Local Governance in Multi-Layered Systems

The book provides a comprehensive analysis of local government in federations. It fills the gap in current legal research and positions local government in federal studies through the lenses of comparative law adopting a more nuanced approach to local government. The book considers the shortcomings between the black-letter constitution and its operational rules. Whether (and how) the regime of local government is implemented is more relevant than its formal-but-ineffective recognition. The comparative survey discloses the variety local institutions take in different federal contexts. Divided into three parts the book comprises chapters investigating local government in systems that to various degrees have been examined and classified as federal. Scholars throughout the world have examined the federal-local connection in aggregative federations (the USA Canada Switzerland Germany Australia and Austria) devolutionary ones (Belgium Bosnia Herzegovina Italy Spain the UK Argentina Brazil Mexico and the Russian Federation) as well as in federations beyond the West where federalism-as-a-colonial-legacy has undergone a process of reinvention affecting the federal-local connection (South Africa Ethiopia India Nigeria Comoros Democratic Republic of Congo Nepal Palau Federated States of Micronesia; St. Kitts and Nevis; United Arab Emirates; and Pakistan).