Even without the urban riots of 1980–1, there would be little disagreement that one, if not the major change in British cities since the war has been in the ethnic composition of their populations. The Black and Asian population of Britain, estimated at some 2.1 million in mid 1980 by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys, and forming 3.9 per cent of the total population, compared with under 1.4 million (2.5 per cent) in 1971 and some 200,000 in 1951. The concentration of this population into four or five major conurbations where, until economic crisis brought unemployment, there was a high demand for labour, means that anywhere between 1 in 10 to 1 in 20 inhabitants of many towns is of so-called ‘New Commonwealth’ and Pakistan origin; in certain London boroughs, depending on definition, the figure might be 30 per cent.

Historians came late to the study of the American city. They lagged far behind scholars in other disciplines who, by the turn of the twentieth century, had begun to apply the tools of the social sciences to the examination of urban America and its problems. American urban history as a distinctive field of scholarly inquiry does not date much earlier than 1940, when Arthur M. Schlesinger, sr, published his landmark article on ‘The City in American History.’ Interest in the field grew rather slowly, however, and by the mid-1950s only a half-dozen or so universities offered courses in the subject. Progress in urban history research was also somewhat less than dynamic, the chief accomplishments being several fine urban biographies and a handful of monographs, notably the works of Carl Bridenbaugh on the colonial seaport towns, Oscar Handlin's study of Boston's immigrants, and Richard C. Wade's book, The Urban Frontier (1959).

The poll books produced before the Ballot Act of 1872 are a major source for political and social history. Those which have an occupational title for most or all entries have been increasingly used since Vincent's pioneering work. Others have been linked to other sources so that voting can be related to occupation. This is either time-consuming or expensive and often both. The alternative is a very selective sampling tactic guided by the directories. The use of occupational titles has been criticized because of the lack of social homogeneity within the groups designated by such titles. This is slightly unfair but a relevant warning against using such titles to do more analytical work than the meaning of the titles justifies. Those who want a more precise measure of status must link with the rate books and the census manuscripts.

Both the house and the household have been subjects of growing interest amongst historians of pre-industrial society, but mostly in isolation from each other. Studies of social structure conventionally treat the household as an entity independent of its physical surroundings. Ten years ago, Peter Laslett bewailed the fact that ‘we know little in general about the effects of buildings on the structure of domestic groups’, and this statement still appears to be valid; while on the other side of the Channel it has been echoed by Jean-Pierre Bardet:

Information on the material environment, undoubtedly important, is diffused to serve the perspectives of a wide variety of studies: the history of architecture, urbanism, geography, sociology etc.

Is the growth of cities and towns determined by broad impersonal forces and situational factors? Or can growth be significantly influenced by the attitudes, perceptions and decisions of the citizens? General surveys of urbanization have leaned to the first interpretation, stressing macro-economic trends, political context and location with respect to resources, transportation and markets. Studies of individual cities tend to emphasize the particular actions of key local leaders and their unique circumstances, and may seem to disregard the comparable experience of other cities.

The opening lecture of the conference was on a Scottish theme to complement the Scottish venue. Professor JOHN BUTT (Strathclyde) spoke on ‘Working-class housing in the Scottish cities 1900–51’. He began with a fairly traditional picture of working-class housing, which seemed to suggest that it was almost synonymous with slum-dwelling. He also outlined the system of house-letting which operated in Glasgow at the turn of the century, and suggested the impact on the housing market. This system was based upon yearly lets expiring at one date for all but thebottom of the market, where monthly lets were the norm. The main agitation for a change in the letting system came from the mostly ‘respectable’ tenants who occupied yearly-let property, as opposed to the slum-dwellers who rented on a monthly basis. (Regular attenders at the Urban History Group conferences will remember that these themes were discussed in the paper presented by Nick Morgan and Martin Daunton to the Loughborough meeting in 1981; they will also form a major element in Dr Englander's forthcoming book on Landlord and Tenant in Urban Britain 1838–1918.) Professor Butt went on to argue that during the rent strikes of the First World War, it is possible to see a clear distinction between the ‘landlord class’ and the ‘employer class’, the latter not always supporting the view of the former. The final part of the lecture considered the provision of new housing for the working classes after 1918. Detailed figures were provided to support the contention that the building industry and building supplies trade in Scotland were incapable of meeting the demand for new housing from the public sector during the 1930s. He illustrated his argument with specific examples of corporation house-building in Aberdeen, Glasgow, Dundee and Edinburgh.

The increasing number of periodical articles devoted to urban history is a reassuring sign that this is still an expanding field of study, sustained by a considerable amount of research. However, this reassurance has to be tempered by an apparent decline in the number of completed theses which are of more than peripheral interest to historians working on urban themes, a development which no doubt reflects the currently unfavourable climate for postgraduate research rather than diminishing interest in our particular field. And it must be pointed out that the theses in question are still produced in such volume that only a limited number can be reviewed here, representing a selection of the work that has come to our attention during 1981 and 1982. The coverage therefore remains restricted but it is gradually becoming more exacting in its definition of ‘recent’ and thus, it is hoped, becoming more useful in disseminating the findings of new research.