Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England, United Kingdom. It is the most populous British city outside London. By 1791 it was being hailed as "the first manufacturing town in the world" Today Birmingham's economy is dominated by the service sector. The city is a major international commercial centre, ranked as a beta− world city by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network. Its metropolitan economy is the second largest in the United Kingdom with a GDP of $114.3bn and its six universities make it the largest centre of higher education in the country outside London. People from Birmingham are called 'Brummies', a term derived from the city's nickname of 'Brum'.

A medium-sized market town during the medieval period, Birmingham grew to international prominence in the 18th century at the heart of the Midlands Enlightenment and subsequent Industrial Revolution, which saw the town at the forefront of worldwide advances in science, technology and economic development, producing a series of innovations that laid many of the foundations of modern industrial society. By 1791 it was being hailed as "the first manufacturing town in the world". Birmingham's distinctive economic profile, with thousands of small workshops practising a wide variety of specialised and highly skilled trades, encouraged exceptional levels of creativity and innovation and provided a diverse and resilient economic base for industrial prosperity that was to last into the final quarter of the 20th century. Its resulting high level of social mobility also fostered a culture of broad-based political radicalism.