Madagascar : Decentralization
The objective of this decentralization study is to provide analysis and policy advice to the new Malagasy government on how to proceed with the decentralization strategy it inherited from the previous government. The end of the post-crisis emergenc...
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| Format: | Other Public Sector Study |
| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
Washington, DC
2013
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2003/11/2814713/madagascar-decentralization http://hdl.handle.net/10986/14663 |
| Summary: | The objective of this decentralization
study is to provide analysis and policy advice to the new
Malagasy government on how to proceed with the
decentralization strategy it inherited from the previous
government. The end of the post-crisis emergency recovery
period creates the opportunity to correct the weaknesses of
the previous strategy while building on the exiting
achievements. The paper specifically aims to (i) analyze the
institutional and fiscal context of decentralization and
(ii) present the resulting challenges for service delivery
and financing - with a particular focus on local
governments. Benefiting from primary data from several
hundred local governments, this study aims at proving
recommendations of how to improve the functioning of
communes in considering the institutional and fiscal
parameters. The report is organized into four chapters,
including the Introduction, which explain the political,
institutional, and fiscal determinants that have been
influencing Madagascar's decentralization process, and
which will continue to do so in the future. Chapter 2
provides the political and institutional background needed
to better understand the decentralization context of today.
The chapter analyzes the historical forces of
centralization, which date back to pre-colonial times and
translate into today's dominant role of the central
government administration. The chapter then takes a closer
look at the existing administrative set-up to explain
functions and responsibilities at different levels of
government. To this end, it looks at the regulatory gaps and
inconsistencies in the legal framework, the parallelism
between decentralized and deconcentrated layers, and the
emerging role of inter- communal associations and informal
regional planning bodies. Based on the concept of the
sub-national fiscal gap, chapter 3 analyzes structural
constraints to fiscal decentralization in Madagascar, and in
particular the dominance of revenue items which cannot be
decentralized. Given the l o w degree of fiscal
decentralization, the chapter takes a closer look at
expenditure deconcentration and provides a more in-depth
analysis of deconcentration in the health and education
sectors. The last part of the chapter evaluates
Madagascar's intergovernmental transfers, which
represent the most important source of local government
financing. Communes are the lowest and institutionally most
advanced level of sub-national government in Madagascar.
They are also the main focus of this study. The fourth
chapter describes the institutional dynamics at the local
level to provide the ground for a thorough analysis of local
government finance. The chapter provides an estimate of
local needs, and analyzes revenue and expenditure patterns
based on budget data of a large sample of rural communes. |
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