For years, federal politicians from all established parties have categorically ruled out any cooperation with the Alternative for Germany (AfD), erecting a so-called "firewall" ("Brandmauer") against the party. Nevertheless, reports increasingly document instances where this firewall is eroding,...

The Freeports strategy announced by the previous government attempted to address today's challenges with yesterday's recipes, lacked the necessary deregulatory framework and failed to address key issues such as the housing crisis. This paper proposes an alternative: a new generation of 'Hong...

In recent decades, decentralization reforms have surged across the Global South, aiming to bring governance closer to citizens. Despite extensive debate on their effectiveness, systematic methods to assess local government performance remain underexplored, particularly in data-constrained...

The Local Development Councils (LDCs) feature a significant participatory governance function in local policy development, as local government units (LGUs) are mandated to constitute LDCs with members from civil society organizations (CSOs). While the Department of the Interior and Local...

Die finanzielle Lage der Kommunen ist regional sehr unterschiedlich. Insbesondere periphere Räume Ost- sowie altindustrielle Städte Westdeutschlands weisen eine geringe Steuerkraft auf. Auch die Emscher-Lippe-Region ist hiervon stark betroffen und fällt im Vergleich weiter zurück. Geringe...

Seit Jahren wird von Bundespolitikerinnen und -politikern aller etablierten Parteien eine Kooperation mit der AfD strikt ausgeschlossen - eine sogenannte "Brandmauer" zur AfD errichtet. Zugleich wird vermehrt über Fälle berichtet, in denen diese Brandmauer bröckelt und etablierte Parteien mit...

The Philippines embraced a devolution agenda in 1991, leading to the enactment of the Local Government Code (LGC). Despite over three decades of implementation, devolution has remained incomplete, giving rise to the blurred accountability between the national government and local governments...

The theory of fiscal federalism suggests that debt of subcentral levels of government is closely related to the internal organization of the country, defined through intergovernmental fiscal relations. Due to a great importance of subcentral levels of government in the theory and practice of...