A History Of Local Government In London by K.G. Whittick

With the rise of urban communities came the need to create a system for the regulation of the interaction both social and material between the various interests at play in densely populated communities, in order to maintain order and prevent frictionbetween those interests. In a totalitarian system such as a monarchy or dictatorship, this regulation was imposed by the monarch or dictator. The earliest recorded systems arose in ancient Greece and Rome, where monarchy had been rejected making it necessary to evolve a new system, which consisted of a section of the community, seeing themselves as citizens or freemen, banding together and electing leaders from amongst themselves, with a fixed term of office. Up until quite recently society was male dominated, and women, slaves, tradesmen and foreigners were all excluded from this franchise.It wasn’t until the twelfth century that the present elements of local government appeared in London and began to develop into the system we know today. There were however centuries of build up to this point which is the subject of this book.