The Processes of Decentralization in Latin America
The processes of the region until now are oriented fundamentally to
ensure the accomplishment of national social policies. How to make to orient them
also to harness the local autonomy and mainly to do it in conditions of equality in
order to make the local and regional development possible, and in addition to advance
in other objectives? To respond to this question the author elaborates a synthesis
of the economic theory on decentralization and, to the light of this frame, he widely
reviews the processes of the region, using for it the unequal existing
information. Their main recommendations to orient the processes are: (i) to differentiate
between systems from financing from «corporate properties» and other potentials
goods to decentralize: «territorial goods», where the fairness principle would be «equal level of provision to equal fiscal effort»; (ii) to induce an political-administrative
territorial reordering oriented to reduce great demographic inequalities and of capacity
between circumscriptions of a same level, and (iii) to take advantage of better
endogenous capacities self-government.
Check other articles from the issue Primavera 2007 or from other issues.