From landscapes of neglect to landscapes of hope

Photo by Flickr user Nicobobinus

In a recent interview for The Guardian, novelist Anthony Cartwright talks about ‘landscapes of neglect’, those mostly urban places which have seen dramatic decline in socio-economic fortune in recent decades and which thus become fertile breeding grounds for far-right extremism. Talking about the town in which he himself grew up, he explains,

"Even as a boy, I was aware of this landscape of decay as the physical fabric of the town was boarded up, and that fed into the psychology of the place… at times of economic collapse, people always look around for someone to blame."

It would seem that in the current climate, there are a lot of people looking around for someone to blame. This study funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation in 2006 found that as many as 18 to 25 per cent of the UK population would consider voting for the British National Party and it is unlikely that this statistic has since dropped.