Emerging Practices in Intergovernmental Functional Assignment

Abstract

Attaining the benefits of (especially fiscal) decentralization in government remains an enduring challenge, in part because the re-arrangement of public functions across levels of government has often been carried out poorly.This book aims to provide a firmer conceptual basis for the re-arrangement of public functions across levels of government. In doing so, it offers practical advice for policy-makers from developing and emerging countries and development cooperation practitioners engaged in such activity. Combining a theoretical approach for intergovernmental functional assignment with an in-depth analysis of real-life country cases where functional assignment (FA) has been supported in the context of international development cooperation, it underscores the common technical and political challenges of FA, and also demonstrates the need to expect and support country made and context-specific solutions to FA processes and results. Examples are drawn from a number of developing/transition countries from the Asia-Pacific region, Africa and the OECD, which outline and suggest advisory approaches, tools, principles and good practices and approaches.This text will be of key interest to scholars, students, policy-makers and practitioners in public policy, decentralization, local governance studies, public administration and development administration/studies. Contentsx Contents 2.6 Functional assignment in OECD and non-OECD countries 62 2.7 International cooperation and functional assignment 63 3 The conceptual and legal architecture of SNG functions 3.1 Broad theoretical currents shaping the distribution of functions in government 72 3.2 The legal framework for governmental functions -the SNG law and other instruments 74 3.3 Two main archetypes in the architecture of SNG functions 85 3.4 Typology of governmental functions 89

Critique of the functional assignment architecture of Punjab’s local governance legislation of 2013 & 2019

“…The paper is based on a desk review of the two local government acts of the province and related legal instruments, and a review of existing literature. The analysis of the acts follows the analytical framework used by Ferrazzi/Rohdewohld (2017) for other Asian countries (see Table 2).…”

“…This article analyses the FA architecture of the two most recent local government laws in Pakistan's largest and most populous province, Punjab: the 2013 Punjab Local Government Act (hereafter referred to as 'PLGA-13') and the 2019 Punjab Local Government Act (hereafter referred to as 'PLGA-19'). 1 To carry out this analysis, the authors have applied the conceptual framework developed by Ferrazzi and Rohdewohld (2017), which distinguishes two major archetypes of FA architecture (i.e. the 'general mandate' and the 'list model'), differentiates different types of functions (such as 'obligatory' and 'discretionary'), and examines the process for making assignment decisions regarding the application of criteria and the involvement of sector institutions (see Table 2).…”

“…While PLGA-13 was based on the concept of devolution, in practice the devolution of administrative authority was severely restricted, and the overall administrative set-up of the province was never aligned with the political set-up of the local government system, therefore perpetuating a disconnect between the political, fiscal and administrative dimensions of decentralisation (Ferrazzi and Rohdewohld 2017). With the exception of a small, local cadre of public employees, local governments were given no autonomy to appoint or dismiss staffthis remained a prerogative of the provincial government.…”

“…The FA analytical model proposed by Ferrazzi and Rohdewohld (2017) Applying this analysis to PLGA-13, it can be seen that its FA was of the 'positive list' type: that is, the law stipulated lists of functions for the different categories of rural and urban local governments.…”

“…'who does what'). In recent years it has become a key concept in the academic discourse on decentralisation and local governance, following a growing realisation that judicious FA choices are an important component in the division of power and functions in a multilevel governance system, and a key element of strategies to strengthen the functionality of subnational governments (Ferrazzi 2005;GTZ 2009;Ferrazzi and Rohdewohld 2017). As a technique, FA has gained considerable traction in Asian-Pacific countries, and can be seen in Indonesia (Ferrazzi and Rohdewohld 2017), India (Aiyar 2015;Davis 2016), Cambodia (Ferrazzi and Rohdewohld 2017;…”