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The persistence of the classic duel between reform and bossism as the dominant theme in the literature on American urban politics has been subject to increasing criticism in recent years. This conflict, it is now argued, provides an inadequate framework in helping us to understand the complexity of American municipal development. While accepting that initiatives suggesting alternative ways of viewing urban politics are long overdue, such efforts, in my view, can only achieve their purpose if they are based on an accurate understanding of the role that the political machine has played in the American city. Unfortunately the consensus that prevails in the abundant literature on this political institution fails to provide just such an understanding. In particular the existing literature fails to furnish satisfactory answers to such key questions as, How do we account for the emergence of the political machine. What functions did it fulfill in the American city. To what extent did so-called "bosses" control party organisations and city governments. Which sections of the urban population supported the machine and why. The aim of this thesis is to address these questions using the Republican political machine (or "Organisation") in Philadelphia as the model for inquiry. The thesis is divided into two parts, the first of which shows that, in spite of appearances to the contrary, an over-riding cleavage between well-organised machine and reform forces did not dominate party politics in Philadelphia in the period prior to 1887. The second half argues that, contrary to received wisdom, a fully fledged political machine did not emerge as the dominant force in the government and politics of the city until the turn of the century. This development is attributed not to the influx of poor immigrants to the city, but to changes in the organisation and structure of Philadelphia's political and economic system, and the ability of the new (internally) consolidated political machine to overwhelm its (external) electoral opponents including its principal opposition the nonpartisan reform movement. It is also argued that the machine, rather than being the natural functional substitute for government that its apologists have traditionally maintained, did in fact function as a blight on the system of government in Philadelphia.

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Local government in England have reformed the management of their public services over many years. The increase in collaboration across the public sector between the public, private and voluntary sectors has been promoted under New Labour in public leisure provision, either through contracts or partnership arrangements. The transfer to collaboration has created significantly new modes of service delivery, including in-house, leisure trust, and private leisure management contractor arrangements. There is a need to examine and test in a more focused way the practices of those engaged in collaborative structures and reflect upon the implications these models present from a strategic management perspective. To this end, the thesis adopts a resource-based view of the firm and seeks to examine how the three approaches to public leisure provision develop strategies and effectively utilise and deploy resources through their strategic actions, with the overarching aim to achieve strategic outcomes. The main findings of the empirical analyses are two-fold. Firstly, of the three approaches examined, in-house provision has the most to gain from being more strategically aware. The case is made for significant strengthening oflocal government in-house managed facilities, which has often been viewed as the poor relation in public leisure provision and stands to lose the most in funding cuts and the subsidies provided to leisure trust rivals. Secondly, leisure trusts receive significant government funds and subsidies through tax breaks that are not forthcoming to rivals, which raises questions as to whether leisure trusts deserve such aid for delivering upon the social inclusion agenda of the government. Given that inclusion is not heavily emphasised or significantly achieved to any greater degree than rivals, it can be argued that this approach to provision does not justify the financial perks oftrust status provided to it. This thesis calls for a fundamental rethink of public policy and for the current public leisure management playing field to be levelled in a rebalance of opportunity and investment through the removal of anti-competitive measures in service delivery.

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