Hooghe & Marks: Unraveling the Centra; State, but How? Types of Multi-level Governance
Draws on several literatures to distinguish 2 types of multi-level governance. One type
conceives of dispersion of authority to general-purpose, nonintersecting, and durable
jurisdictions. The second type conceives of task-specific, intersecting and flexible jurisdictions.
Modern governance is, and should be, dispersed across multiple centers of authority;
but how should multi-level governance be organized? What are the basis
alternatives?
The article states that the diffusion of decision making away from the central state
rase fundamental issues of design that can be conceptualized as 2 contrasting types
of governance
Types are logically coherent + represent alternative responses to fundamental
problems of coordination
Island of theorizing
Scholars in political science responded in different ways to unraveling central state
control
List of 5 literatures + terms scholars have generated for diffusion of authority
European Union Studies described multi-level governance (MLG) as “system
of continuous negotiation among nested governments at several territorial
tiers - supranational, national, regional and local”
Reconfiguring authority has been a major topic in international relations scholars
Literature on multilateral cooperation + global governance has sought to
specify the conditions under which national governments create international
regimes
More recent, scholars examine how globalization facilitates the diffusion of
political authority to subnational + international institutions
Others focus on the proliferation of nongovernmental actors in international
governance
, Extensive literature on federalism examines the optimal allocation of authority across
multiple tiers of government + how governments at different levels interact
Some benefits of decentralization (Oates, 1999) underlie in this literature
The study of local government in the US + Western Europe bears directly on multi-
level, polycentric governance
An influential starting point: Tiebout’s 1956 article
Established the claim that competition among multiple local jurisdictions
leads to more efficient provision of local public services
Debate between “2 traditions” of diffusing authority has spilled into public policy
How can common goods be created under multi-level governance?
Some policy analysts explore how market principles + participation on the
part of societal actors + deregulation create flexible, self-organizing, loosely
coupled, governance by networks
MLG (should not) seen as an alternative but rather as a complement to
intergovernmental relations defined in a regulatory framework
Flexible governance
The literatures share the idea that dispersion of governance across multiple
jurisdictions is more flexible than concertation of governance in one jurisdiction
Efficient governance adjusts jurisdictions to the trade-off between the virtues
+ vices of centralization
Large jurisdictions are good because
- They have the virtue of exploiting economies of scale in the provision
of public goods
- Internalizing policy externalities, allowing for more efficient taxation
- Facilitating more efficient redistribution
- Enlarging the territorial scope of security and market exchange
Large jurisdictions are bad when
- They impose a single policy on diverse ecological systems/territorially
heterogeneous populations
Criticism of centralized government: It is insensitive to varying scale efficiencies from
policy to policy
Economies of scale are more likely to characterize the production of capital-
intensive public goods, instead of labor-intensive services because economies
accrue from spreading costs over larger outputs
Efficiency requires that a policy’s full effects be internalized in decision making
, Centralized government is not well suited to accommodate diversity
Ecological conditions vary from area to area
Variation in preferences of citizens
MLG allows decision makers to adjust the scale of governance to reflect
heterogeneity
Two types
There is consensus that flexible governance must be multi-level, but there is no
consensus about how MLG should be structured
Designed around communities or policy problems?
Bundle of competencies of functionally specific?
Limited in number of should they proliferate?
Designed to last of should they be fluid?
The 2 types of MLG drawn from the literature
Type I: Describes jurisdictions at limited number of levels which are general purpose;
they bundle together multiple functions, including a range of policy responsibilities +
court system + representative institutions
Type II: Composed of specialized jurisdictions, fragmented into functionally specific
pieces
Type I Governance
Some characteristics:
Describes jurisdictions at limited number of levels
The jurisdictions (international, national, regional, meso, local) are general-
purpose
They bundle together multiple functions, including policy responsibilities +
court system + representation institutions
Membership boundaries don’t intersect
Every citizen is located in a Russian Doll set of nested jurisdictions where
there is one and only relevant jurisdiction at any particular territorial scale
Territorial jurisdictions are stable for periods of several decades
Allocation of policy competencies across jurisdictional levels are flexible
, Intellectual foundation: Federalism
Federalism is concerned with power sharing among limited number of
governments operating at a few levels + relationship between central
government and nonintersecting subnational governments
Framework is systemwide, functions are bundles, levels of government are multiple
but limited in number
Characteristics
General-purpose jurisdictions
- Decision making powers dispersed across jurisdictions, but bundled in
small number of packages
- Emphasize costs of decomposing authority into disparate packages
- Idea is strong in Europe, where local government usually eercises wide
spread of functions, reflecting the the concept of general-purpose
local authorities exercising comprehensive care for their communities”
(Norton 1991, 22)
Nonintersecting Memberships
- Durable boundaries that are nonintersecting at any particular level
- Memberships of jurisdictions are higher + lower tiers don’t intersect
Limited Number of Jurisdictional Levels
- Type I organizes jurisdictions at just a few levels
- It is common to distinguish local, intermediate, and central level
Systemwide, Durable Architecture
- Systemic institutional choice
- Type I usually adopt the trias politicas structure in modern
democracies
- Type I are durable; jurisdictional reform is costly + unusual
- Institutions responsible for governance are sticky + tend to outlive
conditions that brought them into being
Type II Governance
Some characteristics
Composed of specialized jurisdictions
Fragmented into functionally specific pieces
Number of such jurisdictions is potentially huge + scale they operate vary
finely
No great fixity in their existence
Tend to be lean + flexible; they come and go as demands for governance
change
Number of jurisdictions is potentially vast, rather than limited
Don’t operate on just a few levels, but operate at numerous territorial scales
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