Decentralization: Catalyst for Welfare Service Delivery by Local Government Administration

Abstract

The paper aims to look at the transferring of authorities, resources and responsibilities from one tier of government (central government) to other tiers of government (state and local governments) in order to deliver efficient and effective welfare service. This transfer serves two basic purposes, namely accountability for resource management and effective welfare service delivery. This can only be possible if the system of co-responsibility between institutions of governance at the central, states and local governments is decentralized effectively. Similarly, the paper intends to critically examine local governments" budget and budgeting system in order to deliver primary education and healthcare service to the public. Therefore, the paper studies the main source of revenue of local governments, and determines how the resources are utilized in providing primary education and healthcare services. The study designs information data sheet to elicit information from at least four local governments in Nigeria. Statutory allocation disbursed to four local governments under consideration for the fiscal year 2008 is considered. Approved annual budget of the local governments is analyzed to determine the differential (%) in terms of what is budgeted and what is the budget outcomes. The findings reveal average differential of 65.78% between approved and actual estimates for primary education, and 37.57% for primary healthcare service in the local government under consideration. This shows that local governments under consideration are not delivering primary education and healthcare services optimally.

Transformations in Local Social Action in Portugal

“…The literature confirms that the success of decentralization depends on ensuring three appropriate levels of delegation: administrative, fiscal, and democratic decentralization [16]. If the administrative and financial levels have raised concerns on the part of the local government due to the murky nature of multilevel functioning and the need for additional funding during periods of greater social vulnerability, at the democratic level, efficiency commitments are also required in terms of concrete responses of social inclusion.…”

Understanding rural local government response during COVID-19-induced lockdown: perspective from Bangladesh

“…While on the other hand, 120 million BDT was dispersed by the LG with the aim of supporting around 5 million low-income families (The Daily Star 2020 ). Nonetheless, the question remains on to what extent these funds have been utilized effectively and reached the target group at the grassroots level given the fact that existing literature, for instance (Khan 2008 ; Khan 2009 ; Haque et al 2011 ; Osman 2011 ; Panday 2011 ; Waheed and Saminah 2012 ; Wahed and Mphande 2014 ; Wahed and Alam 2015 ; Osman 2015 ; Uddin 2019 ; Ahmed et al 2016 ; Ehsan and Kamruzzaman 2019 ; and Ehsan 2021a ), have pinpointed to various issues and challenges of local governance in Bangladesh. In other words, these studies have echoed a pessimistic overtone regarding the fact that local governance at the grassroots of Bangladesh suffers greatly from limited manpower and resources, lack of fiscal autonomy, ineffective monitoring, lack of accountability and transparency, elite power capture, political manipulation, and non-cooperation from Upazila-based bureaucracy (Ehsan 2020 ).…”