This study provides a new perspective on the process of state formation in modern England. Eastwood uncovers the complex interplay between central and local institutions that lay at the heart of Hanoverian polity, and shows how the transformation of local government in the early nineteenth century had a profound influence on the developing political culture and institutional framework of modern Britain.

Volume 8 of The Royal Historical Society Transactions contains essays based around the theme 'identities and empires'.