Decentralization, economic development, and growth in Turkish provinces

Mehmet Tosun and Serdar Yilmaz

No 4725, Policy Research Working Paper Series from The World Bank

Abstract: There have been important developments in the decentralization of the government structure in Turkey since the early 1980s. This paper examines economic development and growth in Turkish provinces. Although there is a rich literature on the economic effects of government decentralization from both developed and developing countries, these effects have not been examined widely in the context of Turkish local governments. The authors first describe changes since the early 1980s and recent reform efforts. They then provide an empirical analysis of the effects of decentralization in Turkish provinces using cross-sectional and panel data approaches. The panel dataset consists of 67 provinces from 1976 to 2001. The analysis examines whether variations in local decentralization across these provinces and across time have had a significant impact on economic development and growth in those provinces. The findings suggest a weak negative economic effect of decentralization through a number of municipalities per capita. However, the findings do not show any significant impact from the creation of new provinces by separation from the existing ones.

Keywords: Municipal Financial Management; Economic Theory&Research; Regional Governance; Intergovernmental Fiscal Relations and Local Finance Management; Public Sector Management and Reform (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008-09-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cwa, nep-geo and nep-pbe
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/WDSC ... ered/PDF/WPS4725.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Decentralization, Economic Development, and Growth in Turkish Provinces (2010)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:4725

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Policy Research Working Paper Series from The World Bank 1818 H Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20433. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Roula I. Yazigi ().