British economic development has long exhibited strong regional patterns and contrasts. The UK shares with France a characteristic not possessed by Germany or Italy: the contemporary weakness of its major regional centres, so that the capital cities (London and Paris) and the regions surrounding them (the so-called Home Counties in south-east England and the Ile de France) dominate. Post industrial society, with its tendency to concentrate up-market services growth in a few chosen metropolitan centres capable of becoming global cities, has intensified this ancient process that was temporarily interrupted by industrialism. South-east England (excluding Greater London itself) is the only region in the UK to have an average per capita income above the European Union mean, but it is itself the richest region in the EU. Although Greater London contains within it the City of London, one of the biggest concentrations of wealth on the planet, and many other extremely rich areas, the mean income for Londoners in general is below the EU mean.
Colin Crouch and Henry Farrell, “Great Britain: Falling Through the Holes in the Network Concept,” in Local Production Systems in Europe: Rise or Demise?, ed. Colin Crouch et al. (Oxford University Press), 2001. Italian translation published in I sistemi di produzione locale in Europa (Il Mulino 2004).