City I governed in recession, full of hope at first (5)
I believe the answer is:
delhi
'city' is the definition.
(I know that Delhi is a city)
'i governed in recession full of hope at first' is the wordplay.
'governed' becomes 'led' (lead can mean to govern or rule).
'in recession' shows that the letters should be reversed in order (letters recede or go back).
'full of' indicates putting letters inside.
'at first' says to take the initial letters.
The first letter of 'hope' is 'h'.
'i'+'led'='iled'
'iled' written backwards gives 'deli'.
'deli' placed around 'h' is 'DELHI'.
(Other definitions for delhi that I've seen before include "Capital on the river Jumna" , "Old city of north central India" , "Asian city" , "Ancient city" , "New -, Asian capital" .)