Abstract: The mayoralty was widely established in the cities and boroughs in medieval England since the 13th century. The basic method for mayoral selection has been a combination of local election and royal appointment, leading to conflicts between central and local powers, regarding the position and candidates for the mayors.Thus mayoral selection became an important content of central-local relations in medieval England. In the process of mayoral selection, to placate local interest conflicts, the crown intervened and controlled the results in flexible ways. The mayoral selection mechanism set the mayors in a dual role as city’s or borough’s men as well as king’s men, and they responded the dual pressure which from the crown and local society successfully in practice. As an effective means ofstate governance, the mayoral selection mechanism balanced the internal tension between local autonomy and centralized governance, building a type of central-local relations which combined cooperation and game, regulation and flexibility.

Keywords: Mayoral Selection; Central-local Relations; State Governance; Middle Ages; England

Published on Historical Research, Issue 8, 2024.