The Political Economy of Decentralisation in Sikkim: Strengthening Gram Panchayat Planning and Budgeting

Bernard Dafflon

No 424, FSES Working Papers from Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences, University of Freiburg/Fribourg Switzerland

Abstract: The objective of democratic decentralization is to enable institutions at the grassroots level to take decisions in matters related to the day to day life of the people. Transparency and accountability do not happen on their own: they have to be promoted and delivered by performing institutions. In Sikkim, the focus on empowering the Panchayats (local governments) was initiated in 2002-3 with the devolution of specific functions, transfers of more grants and posting suitable personnel to the Panchayats. But attitudinal changes take long to obtain, and resistance to such changes and processes are inevitable and deep rooted. This Report opens roads of thinking for improving and accelerating the decentralization process in Sikkim with a view of better participative democracy, budget accountability and governance.

Keywords: local public finance; local political institution; assignment of functions; intergovernmental transfers; local budget; local finance; planning (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H70 H72 H73 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 153 pages
Date: 2011-12-21
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://doc.rero.ch/record/28038/files/WP_SES_424.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
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:fri:fribow:fribow00424

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://doc.rero.ch/record/28038

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in FSES Working Papers from Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences, University of Freiburg/Fribourg Switzerland Bd de Pérolles 90, CH-1700 Fribourg. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Mustapha Obbad ().