Local council members’ view on inter-municipal cooperation: Does office-related self interest matter?

Christian Bergholz () and Ivo Bischoff ()
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Christian Bergholz: University of Kassel

MAGKS Papers on Economics from Philipps-Universität Marburg, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics, Department of Economics (Volkswirtschaftliche Abteilung)

Abstract: We analyze data from a survey among local council members in 59 German municipali-ties. We ask council members whether their home municipality should cooperate with neigh-boring municipalities in the provision of public services like childcare or road maintenance. Their answers are clearly driven by office-related self-interest. Council members who have more political power and thus have more power to lose if their home municipality cooperates are more likely oppose inter-municipal cooperation. This interpretation receives further backing by the fact that delegates’ support for inter-municipal cooperation increases in the population size of their home municipality but decreases in the size of its neighbors.

Keywords: inter-municipal cooperation; politicians; survey; Germany; public choice (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D72 H77 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 32 pages
Date: 2016
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-pol and nep-ure
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Journal Article: Local council members’ view on intermunicipal cooperation: does office-related self-interest matter? (2018)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mar:magkse:201647

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