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Political decentralisation can be explained as the transfer of political power and decision making authority to sub-national levels such as district councils, elected village councils, district councils and state level bodies. Where such transfer is made to a local level of public authority that is autonomous and fully independent from the decentralising authority, the process is referred to as devolution.
Fiscal decentralisation on the other hand, involves some degree of resource reallocation to local government which would allow it to function properly and fund allocated service delivery responsibility. The arrangements for resource allocation are usually negotiated between local and central governments. Normally, the fiscal decentralisation policy would also address some revenue-related issues such as assignment of local taxes and revenue sharing through local taxation and user fees.
Administrative decentralisation encompasses transfer of decision‐making authority, resources and responsibilities for the delivery of selected public services from the central government to the lower levels of government, agencies, and field offices of central government line agencies. Administrative decentralisation may be implemented in three forms of power relations between the centre and the periphery. These are: deconcentration, delegation and devolution depending on the scope of functions that are decentralised and the degree of autonomy allowed at the local levels. This can be explained as a ‘continuum’ of decentralisation (table 2) as discussed under the subsequent sub-heading.
3.4 The ‘continuum’ of decentralisation
Decentralisation is broad. It may take different forms ranging from the lowest to the highest degrees of power shift from the centre to the periphery. The levels of power-shift that constitute the ‘continuum’ of decentralisation are: de-concentration, delegation and devolution (Brinkerhoff and Azfar, 2006). Deconcentration is the transfer of authority and responsibility from one level of the central government to another, with the local unit being accountable to the central government ministry or agency which has been decentralised (Olsen, 2007). It is a form of decentralisation which involves transfer of a narrow scope of administrative authority and responsibility to lower levels of the government institutions. This form of decentralisation does not give the periphery (local authorities) ultimate power to make decisions (Rondinelli and Cheema, 1983; Dyer and Rose, 2005). Decentralisation by deconcentration is often considered as ‘a controlled form of decentralisation’ and is used most frequently in unitary states (Olsen, 2007); where the concern rests on relocation of decision making authority and financial and management responsibilities among different levels of the central government. The process can take two different ways. The first option is that the central government can just shift responsibilities from its officials in the capital city to those working in the regions, provinces or districts. The second option is that the central government can create a strong field administration or local administrative capacity under the central/ministerial control. (Olsen, 2007). In Tanzania, the decentralisation policy of 1972 is a real example of decentralisation by deconcentration. With this form of decentralisation, the central authority retains the final decision making responsibility, while the operations are shifted to the local authorities. For instance, decentralisation of education by transferring the responsibility of supervision of primary and secondary schools to the LGAs[ Local Government Authorities] where City, Municipal and District councils become responsible for the management of schools under the directives from the centre. With this type of decentralisation, LGAs usually have low scope of autonomy. |
