Local government
Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of governance or public administration within a particular sovereign state. A municipal council or local council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, borough council, rural council, village council, board of aldermen, or board of selectmen.
Local governments typically constitute a subdivision of a higher-level political or administrative unit, such as a nation or state. Local governments generally act within the powers and functions assigned to them by law or directives of a higher level of government. In federal states, local government generally comprises a third or fourth level of government, whereas in unitary states, local government usually occupies the second or third level of government.
The institutions of local government vary greatly between countries, and even where similar arrangements exist, country-specific terminology often varies. Common designated names for different types of local government entities include counties, districts, cities, townships, towns, boroughs, parishes, municipalities, municipal corporations, shires, villages, and local government areas. The same term may be used in different countries to refer to local governance institutions with vastly different institutional features, powers, or functions.
In addition to general-purpose local governments, some countries have special-purpose local governments, such as independent school districts, elected water boards, or local service districts.
Although there is no single, commonly accepted definition of the term, the most precise definition of local governments is provided by the International Monetary Fund, which divides the general government sector into three sub-sectors and defines local governments as "institutional units whose fiscal, legislative, and executive authority extends over the smallest geographical areas distinguished for administrative and political purposes."
The IMF further notes that local governments "typically provide a wide range of services to local residents," while "the scope of their authority is generally much less than that of central government or state governments, and they may or may not be entitled to levy taxes." They are often heavily dependent on grants from higher levels of government, and they may also act, to some extent, as agents of central or regional governments. They should also be able to appoint their own officers, independently of external administrative control. Even when local governments act as agents of central or state governments to some extent, they can be treated as a separate level of government, provided they are also able to raise and spend some funds on their own initiative and own responsibility."
Other definitions for local governments are less prescriptive and emphasize the political or representative nature of local governments. For instance, OECD defines local governments as "decentralized entities whose governance bodies are elected through universal suffrage and which has general responsibilities and some autonomy with respect to budget, staff and assets." The Local Public Sector Alliance defines local government institutions as "a corporate body that performs one or more public sector functions within a jurisdiction that has adequate political, administrative, and fiscal autonomy and authority to respond to the needs and priorities of its constituents".
Questions regarding the empowerment of local government institutions, the structure and nature of local political leadership, and the extent of local self-governance and municipal autonomy are key questions of public administration and governance. Local elections are held in many countries.
Africa
Egypt
has a centralised system of local government officially called local administration as it is a branch of the Executive. The country is divided into 27 governorates, the top tier of local administration. A governorate is administered by a governor, who is appointed by the President of Egypt and serves at the president's discretion.Governors have the civilian rank of minister and report directly to the prime minister, who chairs the Board of Governors and meets with them on a regular basis. The Minister of Local Development coordinates the governors and their governorate's budgets.
Mali
In recent years, Mali has undertaken an ambitious decentralization program, which involves the capital district of Bamako, seven regions subdivided into 46 cercles, and 682 rural community districts. The state retains an advisory role in administrative and fiscal matters, and it provides technical support, coordination, and legal recourse to these levels. Opportunities for direct political participation, and increased local responsibility for development have been improved.In August–September 1998, elections were held for urban council members, who subsequently elected their mayors. In May/June 1999, citizens of the communes elected their communal council members for the first time. Female voter turnout was about 70% of the total, and observers considered the process open and transparent. With mayors, councils, and boards in place at the local level, newly elected officials, civil society organizations, decentralized technical services, private sector interests, other communes, and donor groups began partnering to further development.
Eventually, the cercles will be reinstituted with a legal and financial basis of their own. Their councils will be chosen by and from members of the communal councils. The regions, at the highest decentralized level, will have a similar legal and financial autonomy, and will comprise a number of cercles within their geographical boundaries. Mali needs to build capacity at these levels, especially to mobilize and manage financial resources.
Nigeria
as a federal republic operates three tiers of government: federal, statesand local government. The country's constitution provides for each local government, and its development areas and autonomous communities created by individual state legislation to have democratically elected local government heads. There is a ministry of local government and chieftaincy affairs in each state charged with the responsibility of administration at that level. Nigeria has a total of 774 Local Government Areas
.
South Africa
has a two-tiered local government system comprising local municipalities which fall into district municipalities, and metropolitan municipalities which span both tiers of local government. The country has eight metropolitan municipalities, 44 district municipalities and 205 local municipalities.The largest cities are governed by metropolitan municipalities, often called "metros". An example of such is the City of Cape Town, which operates using a City Council as head of the executive, and a Mayor as head of the ruling party locally, and overall city governance. A Deputy Mayor is also appointed.
Metropolitan municipalities govern a total of 24.8 million people, as of the 2022 Census, which constitutes around 40% of the South African population. Outside metros, the rest of the country is governed jointly by district and local municipalities. District municipalities have broader functions, such as integrated planning, infrastructure development, and public transit. Local municipalities have responsibility for all municipal functions not assigned to the district, including local service delivery. Municipalities operate within specific jurisdictions, and can set local bylaws that are quite far-reaching. However, major laws are still set by the provincial and national governments. City budgets are audited annually. Local governments are elected during municipal elections, held every five years.
Asia
Afghanistan
Afghanistan was traditionally divided into provinces governed by centrally appointed governors with considerable autonomy in local affairs. There are currently 34 provinces. During the Soviet occupation and the development of country-wide resistance, local areas came increasingly under the control of mujaheddin groups that were largely independent of any higher authority; local commanders, in some instances, asserted a measure of independence also from the mujaheddin leadership in Pakistan, establishing their own systems of local government, collecting revenues, running educational and other facilities, and even engaging in local negotiations. Mujaheddin groups retained links with the Peshawar parties to ensure access to weapons that were doled out to the parties by the government of Pakistan for distribution to fighters inside Afghanistan.The Taliban set up a shura, made up of senior Taliban members and important tribal from the area. Each shura made laws and collected taxes locally. The Taliban set up a provisional government for the whole of Afghanistan, but it did not exercise central control over the local shuras.
The process of setting up the transitional government in June 2002 by the Loya Jirga took many steps involving local government. First, at the district and municipal level, traditional shura councils met to pick electors—persons who cast ballots for Loya Jirga delegates. Each district or municipality had to choose a predetermined number of electors, based on the size of its population. The electors then traveled to regional centers and cast ballots, to choose from amongst themselves a smaller number of loya jirga delegates— according to allotted numbers assigned to each district. The delegates then took part in the Loya Jirga.
The warlords who rule various regions of the country exert local control. The transitional government is attempting to integrate local governing authorities with the central government, but it lacks the loyalty from the warlords necessary to its governing authority. More traditional elements of political authority—such as Sufi networks, royal lineage, clan strength, age-based wisdom, and the like—still exist and play a role in Afghan society. Karzai is relying on these traditional sources of authority in his challenge to the warlords and older Islamist leaders. The deep ethnic, linguistic, sectarian, tribal, racial, and regional cleavages present in the country create what is called "Qawm" identity, emphasizing the local over higher-order formations. Qawm refers to the group to which the individual considers himself to belong, whether a subtribe, village, valley, or neighborhood. Local governing authority relies upon these forms of identity and loyalty.