residents, and it could be argued that this was a crucial moment in the decline of support for Conservative councillors in Buckinghamshire. It was also totemic of the general difficulty for a longstanding Conservative council of supporting a Conservative government, even when its aims were in conflict with local opinion. It further highlights a more general principle about strategic decision making which suggests that once representatives begin to work on strategic issues, the achievement of an overall strategy takes priority over local issues. However, in this case, the upgrading of the road was eventually suspended by the government, after pressure from local MP's, effectively leaving the councillors with egg on their faces for having supported such an unpopular scheme. The legacy of this conflict, it was suggested to us, was that some of the Councillors would not be re-elected because of their actions over this issue. The effects of these cross-cutting strategic and local interests were to confirm a general feeling that local government had been stripped of most of its effective powers (whilst also being prone to abuse), and to greatly reduce public confidence in the County Council as a representative body. The perceived inadequacies of the consultation process and the experiences of residents in local planning appeals and enquiries further brought about a lack of trust between the planning authorities and residents. It is, therefore, a perception that there is a fundamental inadequacy in the current role, ability and accountability of local politicians that underlies the concerns of local middle class associations. This perceived inadequacy of formal systems of local governance gives power and legitimacy to new forms of association that, once forged, must be kept strong through shared concerns about levels and types of
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development, opportunities for amenity, preservation of the rural environment, ways of life and the redefinition of village and rural/urban identities. These concerns can cement local relationships and allow local residents to adopt a more proactive and professional approach to strategic planning. Conclusion
While the material presented here can be used to show that plan-making is asymmetrically geared to those citizens (particularly rural citizens) who have the social and material wherewithal to engage in planning policy networks, it also shows that even for these most motivated of middle class actors, such 'powers of association' are not easy to sustain. They are based upon combinations of economic, cultural and political resources which demand constant articulation within and between formal and informal networks. These resources are often mobilized as a result of previous patterns of association and involvement in campaigning activities, as in the experiences of those people involved in fighting development control issues which then led them directly to become involved in the consultation over the Structure Plan. As a corollary to this, it was very clear that those groups who did not respond to the Structure Plan were those who either had not had similar experiences of forming associations to fight contentious developments, or did not have access to an effective forum to become involved in the consultation procedure. Although the values of the groups trying to preserve their villages in Buckinghamshire have been characterized as practising the politics of exclusion (Lowe et al., 1995; Murdoch and Marsden, 1994), it would not be accurate to claim that all these groups blindly resent change. Thus they can be characterized as battling for control over the future physical and social shape of rural space. The case study outlined here has shed some light on the ways in which different actors and groups develop their social and political resources to define their, and others', physical spaces. Such uneven and asymmetrical processes of informal and formal local governance raise important questions about what key influences should shape territorial management. In the South East of England, for example, where the pressure for growth and preservationism are heightened, the powers of association within and between key social groups and networks come into sharp focus in the plan-making process. These groups were formed in order to try and control or ameliorate the pressures for development in local areas. Residents, many of whom seem sceptical of the system of representation inherent in local government, were, through these
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group activities, attempting to take some control of their own destinies. An unfortunate side-effect of this localistic activity, however, is that other areas, which are not so strongly protective, can come to bear the brunt of the remorseless pressures for growth. Many commentators have assumed that the planning system has traditionally contained a strong urban bias (playing on a negative role in rural areas). Yet today the growth of environmental concerns, and a commensurate role for planning in delivering environmental 'goods', would seem to indicate that the system will play a more positive role in rural areas. Our analysis highlights some potential dangers in this trend. The middle class action and amenity groups, with established histories of local association, may well simply utilize many of the new environmental policies in order to bolster some very traditional rural concerns. Thus it became apparent that even as the Buckinghamshire Structure Plan took on a more urban focus, concentrating development in the urban areas of Aylesbury and Milton Keynes, the most effective non-professional influences on it appeared to be rural anti-development lobbies. This tended to uphold a strong urban/rural spatial dichotomy in which there are different conceptions of what levels of development are legitimate in urban and rural locations. Middle class groups driven by a positive commitment to community and a distrust of local politicians and planners act to reinforce this dichotomy by protecting 'their' environments. Thus the traditionally negative character of rural planning might be given renewed life by preservationist political formations. In even the most dynamic economic and social contexts, traditional landmarks of English rurality may, thus, be maintained. Acknowledgements - - The material included in this paper was collected under the Economic and Social Research Council's Local Governance Programme. We are grateful to the ESRC for funding this work. An earlier version of the paper was given at the Local Governance conference at the University of Exeter in September 1995. We thank the participants for their comments. We are also grateful for the suggestions of two referees. References
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