UK Spatial Policy and Westminster’s System of Governance: A Case-Study in ‘Hyper-Active Incrementalism’ and Failure to Learn Lessons

A striking feature of the delayed White Paper on Levelling-Up the United Kingdom was the frank critique it offered of past attempts by central government to address spatial inequality. The White Paper highlights key Westminster Model pathologies, notably short-termism, poor policy co-ordination, weak local institutions, inadequate monitoring, and insufficient accountability and transparency. To understand the persistence of such pathologies, this paper bridges the gap between two prominent analytical approaches to public policy often viewed as mutually exclusive: Lindblom’s ‘disjointed incrementalism’ and Moran’s concept of ‘hyper-innovation’. We draw together the tacit assumptions of incrementalism and hyper-innovation to develop a novel framework that we label ‘Hyper-Active Incrementalism’ (HAI). Working back from the Government’s own criticisms of past reforms, we present a detailed survey of the last four decades of spatial policy to better understand the causes and determinants of the West Minster model pathologies. We aver that HAI helps to explain their persistence, not only in curtailing a coherent and effective approach to reducing geographical inequalities, but also in shaping the landscape of UK public policy. In conclusion, it is argued governments need to genuinely learn the lessons of past failings by adopting a comprehensive, system-wide approach to reform.