Sink or swim? The politics of prioritizing public service provision

One of the most pressing issues for contemporary local governments is how to provide public services of sufficient quality when resources are scarce. This is not least the case in many peripheral or rural areas struggling with depopulation and, as a result, citizens have experienced a steady decline in the presence of public facilities and services over time. While local governments may seek to cut costs by outsourcing public services to private organizations, this is not an option for local governments in rural areas where few private businesses that are able to overtake public services exist. Instead most municipalities may feel forced to close down public service units. While research on public service provision and not least cuts in public services like schools or public libraries has tended to focus on those negatively affected, this paper focuses on the perspective of the elite responsible for the decisions. Specifically, we explore how local governments manage tough prioritizations which are likely to upset substantial parts of the population through the lens of an in-depth case study of how a sparsely populated rural municipality in Sweden deals with location of public in-door swimming pools. For historical reasons, this municipality has far more swimming pools than would be expected considering the size of the population and the shape of the municipality’s economy. At the same time, any debate on which facility to close down generate heated emotions among citizens and is widely interpreted as a question of which part of the municipality that is valued and which is not. Drawing on interviews with political representatives and public officials as well as official documentation, this case provides important insights into political reasoning and strategies when valued services and facilities need to be rationed from an economic perspective, but the political and symbolic costs are extensive.