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The paper calls for financial devolution from the federal and provincial levels to the local level. The author argues that the present high degree of centralization has failed to deliver an adequate level of social services. In addition, while the more important services such as education, health and water supply had devolved to the local level, higher levels of government imposed constraints on their expenditures.

This book explains devolution today in terms of the evolution of past structures of government in the component parts of the United Kingdom. Available in paperback for the first time, it highlights the importance of the English dimension and the role that England’s territorial politics played in constitutional debates. Similarities and differences between how the components of the UK were governed are described. It argues that the UK should be understood now, even more than pre-devolution, as a state of distinct unions, each with its own deeply rooted past and trajectory. Using previously unpublished primary material, as well as a wealth of secondary work, the book offers a comprehensive account of the territorial constitution of the UK from the early twentieth century through to the operation of the new devolved system of government.

Although forest devolution, as a type of decentralization, is a high priority in the policy agendas of developing countries, recentralization has also occurred. In this paper, we focus on emerging recentralization within the devolution process of Collective Forest Tenure Reform (CFTR) in China’s southern provinces and conceptualize this process as “recentralized forest devolution.” In this paper, we update a key framework for analyzing decentralization and recentralization in governance processes based on the “policy arrangement approach.” Case studies were conducted in four counties of the Fujian and Yunnan provinces by tracing governance dynamics from 2001 to 2019. Our study found that the central government has tightened upward accountability and recentralized power for environmental conservation since 2012 under the discourse of “Ecological Civilization.” At the local level, recentralized forest devolution was expressed in terms of the restricted timber harvest levels for the purposes of environmental conservation. Therefore, forest devolution could be more vulnerable than expected by researchers and potentially interwoven with recentralization processes. Discourses, actors, property rights, and power are, therefore, considered to be interwoven in the complex dynamics of decentralization and recentralization.

In 2020, management of a prized recreational sportfish species, Lutjanus campechanus (red snapper), underwent a landmark change in the Gulf of Mexico of the United States: from federal management at the national level to a more localized, state level management. This policy change is based on the idea that localized management, informed by greater understanding of the context of the social-ecological system, enhances resilience. But how do fisheries stakeholders see this policy change? Our research asks how fishery stakeholders’ perceptions, especially recreational fishermen’s, vary across those who supported and did not support this change in management, known as Amendment 50 to the Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Management Plan. We analyzed n = 2206 stakeholder comments using mixed methods and qualitative coding. Our thematic analysis found that 40% of comments supported devolved state management, 3% opposed it, and 57% could not be classified because the comment did not explicitly state support or opposition. In this paper, we only analyze the comments that explicitly support (40%) or oppose (3%) state management. We found that supporters of more localized fisheries management believe that it is characterized by (1) greater flexibility in management, (2) more trustworthiness, (3) better recreational access, and (4) trustworthy science. We argue that these four beliefs, analyzed through inductive methods, form a locally accepted and context-dependent model of resilient management for one of the most iconic recreational fisheries in the United States, in one of its fastest growing coastal regions. This model, built from these four beliefs, are connected by stakeholder trust in government. Understanding how to enhance stakeholder, especially recreational fishermen, trust in government has important implications for sectors beyond fishery management.

Against the widespread assumption that data are the oil of the 21st century, this article offers an alternative conceptual framework, interpretation, and pathway around data and smart city nexus to subvert surveillance capitalism in light of emerging and further promising practical cases. This article illustrates an open debate in data governance and the data justice field related to current trends and challenges in smart cities, resulting in a new approach advocated for and recently coined by the UN-Habitat programme ‘People-Centred Smart Cities’. Particularly, this feature article sheds light on two intertwined notions that articulate the technopolitical dimension of the ‘People-Centred Smart Cities’ approach: data co-operatives and data sovereignty. Data co-operatives are emerging as a way to share and own data through peer-to-peer (p2p) repositories and data sovereignty is being claimed as a digital right for communities/citizens. Consequently, this feature article aims to open up new research avenues around ‘People-Centred Smart Cities’ approach: First, it elucidates how data co-operatives through data sovereignty could be articulated as long as co-developed with communities connected to the long history and analysis of the various forms of co-operatives (technopolitical dimension). Second, it prospectively anticipates the city–regional dimension encompassing data colonialism and data devolution.

Many African countries have shown renewed interest in strengthening their local governance systems, processes and praxes. Particularly in Zimbabwe, frantic efforts to renew local governance underline decentralisation and devolution as avenues to bring government closer to people to address racially skewed regional disparities. This paper seeks to establish the relationship between devolution of power and public service delivery in Zimbabwe. The study attempts to examine the implementation of devolution on governance and public service delivery in Zimbabwe. Therefore, existing challenges, threats and opportunities related to devolution are explored to determine the contribution of the government’s decentralisation agenda in promoting public engagement, accountability, and improved public service delivery. Due to the qualitative nature of the study, an exploratory research design was adopted. Key informant interviews and documentary searches were utilised as data collection techniques. The data was analysed through thematic analysis and content analysis approaches. The study revealed that the efficacy of devolution of power in service delivery is premised on respecting the constitutional fundamentals that empower local government in exercising their jurisdictional power and authority. Therefore, there is an imperative for political, fiscal, legislative, and institutional reforms critical for the successful implementation of devolution. This study contributes significantly to the ongoing policy and scholarly debates regarding the theoretical and practical benefits of devolution in Zimbabwe; and provides practical alternative solutions for achieving its full capacity to close extant gaps in public service delivery across the country.

Community-based conservation (CBC) institutions are widely regarded as transformative bodies that benefit social and ecological processes in coupled social-ecological systems. Yet, limited empirical evidence for this claim exists, especially on the African continent where community-based conservancies (CBCs) are being rapidly adopted in diverse institutional forms across multiple countries. We provide the first large-scale systematic review of CBC outcomes in sub-Saharan Africa. We review the literature on CBCs and develop a conceptual model that illustrates the nested scales of interaction in which CBCs are embedded, the institutional processes (“conditions”) reported as important for success, and the outcomes of CBCs on social and ecological systems. The mixed-method approach consists of inductive/deductive textual analysis of cases, geospatial visualization, descriptive statistics, and correlational analysis. Results indicate that more often than not, establishment of CBCs in Africa has led to negative or a mixture of positive and negative social outcomes, whereas ecological outcomes have been largely positive. The research conducted on CBC institutions has overwhelmingly focused on social outcomes, using qualitative methods. Monetary and nonmonetary incentives seem to be important but not sufficient on their own for positive outcomes. Devolution of rights to the local community is significantly associated with CBC outcomes but was not present in many cases, despite this feature being a hallmark of CBCs. A number of conditions were not reported in the cases reviewed, including leadership, social learning, consideration of cultural worldviews, and diverse partnerships. We provide indepth examples of the types and diversity of outcomes and contexts underpinning the presence or absence of societal processes, highlight important gaps in the existing research, and offer guidelines for research and evaluation moving forward.

Devolution has become a key 'global trend' over recent decades as many states have decentralised power to sub-state governments. The UK resisted this trend until the late 1990s when devolution was enacted by the then Labour Government, taking a highly asymmetrical form in which different territories have been granted different powers and institutional arrangements. Devolution allows the devolved governments to develop policies that are tailored to the needs of their areas, encouraging policy divergence, although this is countered by pressures to ensure that devolved approaches do not contradict those of the central state, promoting convergence. This review paper aims to assess the unfolding dynamics of devolution and policy divergence in the UK, spanning different policy areas such as economic development, health and social policy. The paper emphasises that devolution has altered the institutional landscape of public policy in the UK, generating some high-profile examples of policy divergence, whilst also providing evidence of policy convergence. In addition, the passage of time underlines the nature of UK devolution as an unfolding process. Its underlying asymmetries have become more pronounced as the tendency towards greater autonomy for Scotland and Wales clashes with a highly centralised mode of policymaking in Westminster, the consequences of which have spilt over into the devolved territories in the context of the post-2007 economic crisis through public expenditure cuts.

The 'Scottish approach' refers to its distinctive way to make and implement policy. Its reputation suggests that it is relatively comfortable with local discretion and variations in policy outcomes. Yet, policymakers are subject to 'universal' processes - limited knowledge, attention and coordinative capacity, and high levels of ambiguity, discretion and complexity in policy processes - which already undermine central control and produce variation. If policy is a mix of deliberate and unintended outcomes, a focus on policy styles may exaggerate a government's ability to do things differently. We demonstrate these issues in two 'cross cutting' policies: 'prevention' and 'transition'.