Search results for "jel:H7"
showing 10 items of 14 documents
Reforms and decentralization: friends or foes
2013
Systemic concerns about markets, capitalism and the role of the state in the economy are salient again. Relatively large-scale reforms of economic and social arrangements are seriously considered. Historical experience suggests that reforms of that kind are sometimes associated with important changes in institutional arrangements pertaining to political decentralization. To explore the relationship between economic reforms and decentralization, the paper argues that a reform has two dimensions. It is a process and it is a design. The organization of the paper is inspired by that distinction. For economists, it seems natural to reason in terms of design -- that is, to perceive reform as the …
Decentralization as an incentive scheme when regional differences are large
2010
It has been suggested that large regional differences could be an obstacle to that part of the political accountability of office-holders which is based on yardstick competition among governments. The paper addresses that question and concludes that the obstacle is not too serious in general. The second part of the paper is devoted to the persistent economic underperformance of some regions in countries such as Germany, Italy and (with regard to regions overseas) France. How is it that the mechanism of yardstick competition induces a convergence of economic performance among European Union member countries, even those particularly poor initially, but fails to induce all the underperforming …
Asymmetric decentralisation, economic cycle, regional and local government’s borrowing in Spain
2014
This paper investigates the evolution of sub-central government borrowing in Spain over the period 1996–2011. The arguments and figures provided show that the intense process of political and fiscal decentralisation that took place over the 1990s and 2000s did not lead to higher debt ratios in terms of GDP at these tiers of government until 2007. Although a kind of overspending bias was in effect until the late 2000s, the paper shows that the evolution of GDP and tax revenues provided regional and local governments with enough resources to vigorously pursue their devolved public policy responsibilities and still keep their debt ratios under control. However, since 2008, when the world finan…
Determinantes Políticos de las Transferencias Discrecionales. Evidencia de la Provincia de Córdoba, Argentina
2005
Este trabajo examina el impacto de la táctica política en la distribución de las transferencias de fondos discrecionales entre el gobierno provincial y los municipios. Se analizan las diferentes teorías basadas en modelos partidistas y no partidistas, contrastando las mismas empíricamente para los municipios de la provincia de Córdoba, en Argentina. Los resultados obtenidos permiten confirmar la existencia de factores políticos y económicos como determinantes de la asignación de las transferencias discrecionales y si bien ninguno de los modelos teóricos explicados se ven reflejados en sentido estricto, sí se observa una combinación entre ellos. This work examines the impact of political tac…
Construction de logements sociaux et stratégies électorales locales,
2013
Our article examines if local incumbents’ choices regarding social housing construction are influenced by strategic electoral considerations, which might foil the French state’s efforts in favour of greater social mixity. By constructing a probabilistic voting model which integrates a partially mobile population, we show that such strategic considerations let the political choices of neighbouring municipalities become interdependent, and that the intensity of the resulting strategic inter-actions varies in function of the local population’s mobility. These propositions are confirmed by our empirical analysis concerning social housing construction in the Greater Lyon region. A local incumben…
Can fiscal decentralization alleviate government consumption volatility?
2016
We analyse how fiscal decentralization affects the volatility of government consumption extending the existing literature that mainly deals with the effects of the former on government size. Using data for 97 developed and developing countries from 1971 to 2010, we find that a higher degree of fiscal decentralization leads to lower government consumption volatility. This result holds for the sub-sample of advanced economies, while it is not confirmed for those less-developed. This mechanism seems to work mainly through a lower volatility of the non-discretionary spending, which typically belongs to the central government’s policy. We also confirm existing findings according to which country…
Mantenimiento temporal de la equidad horizontal en el sistema de financiación autonómica.
2011
Este trabajo propone un mecanismo de actualización del sistema de financiación autonómica que mantiene la equidad horizontal a lo largo del tiempo, al que se denomina mecanismo de las “Relatividades Constantes”. En este contexto, el trabajo examina críticamente el concepto de necesidades de gasto utilizado en la financiación autonómica española, propone una definición operativa del mismo, e identifica un índice global de necesidades que replica la distribución de recursos normativos del nuevo modelo de financiación. Utilizando este índice global, el artículo ilustra empíricamente el mecanismo de actualización propuesto y compara los resultados con los obtenidos a partir de la regla existent…
Fondos estructurales y política regional en la Unión Europea
2000
The present work examines the reasons that gave rise to European Regional Policy and describes its principles and basic objectives, as well as the operational transformations it underwent from the 1988 Structural Fund reform till the approval of the Agenda 2000. Its ability to correct regional imbalances is subsequently compared with the limited ability of European Public Finance to carry out some of the functions performed by central governments in States with a federal political structure, which results in disparity between regional income levels and the corresponding tax balances. Finally, the achievements and limitations of European Regional Policy are assessed on a wide basis rather th…
The Universitary Educational System, Cibernetic System
2009
The national system of higher education shall solve one of the most difficult and most important social and human issues – the education and training of the young generation, of the labour hand. The system of higher education appears as a subsystem of the national educational system and of the society. That is why it appears the urgency of the artificial unrestriction of the university educational subsystem by the economy system. Economy’s vision of the university’s education subsystem must respond in these conditions to the following questions: What services and under what form should give the university at a time? Who should provide these services? What methods and strategies will be addr…
PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION-A COMMUNICATING ORGANIZATION. THE ROLE OF COMMUNICATION AND ORIENTATION TOWARDS THE CITIZENS
2015
Public organizations are complex structure, which are continuously changing, a "meeting point" for resources, be they human, material, technological or of a different nature. In terms of the Romanian public system, the last few years have seen some major changes across the board, the way state institutions are organized and function, the attributions and responsibilities of public workers, and the needs and expectations of the citizens which benefits from these services being but a few of these aforementioned changes. Communication is essential for any intervention which aims to change something, especially when it comes to the public domain, where the success of any action is based on inte…