lecture notes: decentralization

—the transfer of authority and responsibility for public functions from the central government to subordinate or quasi-independent government organizations and/or the private sector—is a complex multifaceted concept.

Types of decentralization include

aims to give citizens or their elected representatives more power in public decision-making.

It is often associated with pluralistic politics and representative government, but it can also support democratization by giving citizens, or their representatives, more influence in the formulation and implementation of policies.

that decisions made with greater participation will be better informed and more relevant to diverse interests in society than those made only by national political authorities.

seeks to redistribute authority, responsibility and financial resources for providing public services among different levels of government.

It is the transfer of responsibility for the planning, financing and management of certain public functions from the central government and its agencies to field units of government agencies, subordinate units or levels of government, semi-autonomous public authorities or corporations, or area-wide, regional or functional authorities.

The three major forms of administrative decentralization

is often considered to be the weakest form of decentralization and is used most frequently in unitary states– redistributes decision making authority and financial and management responsibilities among different levels of the central government.

It can merely shift responsibilities from central government officials in the capital city to those working in regions, provinces or districts, or it can create strong field administration or local administrative capacity under the supervision of central government ministries.

is a more extensive form of decentralization. Through delegation central governments transfer responsibility for decision-making and administration of public functions to semi-autonomous organizations not wholly controlled by the central government, but ultimately accountable to it.

Governments delegate responsibilities when they create public enterprises or corporations, housing authorities, transportation authorities, special service districts, semi-autonomous school districts, regional development corporations, or special project implementation units. Usually these organizations have a great deal of discretion in decision-making.

usually transfers responsibilities for services to municipalities that elect their own mayors and councils, raise their own revenues, and have independent authority to make investment decisions.

local governments have clear and legally recognized geographical boundaries over which they exercise authority and within which they perform public functions. It is this type of administrative decentralization that underlies most political decentralization.

is a core component of decentralization.

can take many forms, including a) self-financing or cost recovery through user charges, b) co-financing or co-production arrangements through which the users participate in providing services and infrastructure through monetary or labor contributions; c) expansion of local revenues through property or sales taxes, or indirect charges; d) intergovernmental transfers that shift general revenues from taxes collected by the central government to local governments for general or specific uses; and e) authorization of municipal borrowing and the mobilization of either national or local government resources through loan guarantees.

The most complete forms of decentralization from a government’s perspective are privatization and deregulation because they shift responsibility for functions from the public to the private sector.

can range in scope from leaving the provision of goods and services entirely to the free operation of the market to “public-private partnerships” in which government and the private sector cooperate to provide services or infrastructure.

reduces the legal constraints on private participation in service provision or allows competition among private suppliers for services that in the past had been provided by the government or by regulated monopolies.

is usually a supporting strategy for more general decentralization in government operations or service delivery.