Bulletin n. 2/2009
October 2009
CONTENTS
  • Section A) The theory and practise of the federal states and multi-level systems of government
  • Section B) Global governance and international organizations
  • Section C) Regional integration processes
  • Section D) Federalism as a political idea
  • del Campo García Esther, Haro González Ana
    A la búsqueda de una gobernanza responsable: descentralización y mecanismos de rendición de cuentas en los municipios bolivianos
    in Reforma y democracia (Venezuela) , n. 44 ,  2009
    As stated by Victor Bekkers and other authors (in a document edited in 2007), throughout the decade of 90’s, the management of public resources has suffered a paradigm change, from a classical one of government to the new paradigm of governance. With this transformation, the government (understood in a classical sense) has stopped to be the only actor who can influence in the development of societies; governmental interventions falls rather on public policy network, in which the power, the dependence on the resources, and the behaviour strategies, become vital elements. Therefore, we are talking of a polycentric management, where the discussion, the design and the control of public management are carried out jointly between institutional and non institutional actors. This new governance takes place, particularly, in the participation spheres of local governments. The authors of this article understand that the efficiency and, consequently, the legitimacy of both public institutions and management of public resources, is reinforced by the formation of social networks and institutional decision-making closer to citizens. In this sense, the local goverment is the ideal space to develop those participatory practices, since the smaller the realm, the greater is the potential for direct involvement of citizens. Also because the need to strengthen the direct social control of institutions often coincides with the implementation of decentralization processes of political power. However, in this local area is especially obvious the lack of the mechanisms of horizontal and vertical accountability. Under these assumptions, this paper attempts, first, to discuss the instruments and mechanisms of accountability that were developed in the case of Bolivia, when the Popular Participation Law was passed, and secondly, to evaluate whether these mechanisms have a positive impact on the governance and legitimacy of public policies or not. In sum, it looks forward to verify the extent to which interests and demands of the Bolivian people have been included in the final product.
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