Los estudios comparativos han sido el objetivo de los gobiernos y de\nlas organizaciones multilaterales, adquiriendo cada vez más relieve en el\nactual proceso de globalización. En la evaluación de las políticas, especialmente\nlas educativas, la comparación se utiliza para delimitar los parámetros\nde calidad y los modelos de eficiencia. Este artículo tiene como objetivo\npresentar un estudio de las políticas en materia de formación y\ndesarrollo profesional para profesores de enseñanza secundaria de España\ny Brasil, con las categorías de análisis de la descentralización, la financiación, la evaluación y \ncambios del perfil del profesor, bajo la influencia\nde los procesos de globalización y reforma del Estado en la educación,\ncon el fin de identificar las tendencias en curso.
OBJECTIVE: Scaling up antiretroviral treatment (ART) through decentralization of HIV care is increasingly recommended as a strategy toward ensuring equitable access to treatment. However, there have been hitherto few attempts to empirically examine the performance of this policy, and particularly its role in protecting against the risk of catastrophic health expenditures (CHE). This article therefore seeks to assess whether HIV care decentralization has a protective effect against the risk of CHE associated with HIV infection. DATA SOURCE AND STUDY DESIGN: We use primary data from the cross-sectional EVAL-ANRS 12-116 survey, conducted in 2006-2007 among a random sample of 3,151 HIV-infected outpatients followed up in 27 hospitals in Cameroon. DATA COLLECTION AND METHODS: Data collected contain sociodemographic, economic, and clinical information on patients as well as health care supply-related characteristics. We assess the determinants of CHE among the ART-treated patients using a hierarchical logistic model (n = 2,412), designed to adequately investigate the separate effects of patients and supply-related characteristics. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Expenditures for HIV care exceed 17 percent of household income for 50 percent of the study population. After adjusting for individual characteristics and technological level, decentralization of HIV services emerges as the main health system factor explaining interclass variance, with a protective effect on the risk of CHE. CONCLUSION: The findings suggest that HIV care decentralization is likely to enhance equity in access to ART. Decentralization appears, however, to be a necessary but insufficient condition to fully remove the risk of CHE, unless other innovative reforms in health financing are introduced.
Part of Regional Otonomy in finance is giving local government to arrange regional receipt to purchase expenses bugget. Government genuine Receipt is one regional receipt that shows how stronger local goverment finance can handled all the expenditure, not only depend on Central Government. Metro and Lampung Timur same with another local government in Indonesia, wants the higher regional otonomy espescialy in finance. The higher decentralization indicate higher ability on local government to fulfill all expenditure. In can be analized from share of Government Genuine Receipt and Tax and non Tax Share compare Total Regional Receipt and Total Regional Expenditure. Higher fiscal Desentralization needed by Metro and Lampung Timur to get higher Regional otonomy.
In many countries the decentralization of spending responsibilities has outpaced the decentralization of revenue powers. Sub-national governments have then to rely on transfers from the center and borrowing to finance their spending. When this occurs, we find that the overall fiscal deficit tends to increase. This result is based on cross-country econometric evidence from OECD countries, and is particularly strong in the presence of regional disparities. Fiscal discipline can be strengthened by ensuring that sub-national taxing powers are adequate to meet spending obligations.
Jorge F. Chávez, Roberto F. Iunes, Hector Conroy, Johanna Ramos · 7 authors
This evaluation examines the IDB's Country Program with Colombia for the 2007-2011 period. The evaluation found social investment and decentralization as two areas in which the IDB maintained presence and relevance during this period. In social investment, the IDB was consolidated as a stable partner to Colombia in the creation and operation of a long-term social safety net. In regards to decentralization, cooperation was crosscutting, as the IDB worked with subnational institutions in diverse sectors, such as transportation, business development, housing, and modernization of the State. The IDB also continued its long-term work with Colombia to modernize and improve the efficiency of oversight agencies and the judicial branch, helping the country to obtain sizeable savings. To continue to improve the strategy with Colombia, OVE recommends that the IDB should: (i) increase its efforts to lower the transaction costs of IDB's cooperation with the country; (ii) improve the evaluability, monitoring and evaluation of the Country Strategy and the projects financed by the IDB; (iii) identify and strengthen the IDB's capacity in the areas and sectors in which the country will concentrate its demand for financial cooperation; and (iv) identify international development experiences that have been successful and present them to Colombia.
INTRODUCTION: In Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) sound planning is required as interest increases in the decentralization of healthcare financing and the implementation of a sector-wide approach to health care. For this, improved knowledge of national morbidity and mortality is essential. Data from remote areas of SSA are needed to ensure that public health priority-setting and actions reflect the situation in all regions, not just those easily accessed and readily researched. In order to understand the causes, circumstances and changes over time of death in a remote and underserved region, this study sought information on all deaths in a district hospital over a 17 year period. METHODS: The study design was a retrospective review of the hospital records (in registers) of all patients hospitalized in Kolofata District Hospital, a rural public hospital in the Far North Region of Cameroon, 1 January 1993 to 31 December 2009. A line listing was extracted of all 1281 inpatient deaths, and this included dates of admission and death; patient name, address, sex and ethnic group; presenting complaint; duration of symptoms; summary of physical examination; and the diagnosis presumed to be the cause of death. RESULTS: Children under the age of 15 years and males comprised the majority of deaths (63.9% and 56.0%, respectively). Causes of death were related to the seasons. Infectious diseases including acute lower respiratory tract infection, malaria and diarrhoeal diseases were the leading causes of death; AIDS caused most adult deaths. A total of 67% of patients presented within 1 week of symptom onset, and 56.8% of deaths occurred on or before the day after admission. Deaths due to AIDS, malaria and complications of pregnancy increased over time. Among Kolofata District residents, death from vaccine-preventable measles and neonatal tetanus were rare, particularly in the later study years. The proportion of deaths attributed to non-communicable diseases did not increase in the 17 year period. CONCLUSIONS: To reduce mortality in this world region, priority should be given to the prevention and management of lower respiratory tract infections, malaria, diarrhoeal diseases, AIDS, and the complications of pregnancy. The planning of health resources and activities should take into account seasonal variations in the causes of death. Improvements to emergency services and community education that emphasises the need for earlier presentation when ill should reduce deaths that occur soon after hospital admission. Death due to measles and neonatal tetanus has become rare, a reflection of the effectiveness in this area of the national vaccination program.
UN listing of al Qaeda and Taliban affiliates under the Security Council resolution 1267 system has been controversial, in large measure because of the absence of due process and the secrecy surrounding the decisions made by the sanctioning committee. There have been a number of successful domestic challenges to the implementation of this system at the national and supranational level. If domestic and supranational courts continue to invalidate domestic implementation of 1267 listings, there will be a disconnect between the global 1267 list and certain domestic lists. The 1267 process may be able to survive some domestic challenges and exemptions, but criticisms by domestic judges will erode support for the 1267 system. This may not in itself be a bad development, as 1267 listing, with its focus on al Qaeda and the Taliban, is only a partial response to international terrorism. Even apart from the human rights implications of listing, it is not clear that listing and related terrorism financing and travel ban interventions are particularly effective means to combat today’s decentralized and often homegrown terrorism. Listing may be an example of fighting the last war against al Qaeda rather than deploying tools to forestall the next form of terrorism.This Article explores these issues in four parts. In Part I, we provide a brief overview of the 1267 system and its origins and operations. In Part II, we examine the substantive international law that may apply to the Security Council as well as the jurisdictional basis for (and possible constraints on) the 1267 system. The focus here is on the possibility of applying due process protections derived from various forms of international law to the 1267 listing process. In Part III, we examine some of the “dualist” defenses of due process, examining domestic and supranational court decisions in the European Union, the United States, and Canada. In Part IV, we discuss some of the lessons that can be drawn from both international and domestic attempts to increase the fairness of terrorist listing processes. This includes the common and difficult challenge in both the international and domestic realms of providing for adversarial challenges to secret intelligence that is said to justify listing. Finally, we reflect on the implications of these challenges to the sustainability of listing processes, terrorism financing, and judicial review of counterterrorism actions in general.
This is a study of financial disparities in primary and secondary education in OECD countries that have a relatively large population and a school finance system with decentralized features. These countries include the United States, Britain, Australia, Spain, Canada, and Japan. There are two major research questions: What are the trends in disparities in per-student education spending during the 1990s and early 2000s period? What government policies or factors may explain these trends? Common statistics such as the coefficient of variation, the restricted range, the federal range ratio, and Gini coefficient are used to measure disparity in per-student spending. Sub-national data for this study are obtained from published government sources. There are three major findings: (1) there was a general trend towards a reduction in inequity in per-student education spending in these countries; (2) this equalization trend was associated with a variety of financing policies implemented in these countries; and (3) a larger share of regional government funding relative to the share of local government funding, intergovernmental transfer, and the design of school funding formulas are crucial factors for enhancing equity in education funding. The policy towards centralization in education finance system also appears to be an important factor in financial equalization.
The importance of the local public finance is growing in accordance with the increasing proportion of the decentralization process. The mechanism of resource allocation, and especially the allocation criteria used, constitutes subjects of debate. Our objective pursued is to assess whether the avoidance of the first step for balancing the allocation of funds can provide enhanced fairness in balancing the local budgets across the country. Local budgets in Romania receive significant resources from the state budget in the form of amounts and quotas distributed from certain taxes, which are revenues for the state budget. Some of these amounts are designed to balance the local budgets. The distribution of funds from the state budget to the local budgets requires two steps. Firstly, the amounts are divided by county, secondly, these amounts are directed within the county especially towards localities which have a lower financial standing. Given the significant disparities between counties, we believe that this mechanism does not ensure fairness in the allocation because the funds distributed according to the first step may not use fair criteria to meet the requirements for balanced local budgets. Therefore, we intend to simulate a balanced allocation of national funds for eliminating the first step that produces the most significant inequities. Direct application of the second step of allocation, with its two phases, will provide more funds serving those local administrative units for the income tax per capita is lower than the national average. Comparing the values allocated for the year 2011 with those obtained in the simulation we will examine changes that occur after the application of this method which seems to be more equitable and appropriate. This work was supported by CNCSIS-UEFISCSU, project number PNII-IDEI 1780/2008
Romania's integration in the European Union implies, apart the complex process of policy transfer, the learning of new modes to make policies characteristic to a multi-level governance and partnership culture. Of the different levels of governance of the European model, the regional level ("regional governance") most faithfully reflects, in our opinion, the complexity of reconfiguring the role of state in economy, at the beginning of this new millennium, in the European Union space and presents the highest practical importance for Romania, as a new Member State of the European Union, for, at the regional level, the structures are more flexible and the good practices are more rapidly assimilable. The selection of the best regional growth and development economic policies, the choosing of the objectives out of a series of competing options, the calibration in time and space of powers, roles, capabilities, and responsibilities and the encouragement of the win-win solutions call upon the choice and combination of some appropriate and efficient instruments. Representative for the new context, the regional growth and development policy must integrate, in Romania too, more knowledge, more creativity, new combinations of capabilities and new fields of expertise. This paper presents preliminary research results afferent to the post-doctoral research project: "Growth and regional development economic policies. Challenges for Romania in the context of economic-financial crisis and European model integration", carried out in the project "Economic scientific research, reliance of human welfare and development in European context", the Romanian Academy, "Costin C. Kiriţescu" National Institute for Economic Research, project financed for the 2010-2013 period from the European Social Fund (EFS) and implemented by the Romanian Academy, Costin C. Kiritescu National Institute for Economic Research, in the period of time 1 December 2010 - 30 November 2012, coordinator: Professor Dr. Valeriu Ioan Franc. The question we intend to answer, in the present phase of our research, based on the comparative analysis of the decentralisation systems of several Member States of European Union, respectively on the analysis of the regional disparities existing at the European Union level and of the effects of the economic integration, is- to what extent the capabilities of the regional policy should rather be concentrated in the hands of regional authorities or of the European Union than to be left individually to the Member States which should conceive their own regional policy? What we intend in this paper, based on the analysis of some experiences to decentralize the capabilities of economic policy at the European Union level, is to identify the regional implications of the interconnection of decentralization, centralization, respectively supra-nationalization tendencies and, implicitly, the analysis of the way to reconfigure the role of state in economy at the regional level, in the context of integration in the European model. The examination of the way to reconfigure the role of state in economy at regional level requires the review of the allocative, distributive, and regulating roles of the state from a regional perspective, the analysis, on one side, of the decentralization of economic policy capabilities from the national level to the regional level (for example, national level: pure public goods supply, for instance, national defence and the centralization of fiscal policy capabilities in order to achieve macroeconomic stability and revenue redistribution; regional level: mixed public goods supply, for instance, waste collection and community policy), on the other hand, the centralization/decentralization of regional capabilities at the European Union level.
Lizardo Huamán-Angulo, Lindaura Liendo-Lucano, Manuel Núñez
Los recursos humanos son el eje del accionar del sector salud; sin embargo, no necesariamente son el aspecto mejor atendido, por ello el Ministerio de Salud del Perú (MINSA) conjuntamente con los gobiernos regionales generó el Plan Sectorial Concertado y Descentralizado para el Desarrollo de Capacidades en Salud 2010-2014 (PLANSALUD) con el propósito de fortalecer las capacidades de los Recursos Humanos en Salud (RHUS) y contribuir para que la atención de salud se desarrolle con eficiencia, calidad, pertinencia, equidad e interculturalidad en el marco de la descentralización, el Aseguramiento Universal de la Salud (AUS) y las políticas de la salud. Con ese objeto se han propuesto tres componentes (asistencia técnica, capacitación y articulación educación - salud) que agrupan a un conjunto importante de intervenciones, las cuales son planteadas y definidas de acuerdo al contexto nacional, regional y local, contribuyendo de ese modo a la mejora de las capacidades de gobierno, de gestión por competencias y la prestación de servicios de salud. El presente artículo muestra una primera aproximación de PLANSALUD, incluyendo aspectos relacionados a su planificación, gestión, financiamiento, estructura y funcionamiento, así como las medidas de monitoreo y evaluación.<br>Human resources are the backbone of health sector actions; however, they are not necessarily the area with the greatest attention, therefore, the Ministry of Health of Peru (MINSA) together with regional governments, led the Decentralized and Agreed Sector Plan for the Capacity Development in Health 2010-2014 (PLANSALUD) with the aim of strengthening the capacities of Human Resources for Health (HRH) and contribute to health care efficient development, quality, relevance, equity and multiculturalism, in the context of descentralization, the Universal Health Insurance (AUS) and health policies. To achieve this goal, they have proposed three components (technical assistance, joint training and education - health articulation) that bring together an important set of interventions, which are planned and defined according to the national, regional and local levels, thus contributing to improve the government capacity, capability management and delivery of health services. This paper presents a first approach of PLANSALUD, including aspects related to planning, management, financing, structure and functioning, as well as monitoring and evaluation measures.
We hereby propose a model to analyze the provision of environmental protection activities (United Nation 2005) with positive interregional externalities in order to verify - at least in theory - whether this kind of policy is better accomplished through centralized policymaking, which implies a coordinated solution among local representatives, or a decentralized system, whereby local authorities independently finance and implement their environmental protection policy. The research question concerns the identification of criteria on how to allocate powers and functions to environmental management at different tiers of government. Moreover, modelling interregional externalities as a mechanism contributing to lowering the cost of financing environmental policy in each region (production externality), we can assume that different environmental policies are allowed across regions. Given this general framework, considerations favouring either institutional setting in terms of individuals’ welfare seem to involve interaction among these key elements: the extent of the inter-jurisdictional spillovers, the size of local jurisdictions and the regional preferences for environmental protection policy.
José Jesús Martín Martín, María del Puerto López del Amo González
The Spanish National Health System (SNHS) has sustainability problems resulting from weaknesses in institutional design and governance compounded by the economic crisis it faces. The global economic crisis has had a particularly virulent impact in Spain, characterized by high levels of unemployment and public and private debt. Fiscal adjustment policies implemented may significantly compromise the SNHS. Along with general funding problems, the strong territorial decentralization of health jurisdictions in the Autonomous Communities has not been backed up by efficient State-level health coordination. The SNHS suffers from problems in its rules of governance, its autonomous financing system, human resource policies and diversity of direct and indirect management models in different Autonomous Communities. A reform strategy in Spanish healthcare governancemust be articulated within the context of a broader review of public policies to stabilize the lines of defense of the welfare state. Within the scope of the health sector, the financing system must be improved and institutional changes to increase efficiency must be implemented.
Claudia Dziobek, Miguel Alves, Majdeline El Rayess, Carlos Gutierrez Mangas · 5 authors
A useful but little known feature of the IMF’s Government Finance Statistics Yearbook (GFSY) is the information on the structure of governments. Institutional tables, included in the GFSY, provide detail on the central, state, and local levels of governments, social security, and extrabudgetary units. We refer to the main levels of government as GL1, GL2, and GL3 in ascending order of institutional coverage. We present maps of the various levels of government for 74 countries to illustrate the usefulness of this database and make it more accessible to users. The maps provide information about how centralized or decentralized government finances and employment are and their size relative to the overall economy. Government map data facilitate the monitoring of fiscal policy and fiscal rules.
The article aimed to analyze the impacts of earmarking revenues and conditional transfers on the supply of health financing in Brazil. After analyzing the role of these Federal regulation mechanisms on decentralized healthcare administration, the article verified the effects on total expenditure in health and disaggregated by level of government, evaluated whether transfers by the Unified National Health System (SUS) were consistent with the evolution in the decentralized supply, and measured the inequalities in per capital health spending by municipalities. The conclusions showed the complementary relationship between earmarking revenues and conditional transfers according to supply, which: (1) increased the share of State and Municipal governments in health financing; (2) provided incentives for the decentralization of primary care according to Federal guidelines; and (3) reduced the inequalities between municipalities in per capita health expenditures.
Conventional wisdom postulates that there are benefits from decentralizing government finances but there is little empirical evidence about actual country practices. This paper presents data on fiscal decentralization for about 80 countries over a period of about 20 years (1990-2008) from the IMF’s Government Finance Statistics Yearbook (GFSY), the only global database with fiscal data for several levels of government. The data show that in many countries, revenue collection remains relatively more centralized than expenditures and that employment tends to be concentrated in lower levels of government. Except for transition economies, the levels of decentralization are relatively stable over the time period. The findings are shown by degree of economic development, constitutional power arrangements, and geographic area, broadly confirming key factors identified in the literature as determining the extent of fiscal decentralization.
Ali Kakhbod, Joseph C. Koo, Demosthenis Teneketzis
We present a decentralized message exchange process (tatonnement process) for determining the level at which a certain public good will be provided to a set of individuals who finance the cost of attaining that level. The message exchange process we propose requires minimal coordination overhead and converges to the optimal solution of the corresponding centralized problem.
s - This study investigated the causal relationship between quantity of fish sold and marketing costs in Adamawa State. Specifically, the profitability was determined and distribution channels identified. Structured questionnaires were used to collect data from 80 fish marketers using purposive and simple random sampling technique from Jimeta, Yola, Gurin and Labondo markets. Analytical tools used were descriptive statistics, market margin and multiple regression analysis. The result showed a margin of 39.8% which could be attributed to the marketing functions. The study identified a decentralized distribution channel in the area. Regression analysis revealed an R2 of 63.8%, F-value of 8.93 and a very low standard error of 0.38889. The result further revealed that initial capital, cost of fish, processing cost and handling charges were positive and significant at different levels indicating that they were the major determinants of selling prices of processed fish in the area. The study concluded that processed fish marketing in the study area was profitable. It recommended that marketers should form a strong co-operative society. There is also a need for government intervention by reducing tax and providing licence to increase the number of micro-credit finance institutions.
Célia Regina Pierantoni, Ana Cláudia Pinheiro Garcia
BACKGROUND: The Brazilian health reform process, following the establishment of the Unified Health System (SUS), has had a strong emphasis on decentralization, with a special focus on financing, management and inter-managerial agreements. Brazil is a federal country and the Ministry of Health (MoH), through the Secretary of Labour Management and Health Education, is responsible for establishing national policy guidelines for health labour management, and also for implementing strategies for the decentralization of management of labour and education in the federal states. This paper assesses whether the process of decentralizing human resources for health (HRH) management and organization to the level of the state and municipal health departments has involved investments in technical, political and financial resources at the national level. METHODS: The research methods used comprise a survey of HRH managers of states and major municipalities (including capitals) and focus groups with these HRH managers - all by geographic region. The results were obtained by combining survey and focus group data, and also through triangulation with the results of previous research. RESULTS: The results of this evaluation showed the evolution policy, previously restricted to the field of 'personnel administration', now expanded to a conceptual model for health labour management and education-- identifying progress, setbacks, critical issues and challenges for the consolidation of the decentralized model for HRH management. The results showed that 76.3% of the health departments have an HRH unit. It was observed that 63.2% have an HRH information system. However, in most health departments, the HRH unit uses only the payroll and administrative records as data sources. Concerning education in health, 67.6% of the HRH managers mentioned existing cooperation with educational and teaching institutions for training and/or specialization of health workers. Among them, specialization courses account for 61.4% and short courses for 56.1%. CONCLUSIONS: Due to decentralization, the HRH area has been restructured and policies beyond traditional administrative activities have been developed. However, twenty years on from the establishment of the SUS, there remains a low level of institutionalization in the HRH area, despite recent efforts of the MoH.
Cătălina Liliana Andrei, BOGDAN OANCEA, TUDOREL ANDREI
Reforming the public health system is a complex and long process, involving different categories of people. To accelerate the process of integration into the European Union, Romania is currently implementing strategies and programs aimed to increase the quality of public services. In the medical field a series of measures have been undertaken aimed at accelerating the decentralization process and optimize the activities of medical institutions. During the transition period a series of measures have been taken to decentralization and privatization of health services. However, currently we are witnessing a fragmentation of the system, which stressed the inequality in the distribution of medical personnel and reduced people's access to certain types of medical services. Please note that the number of doctors per capita in rural areas is only 20% of the urban area. Another major shortcoming of the system is linked to the financing system and its correlation with the strategies of decentralization. Frequently, decentralization has emerged as a way of placing the central tasks in the task of local government. Using panel data from developing regions we highlight a number of implications of the decentralization process.
The enactment of The act Number 2211999, about The Local Government and The Act Number 2511999, about The Balancing Financial between Central and Local Government, they have changed the centralization system to the decentraiization in form of giving the regional autonomy, which it's real, broad and responsible. One of the impacts of that policy is The Local Government's fiscal decentralization (financing the regional autonomy), which it is authorities to coiiect the local tax and local retribution in order to financing public services in local region. Based on the argument, they important reviewed, such as: (a) how the basic concept of the local tax and retribution tax; (b j What is the legal basis of the local tax and retribution tax; and (c) how the implementation of local tax and local retribution. The basics concepts of local tax and local retribution, its essentially, should be able to provide local revenue in accordance with the degree of fiscal autonomy period and clearly had an impact on the fiscal responsibility of owned the relevant owned. The legal basics of tax collecting, such as The Article Number 23A ofUndang- UndangDasar1945; The Article Number 7, Paragraph 4 of The Act Number 1012004, about The Establishment, Regional Regulation; The implementation of the tax collecting have to based on the principles or system, which it is called "closed list". Kata kunci: Desentralisasi Fiskal, Pungutan Pajak Daerah, "Closed List"
Failure is the norm for urban sanitation infrastructure in Ghana: of the rather substantial number of wastewater and faecal sludge treatment plants, with about 70 mostly decentralized systems throughout the country, less than 10 are operating effectively. This research presents an overview of the related sanitation situation in Ghana, and compares the few successful facilities with their failed counterparts in order to decipher the factors that enable the former to prevail. The research reveals important differences in the operation and maintenance (O&M) strategies, financing schemes and incentive structures in the successful versus unsuccessful facilities, which are probably not unique to Ghana. Based on the findings, we suggest a set of guiding questions for incorporation into the existing planning, funding or general decision-making framework in order to avoid commonly observed traps, which not only undermine progress in the delivery of sanitation services but also harshly affect environmental and public health.
This publication discusses the decentralization issues faced by countries of Asia and the Pacific. It includes practical suggestions on how to proceed in this area to achieve economic growth, macroeconomic stability, poverty and income distribution, services delivery improvements, and political accountability. This note elaborates on adequacy of local revenues and autonomy, expenditure management and clear service delivery mandates, horizontal imbalances and limited use of incentives in intergovernmental transfers, financing needs and local government borrowing, and local management capacities as the major challenges in a decentralized fiscal architecture. The recommendations to address the above challenges also note the long- term nature of these reforms.
Decentralization will increase economic efficiency because local government are better positioned than the national government to deliver public services as a result of information advantages (Oates' Decentralization Theorem). Consequently, it was thought that decentralized finance would appear to have a potentially useful role to play in economic development (Oates [1993]). From the empirical viewpoint, however, it remains controversial whether there is any relationship between decentralization and economic growth. For example, as pointed out by Ebel and Yilmaz [2002] and Iimi [2005], it has been argued that fiscal decentralization can serve as a means to promote economic growth. On the other hand, there is some empirical evidence that fiscal decentralization is negatively associated with economic growth (e.g., Davoodi and Zou [1998], Zhang and Zou [1998]). Various reasons can be given for the differences in empirical estimations. In particular, the selection of fiscal decentralization variables is thought to be a cause of differences. A widely accepted measure of fiscal decentralization is the subnational share of total government spending. However, this is an imperfect measure of fiscal decentralization because it does not identify the degree of local expenditure autonomy. Ebel and Yilmaz [2002] defined the degree of local expenditure autonomy as the share of subnational own-revenues in total revenues. Though this indicator might capture subnational autonomy, it is difficult to represent the empowerment of people and communities through fiscal decentralization. However, it is important to be able to define fiscal decentralization as the empowerment of people and the community through fiscal empowerment of their local government. People and the community must be able to direct their subnational government officials to use their financial resources in accordance with local needs and preferences (Bahl [2005]). Boex and Simatupang [2008] develop a measure of fiscal empowerment to quantify fiscal decentralization as the gain in empowerment due to the devolution of fiscal power. However, this study does not examine the relationship between fiscal decentralization and economic growth. This paper sets the stage for a renewed effort to compute alternative measures of decentralization that take into account the degree of subnational autonomy and the empowerment of people and the community, and examines how fiscal decentralization viewed in terms of the empowerment of people and the community can affect economic growth.