Policy coordination and intergovernmental relations from local to national in multi-level systems

Abstract

Policy coordination in multilevel systems gained increasing attention among scholars in the recent years. This is partially related to the ever-growing complexity of policy making in modern socio-economic systems as well as the emerging ‘wicked’ policies, like immigration, environment, sustainability, energy, climate, infrastructures, etc.. Wicked issues can’t be solved only at central or at local level but call for cooperation and coordination among local authorities and central government. Analogously, Covid times emphasized the need for coordination between local authorities and central government shedding light on conflicts and accountability. This is not only a domestic matter, but it involves transnational policies, cross-border and cross-sectoral interventions concerning both decision making and implementation. The topic of a better coordination is becoming more and more common in studies about intergovernmental relations and local government because of the increasing pressures on the Local Authorities in the last decade: austerity measures, globalization and the pandemic crisis not only limited their available resources and autonomy but burdened them with new responsibilities and tasks. At the same time, the central governments, in order to deal with such wicked issues, strengthened centralization, without, however, developing the necessary coordination capacity, although the design and especially the implementation of these policies involve all levels of government. As a result, they still have to seek for collaboration and legitimation by the local authorities. As a matter of fact, in recent literature, scholars became progressively aware of the unintended effects of poor coordination and scrutinized factors that either impeded or empowered coordination between center and periphery. For this reason, coordination is a pervasive topic concerning unitary systems as federal or decentralized ones, affecting a variety of modes of governance and often invoked for reforms and power re-allocation. The panel is aimed at collecting contributions focused on center-periphery problems of coordination with regard to the challenges for local government and its role in a changing world. The focus concern case studies or comparative analysis at national or cross-national levels, as related to specific policies or wicked issues as well as intergovernmental relations in general. Papers dealing with field research findings belonging to the following streams are warmly welcome: 1. The institutional dimension of coordination, including legal frame, mechanisms and forms of collaborative or networked management that facilitated dialogue and mutual adjustment among level of government. 2. The geographical dimension of coordination, especially looking at the territorial divides inside the states and the problem of cross border or transnational coordination. 3. The political dimension of coordination affecting strategies and resources of the different levels of government, including conflicts, pressures and resistances.

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