Handing over the Reins of Power: Making Local Democracy Work
| Author | Liz Richardson |
| Published date | 01 December 2012 |
| Date | 01 December 2012 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.2041-9066.2012.00122.x |
| Subject Matter | Original Article |
are obvious challenges to improving local government.
Less immediately clear but equally damaging are where
local democratic representatives are unresponsive, and
where local decisions over how resources are allocated lack
transparency. Americans talk about ‘pork barrel politics’;
research I have conducted in north-west England suggests
residents in neighbourhoods can be equally cynical about
local politicians when they feel that public resources are
being directed with ulterior political motives.
Democracy in Inaction
In research for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation on
neighbourhood working, local politicians recognised
that constituents’ perceptions of ‘money for votes’ were
a real risk when budgets are handed over to councillors
in wards. Communities trying to do more for themselves
can come up against resistance from local councils. One
reason for local government reluctance to hand over the
reins to communities is that power is seen as indivisible
and a zero-sum game. Therefore, to hand over more
control is perceived as taking power away from demo-
cratically accountable representatives.
Current ways of thinking also mistakenly assume that
community preferences are fixed and unsophisticated;
that a groundswell of feeling against the closure of a
swimming pool, or the proposed location of a landfill
site, cannot be shifted. In this interpretation, the role of
the local councillor is to either accommodate an opinion
or go against it.
Councillors are more likely to feel their role is to make
the ultimate decision and communicate this to citizens;
whereas citizens are more likely to feel councillors should
agree with their views. One result of this divergence is
that local politicians do not truly engage with or respond
to citizens’ views and lobbies. In other research, one com-
plaint was that consultation was being conducted even
though citizens suspected that a decision had already
Handing over the Reins
of Power: Making Local
Democracy Work
A
few years ago, a chain email went round the local
government community poking fun at attempts to
modernise the public sector. It was called ‘Tribal
strategies for dead horses’ and suggested ways to revive
a lifeless horse, including changing riders, appointing a
committee to study the horse, hiring outside contrac-
tors to ride the dead horse and harnessing several dead
horses together to increase speed.
The dead horse quip is the public administrator schol-
ar’s version of the sign saying ‘You don’t have to be mad
to work here, but it helps’. I was reminded of the email
recently when presenting evidence at the CLG Select
Committee Inquiry on ‘councillors and the community’.
The Inquiry is focusing on how to transform the nature
and quality of local politics.
Persistent low turnouts in local elections and a ‘pale,
male and stale’ profile of older, white and male councillors
Citizens are often cynical and mistrustful of local democracy. While there have been missed opportunities to
transform local politics in the past, local councillors are learning to share power with their communities and can
reap big rewards as a result, writes Liz Richardson.
Current ways
of thinking
mistakenly
assume that
community
preferences
are xed and
unsophisticated
Conservative MP Eric Pickles, Secretary of State for Communities and Local
Government, is in charge of the localism agenda. Reuters
32 Political Insight
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