Ideology matters: Why decentralisation has a differentiated effect on regionalist parties’ fortunes in Western democracies
By Emanuele Massetti & Arjan H. Schakel, 2013
This article addresses the effects of decentralisation reforms on regionalist parties’ electoral strength. It takes up the debate between ‘accommodatists’ (i.e., electoral loss due to policy accommodation) and ‘institutionalists’ (i.e., electoral gain due to institutional empowerment).These effects depend on the electoral venue considered – regional or national – and on the ideological radicalism of a given regionalist party – secessionist or autonomist. This study finds that increases in the level of decentralisation are positively associated with higher scores for autonomist parties in regional elections, while they are not statistically significantly correlated with secessionist parties’ electoral performances. In contrast, in national elections, decentralisation reforms seem to penalise autonomist parties more than secessionist ones.These findings are based on the analysis of a novel dataset which includes regional and national vote shares for 77 regionalist parties in 11 Western democracies from 1950 until 2010.
 Massetti & Schakel (2013) Ideology matters | [ ] |
Exploring the Causes and Effects of Revenue Decentralization: Does Revenue Decentralization Increase or Reduce Economic Growth?
By Kuralay Baisalbayeva, 2013
Although many developing and transition countries are pursuing fiscal decentralization reforms, the debate surrounding the relationship between revenue decentralization and economic growth has not yet been fully resolved. While proponents of decentralization suggest that local own source revenue collections are generally evidence of an effective local public sector, a contrasting view holds that revenues collected by weak and non-responsive local governments tend to negatively affect economic growth. Our analysis suggests that the relationship between revenue decentralization and economic growth differs considerably for different groups of countries, but does not find any evidence for the hypothesis that revenue decentralization suppresses economic growth.
| Exploring the Causes and Effects of Revenue Decentralization | [ ] |
The global trend towards devolution and its implications
By Rodríguez-Pose, A. and Gill, N., 2003
Globalisation has been accompanied by an equally global tendency towards devolution of authority and resources from nation-states to regions and localities that takes on various forms, depending upon which actors are driving the decentralisation efforts. The existence of a general trend towards devolution also has significant implications for efficiency, equity, and administration. The authors outline first the general drive towards devolution and then proceed to examine which countries are experiencing which forms of decentralisation. A theoretical argument emphasising the role of governmental legitimacy across various tiers of government is used to explain the diversity of devolution initiatives, drawing on examples that include Brazil, Mexico, India, China, the USA, and some European countries. Having supported their model of decentralisation, the authors then examine the implications of the widespread downward transfer of power towards regions. Some of the less widely discussed pitfalls of decentralisation are presented; caution in promoting devolutionary efforts is the prescription of this paper.
| The global trend towards devolution and its implications | [ ] |
Decentralized cooperation in the Mediterranean: Perspectives for the Period 2007-2013
By Chichowlaz Philippe, 2006
In the Mediterranean context, there has been a growing implication of the cities, provinces and regions in international cooperation actions. It is evident that it has become another element in the political strategy of the territorial community. Slowly, the cooperation actions coming from the different components of the local community (public services, associative sector, professional organisations, companies and representatives of different population groups) are gathering. As a consequence, we are advancing towards a new model of cooperation that is taking over from the classical, more vertical vision, centred on the simple transfer of resources. Furthermore, we are moving towards a complex cooperative system, based on multilevel relations that ought to be richer and more dynamic.
| Decentralized cooperation in the Mediterranean | [ ] |
