scholarly journals Reconsidering Rationales for Local Self-Government - Impacts of Contemporary Changes in Local Decision-Making

2010 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-113
Author(s):  
Rolv Lyngstad
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Local Policy ◽  
Informal Governance ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
The Public ◽  
Local Decision ◽  
Policy Fields ◽  
Local Decision Making ◽  
Governance Processes ◽  
Developmental Policies

This paper discusses two contemporary trends in local decision-making. Firstly, there seems to be more centralised decision-making today than before in important policy fields such as welfare policy. Secondly, informal governance processes outside formal government structures open up for a substantial influence from non-elected political actors. The paper asserts that there is a connection between the trends, and argues that the centralisation tendencies in welfare issues might affect and encourage governance processes in other local policy arenas. These policy fields are mainly within the so-called ‘developmental policies’ that often facilitate more networking and partnership activities in ‘grey areas’ between the public, private and civil sectors in collective problem solving. Accordingly, more attention should be given to policy fields where governance networks operate, and the implications for revitalising democratic political participation should be studied. The paper concludes that the well-established rationales for local self-government and local democracy need to be reconsidered by taking into account these new decision-making structures.

scholarly journals Assessment of public participation in local planning & decision-making. A case study from Albania

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 84-94
Author(s):  
Mirjam Dibra ◽  
Dea Strica
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Public Participation ◽  
Local Community ◽  
Local Planning ◽  
The Public ◽  
Local Decision ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Planning Decision ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Local Decision Making

The public participation (PP) is widely legitimised as a vital prerequisite to achieve sustainable development and as a basic principle of democracy. Under the conditions of the new territorial administrative-territorial division of local government units in the Republic of Albania, the Malesia e Madhe (MM) Municipality is a new one. The purpose of this study was the assessment of attitudes of the local community of areas under the administration of MM Municipality on PP in local planning and decision-making in order to influence future behaviours of the local community to take active part in local decision-making processes. The questionnaire was used as a research instrument for the local community of this Municipality. The research results showed that the local community of this area was generally aware of the need for their involvement in local decision-making, but they considered the municipality as the main responsibility for their involvement in this process. Keywords: Albania, local planning & decision-making, Malesia e Madhe Municipality, public participation.

scholarly journals Public Administration Transparency in E-government at Local Level of Czech Government

2015 ◽  
Vol 2 (8) ◽  
pp. 24-33
Author(s):  
Eva Ardielli
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Public Administration ◽  
Information Disclosure ◽  
Information Technologies ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Essential Element ◽  
The Public ◽  
Information Availability ◽  
Local Decision ◽  
Local Decision Making

Transparency is currently required as an essential element of public administration functioning. It supports quality, effectiveness and economy of administration both at the central and the local level of government. Transparency is currently also supported by modernization trends in public administration utilizing an implementation of information technologies and open access to information. The key role in the modernization efforts of public administration plays worldwide e-government. It is the effective tool to transform the public administration and public services towards greater transparency, information availability and participation in decision-making process. The submitted paper is focused on the analysis of transparency principle application on the local level of government in the Czech Republic. It is based on the evaluation of transparency in local decision-making, information availability and participation possibility. The availability of selected information was analyzed on selected local municipal websites in the Moravian-Silesian region in the year 2014. The target is the assessing of information disclosure on official municipal websites, especially offering and availability evaluation of selected information and the evaluation of the rate of information availability on monitored municipal websites.

The Veil of Bureaucracy: How Officials Evade Partisan Politics in Participatory Settings

2021 ◽  
pp. 232949652110288
Author(s):  
Meaghan Stiman
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Political Ideology ◽  
Partisan Politics ◽  
Community Voice ◽  
Political Debates ◽  
Local Decision ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
The Veil ◽  
Local Decision Making ◽  
Do So

In theory, participatory democracies are thought to empower citizens in local decision-making processes. However, in practice, community voice is rarely representative, and even in cases of equal representation, citizens are often disempowered through bureaucratic processes. Drawing on the case of a firearm discharge debate from a rural county’s municipal meetings in Virginia, I extend research about how power operates in participatory settings. Partisan political ideology fueled the debate amongst constituents in expected ways, wherein citizens engaged collectivist and individualist frames to sway the county municipal board ( Celinska 2007 ). However, it was a third frame that ultimately explains the ordinance’s repeal: the bureaucratic frame, an ideological orientation to participatory processes that defers decision-making to disembodied abstract rules and procedures. This frame derives its power from its depoliticization potential, allowing bureaucrats to evade contentious political debates. Whoever is best able to wield this frame not only depoliticizes the debate to gain rationalized legitimacy but can do so in such a way to favor a partisan agenda. This study advances gun research and participatory democracy research by analyzing how the bureaucratic frame, which veils partisanship, offers an alternative political possibility for elected officials, community leaders, and citizens to adjudicate partisan debates.

Allocating HIV prevention resources: A tool for state and local decision making

Health Policy ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 87 (3) ◽  
pp. 342-349 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anke Richter ◽  
Katherine A. Hicks ◽  
Stephanie R. Earnshaw ◽  
Amanda A. Honeycutt
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Hiv Prevention ◽  
Local Decision ◽  
State And Local ◽  
Local Decision Making

scholarly journals Social work in municipalities

2013 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-94
Author(s):  
Rolv Lyngstad
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Social Work ◽  
Wide Sense ◽  
Professional Discretion ◽  
Local Decision ◽  
Local Discretion ◽  
Specific Meaning ◽  
Local Decision Making ◽  
Context Specific ◽  
The Relationship

The point of departure of this article is contemporary changes in the relationship between national and local decision making in the Norwegian political system. The last decades’ centralization tendencies seem to be challenged by a “new” emphasis on local discretion, and the article discusses how this will affect social work in municipalities. The changes are contested and controversial and allude to questions such as how much discretion should be given to local decision makers in the name of local democracy, and how much difference should be accepted in the name of diversity? The article argues that professional social work must be context-specific, meaning that in a wide sense local knowledge is a prerequisite for good social work. Devolution and local political and professional discretion are necessary in many cases, but not sufficient in themselves as conditions for success. Professional social workers will encounter a lot of difficult dilemmas arousing from issues related to the equality/liberty debate and the diversity/difference/equality debate in social work discourses. In order to approach these dilemmas, more of a focus on local deliberation and place shaping, in combination with a social work focus on democratic professionalism, is necessary. If this is done successfully, devolution and a recapturing of local discretion and decision-making power will empower clients as well as professionals. Thus, current changes in the relationship between different levels of decision making will enlarge the possibilities for professional social work in the municipalities.

Estimating Local Decision-Making Behavior in Complex Evolutionary Systems

2014 ◽  
Vol 136 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhenghui Sha ◽  
Jitesh H. Panchal
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Systems Engineering ◽  
Choice Model ◽  
Preferential Attachment ◽  
Network Evolution ◽  
System Structure ◽  
Statistical Regression ◽  
Evolutionary Systems ◽  
Local Decision ◽  
Local Decision Making

Research in systems engineering and design is increasingly focused on complex sociotechnical systems whose structures are not directly controlled by the designers, but evolve endogenously as a result of decisions and behaviors of self-directed entities. Examples of such systems include smart electric grids, Internet, smart transportation networks, and open source product development communities. To influence the structure and performance of such systems, it is crucial to understand the local decisions that result in observed system structures. This paper presents three approaches to estimate the local behaviors and preferences in complex evolutionary systems, modeled as networks, from its structure at different time steps. The first approach is based on the generalized preferential attachment model of network evolution. In the second approach, statistical regression-based models are used to estimate the local decision-making behaviors from consecutive snapshots of the system structure. In the third approach, the entities are modeled as rational decision-making agents who make linking decisions based on the maximization of their payoffs. Within the decision-centric framework, the multinomial logit choice model is adopted to estimate the preferences of decision-making nodes. The approaches are illustrated and compared using an example of the autonomous system (AS) level Internet. The approaches are generally applicable to a variety of complex systems that can be modeled as networks. The insights gained are expected to direct researchers in choosing the most applicable estimation approach to get the node-level behaviors in the context of different scenarios.

Explaining Public Support for the Use of Military Force: The Impact of Reference Point Framing and Prospective Decision Making

2011 ◽  
Vol 65 (1) ◽  
pp. 139-167 ◽  
Author(s):  
Héctor Perla
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Reference Point ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Public Support ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
Military Force ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Impact

AbstractThis article examines the determinants of public support for the use of military force. It puts forward a Framing Theory of Policy Objectives (FTPO), which contends that public support for military engagements depends on the public's perception of the policy's objective. However, it is difficult for the public to judge a policy's objective because they cannot directly observe a policy's true intention and influential political actors offer competing frames to define it. This framing contestation, carried out through the media, sets the public's decision-making reference point and determines whether the policy is perceived as seeking to avoid losses or to achieve gains. The FTPO predicts that support will increase when the public perceives policies as seeking to prevent losses and decrease when the public judges policies to be seeking gains. I operationalize and test the theory using content analysis of national news coverage and opinion polls of U.S. intervention in Central America during the 1980s. These framing effects are found to hold regardless of positive or negative valence of media coverage.

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