Center-Local Relations

Central-Local Governance and Networks

The concept of central-local relations (rather than center-local) emerged in the literature on the United Kingdom, where it was used to refer to domestic intergovernmental relations. The term was seen as appropriately describing the constitutional setting of a unitary state that lacked the more complex (“vetopoint” rich) intergovernmental relationships that characterize federal states, such as the United States, Switzerland, and Germany (the latter associated with the literature on joint decision making rather than central-(state)-local relations). The literature revealed a growing degree of centralization since at least the 1970s, as well as increasingly adversarial relationships. At the same time, the analytical value of central-local relations has encountered increasing criticism. This criticism was particularly directed at the supposed bilateral focus (on central government vis-à-vis local authorities) of the central-local literature. In particular, it was argued that the increased use of private or third parties, as well as the growth of quasi-governmental organizations, added substantial complexity to the domain.

At the same time, it was recognized that representative institutions of local government played a relevant role in central-local relations, in the United Kingdom and more so in other countries. This “national world of local government” has always been a prominent feature of central-local relations in countries like Denmark, where bargaining over local government budgets between local government associations and the central government is a key feature of central-local relations.

Other trends that are said to qualify the centrality of the central-local relations perspective include the perceived shift toward multilevel governance, with its stress on increasing complexity and flexibility of intergovernmental relations. Different levels of government, including supranational levels (e.g., the European Union), interact simultaneously without necessarily being hierarchically ordered. Given crossnational trends toward political decentralization and devolution, as well as the growing importance of the European Union, any perspective that solely relies on the bilateral central-local relationship is likely to be severely limited. At the same time, the significance of these developments should not be overemphasized, and the relationship between the center and the local still remains politically important.

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