Current Discussions on the Question: Remarks of Local Government's Reform through Comparative Perspective

Current Discussions on the Question: Remarks of Local Government's Reform through Comparative Perspective

Ugur Sadioglu, Kadir Dede
Copyright: © 2016 |Pages: 23
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-0317-0.ch001
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Abstract

Subject of local governments has been attracting the attention of researchers from various disciplines in recent years. Local governments themselves and other related actors undergo a transformation in the face of new public management, good governance, direct democracy, decentralization and other reform waves. Thoughts directing reforms, reform tools and reform results have diversified. In addition, new problem areas have arisen in the local governments after the reform process. Number of studies analyzing local governments both during and after the administrative reform process from a comparative perspective has increased as well. Currently, there is a need to analyze local governments from comparative perspective via different theoretical discussions and country studies. This part will present current discussions as an introduction to comparative local government studies introduced in general terms throughout the book. Particularly the question remarks to have arisen after the local government reform will be addressed and analyzed.
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The Evaluation Of Comparative Local Government

The sub-study field Comparative Local Government has an interdisciplinary nature combining empirical and theoretical approaches on local governments from the fields of political science, public administration and public policy studies. Comparative analysis method is not a new approach towards analysis of government systems. This is a field studied for quite a long time (Harris, 1948; Humes, 1959; Humes & Martin, 1961) and it consists of current, comprehensive studies on general political-administrative system (Caramani, 2014; Hague & Harrop, 2007; Kuhlmann & Wollmann, 2014; Peters, 1998). However, it offers innovations in terms of academic knowledge regarding local governments and politics (Lidström, 1999; Wolman, 2008). Before touching upon local governments and politics, the main subject of the research, one should focus on development and theoretical background of comparative public administration discipline. Comparative public administration is, firstly, a sub-field of public administration and is based on comparative analysis of administrative processes, structures and public policies. Importance of comparison, as a field of specialty, cannot be limited only to a country or a case study. Development of comparative analysis method is significantly affected by colonialism era, improvements in worldwide information flow and international institutionalization triggered by human development. Above all, comparative analysis has gained a sound position in public administration with emergence of institutions equipped with global aims after World War II (Otenyo & Lind, 2006: xxi; Waldo, 2006: 135).

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