What happens when devolution is built not around a single dominant city, but a diverse patchwork of places - rural, urban, deprived, wealthy, connected, and isolated?
That’s the question the East Midlands Inclusive Growth Commission (IGC) set out to answer over a 12-month period, following the election of the region’s first metro mayor and creation of the East Midlands Combined County Authority (EMCCA).
Their final report - published this month - might just offer a blueprint for how strategic authorities can make space for local complexity without flattening it. And it holds sharp lessons for Sussex.
“Our ambition must be to build a region where economic growth and social progress go hand in hand.” - Andy Haldane, former Bank of England and Royal Society of Arts executive; Chair of the Commission
🗺️ A polycentric region, a new model
The Commission offers an alternative to the city-centric model adopted in Greater Manchester or the West Midlands. Instead, it recognises the East Midlands as "polycentric" - a region of small cities, historic towns, rural hinterlands, and overlapping identities.
Rather than chase a single growth hub, the strategy pivots to distributed ambition. The result is a detailed framework of ten interventions, each designed to unlock place-based opportunity through joined-up leadership, skills pathways, and civic infrastructure.
👥 500 people. 100 events. One shared process.
The report is unusually grounded in process. Over 12 months, the IGC team:
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Engaged more than 500 individuals
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Hosted over 100 roundtables, public events, and bilateral meetings
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Undertook both quantitative and qualitative research
This depth of engagement directly informed interventions on youth progression, community capital, health equity, net-zero investment, and the regional innovation ecosystem.
As the report states:
“The most powerful solutions are those shaped by people with direct lived and learned experience of the places and systems we are trying to change.”
🏗️ Local government as enabler, not owner
The EMCCA isn’t trying to run everything. Instead, it’s positioning itself as a connector and enabler - creating the conditions for towns, communities and anchor institutions to act.
This means:
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A clear theory of change to guide decision-making across councils and partners
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Investment in data and evaluation to understand what’s working
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Focus on capabilities and collaboration, not just service delivery
This is especially relevant to Sussex, where overlapping authorities, tight budgets, and legacy politics risk derailing the promise of a new mayor-led combined authority. The East Midlands shows it’s possible to start with complexity, and build outwards.
🔁 So what can Sussex learn?
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Devolution isn’t a magic wand – but it can be a lever for longer-term, place-led, inclusive strategies when grounded in lived experience and shared learning.
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Polycentric regions need pluralist approaches – not a single vision but a constellation of locally-owned missions.
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Process matters – strategic authorities should invest in participation and experimentation, not just delivery.
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Inclusive growth is not soft growth – it’s about robust, long-term resilience: economic, social and environmental.
“If we want better growth, we need a better model.” - Final Report, p.5
📖 Further reading:
Would an Inclusive Growth Commission be useful in Sussex?
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