Local Government Studies

Are more affluent parents treated more favourably by elementary school principals? Socioeconomic discrimination among local Swedish public officials This article argues that previous public administration and political science research might have missed important class-based inequalities by primarily focusing on ethnic discrimination among publ...

@jonastaghizadeh.bsky.social investigates class-based #inequality by focusing on #discrimination based on socio-economic status in his study of Swedish public officials. Are affluent parents treated more favourably by elementary school principals?
@lgstudies.bsky.social

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

The scope of active labour market policies in local labour market programmes in Swedish municipalities – driven by needs or values? This study takes its vantage point from the increasing decentralisation of welfare by examining the growing trend of welfare states implementing active labour market policies (ALMPs), with a focus ...

New study with Olov Hemmingsson in @lgstudies.bsky.social

This study sheds new light on the local politics of welfare decentralisation. Using a new dataset on Sweden’s municipal labour market initiatives, it investigates why some municipalities run extensive local labour market programmes.

Upturning the turnout voting upside down: the case of the Arab local government in Israel This study challenges the conventional assumption that high voter turnout signifies a well-functioning democracy and government legitimacy. In the case of Arab local elections in Israel, exceptiona...

📢 🆕 NEW in Local Government Studies Journal, ‘Upturning the turnout voting upside down: the case of the Arab local government in Israel’ from Mohammed Khalaile, Yousef Makladeh and Doron Navot #openaccess.

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Crisis management in cities: how politicians and public servants worked together during the Ukrainian refugee reception Dr. Nicolai De Wulf, Prof. Dr. Joris Voets When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, millions of people fled their homes seeking safety across Europe. In Belgium, cities such as Antwerp, Ghent,…

📢 🆕 blog post from Dr. Nicolai De Wulf and Prof. Dr. Joris Voets 'Crisis management in cities: how politicians and public servants worked together during the Ukrainian refugee reception', published by @inlogov.bsky.social (The Institute of Local Government Studies)

inlogov.com/2025/11/18/c...

The ‘community’ concept in local government community plans: defining community in regional Australia The concept of community is synonymous with local governance. It is relied upon to speak to populations and to define the values of a region. This paper draws on an analysis of non-metropolitan loc...

📢 🆕 NEW in Local Government Studies Journal: Andrew Hickey and Sally Hourigan analyse local government community plans from Queensland, Australia to examine the ways that the community concept is rendered with functional meaning.

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Decentralisation and electoral participation: does fiscal independence affect voter turnout in local elections? After the third wave of democratisation, many countries underwent reforms of decentralisation to consider the heterogeneous preferences of voters across different localities. However, contrary to t...

📢 🆕 NEW article in Local Government Studies Journal: Eun Young Kim finds that decentralization without fiscal independence of local governments weakens the link between local governments and citizens

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Crisis management in cities: politico-administrative complementarity during the reception of Ukrainian refugees This study investigates politico-administrative relations across four key crisis management tasks: sense-making, decision-making and coordination, meaning-making and account-giving, and learning du...

📢 🆕 in LGS Journal: When crisis hits, politics and administration must work hand in hand. What can we learn from Flemish cities that built “emergency villages” for Ukrainian refugees? By Nicolai De Wulf & Joris Voets. Read the full article #LocalGovernment
doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Regionalisation Nordic Style: Will Regions in Sweden Threaten Local Democracy? Governance in the Nordic countries has a highly local character. Most public services are provided by locally elected bodies that enjoy a high degree of autonomy in relation to political institutio...

Does regionalisation in the Nordic setting reduce the democratic quality of #governance in the area of health care? Not necessarily, according to this study by @uu-polisci.bsky.social's Paula Blomqvist and Patrik Bergman.
@lgstudies.bsky.social

www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1...

Councillors’ intentions to seek re-election in a gender-balanced local government system: evidence from Iceland With few exceptions, women are underrepresented in local councils throughout the world. Moreover, female councillors have much higher turnover than their male counterparts, leaving political life q...

📢🆕in Local Government Studies Journal: 'Councillors’ intentions to seek re-election in a gender-balanced local government system: evidence from Iceland' from authors Eva Marín Hlynsdóttir and Hafsteinn Einarsson from the University of Iceland.

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Political resistance, representation, and identity during English local government re-organisation: a micro-case study This paper examines the political and identity-based consequences of the 2019 Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP), where three historic towns were mer...

📢 🆕 NEW in Local Government Studies: ‘Political resistance, representation, and identity during English local government re-organisation: a micro-case study’ from Tabitha Baker and Ian Gwinn from Bournemouth University.

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Shall we tango? Exploring the drivers of co-production in US local governments Co-production requires two main actors: citizens and local governments. However, a significant portion of existing research has primarily examined co-production from the citizens’ perspective. Addr...

📢🆕 in Local Government Studies Journal. 'Shall we tango? Exploring the drivers of co-production in US local governments' From authors Donwe Choi, Jinsol Park and Sung-Wook Kwon.

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Attention please! Explaining local governments’ political attention for Europe As a result of the ongoing European integration process, the EU increasingly impacts local governments. However, how they respond to this differs: local governments ‘Europeanise’ in different ways....

📢 🆕 in Local Government Studies. 'Attention please! Explaining local governments’ political attention for Europe' by authors Pieter Zwaan, S. Elemans, S. André and M. van Genugten #openaccess

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

The impact of city-county amalgamations on small administrative units: evidence from land transfer in China The attitude of small units is crucial to the success of city-county amalgamations. This paper focuses on the impact of amalgamations on small units from the perspective of land transfers. Based on...

📢🆕NEW in Local Government Studies Journal: ‘The impact of city-county amalgamations on small administrative units: evidence from land transfer in China' from authors Tao Zheng and Bindong Sun.

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

From single-issue to sustained Influence: factors driving the endurance of local political parties This study aims to advance the understanding of new political party longevity by examining an overlooked phenomenon: challengers formed exclusively to run for local elections (‘local parties’, ‘loc...

📢🆕 in Local Government Studies journal, 'From single-issue to sustained Influence: factors driving the endurance of local political parties' by Felicia Andreassen, Gissur Ó Erlingsson & Susanne Wallman Lundåsen #openaccess

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Managing inclusive co-creation processes in a superdiverse neighborhood: drivers of inclusion in the case of Rotterdam This study responds to the call in the literature for more attention to examine the inclusive nature of co-creation processes. It explores the dynamic nature of inclusion within co-creation process...

📢 🆕 NEW in Local Government Studies: 'Managing inclusive co-creation processes in a superdiverse neighborhood: drivers of inclusion in the case of Rotterdam' from authors Warda Belabas, Ingmar van Meerkerk and Thomas van den Kieboom. #openaccess

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Politician–manager relationship, procurement decisions, and corruption risk in local governments This study combines agency and patronage theories to explore how the nature of local governing bodies – elected politicians or centrally appointed commissioners – influences managerial decisions an...

📢 🆕 in LGS Journal: 'Politician–manager relationship, procurement decisions & corruption risk in local governments' from authors Riccardo Mussari, Fabio Monteduro, Simona Caramia & Veronica Allegrini from the Department of Business & Law, Siena University in Italy.

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Unlocking the potentials of Information and Communication Technology on citizen participation in Tanzania local government authorities: the citizen’s perspectives Globally, ICT use is considered vital for citizen participation in local governance. However, the impacts of ICT use on citizen participation in local governance of developing countries like Tanzan...

📢 🆕 NEW in Local Government Studies Journal: 'Unlocking the potentials of Information and Communication Technology on citizen participation in Tanzania local government authorities: the citizen’s perspectives' from authors
Nicholaus Ngowi, Gasper Kissoka & Parestico Pastory

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Twitter communication in times of crisis: how do German local governments use and frame social media messages and how do citizens react to them? This study examines how local governments use social media during crises and how citizens respond to their communication. Focusing on the COVID-19 pandemic, we analyse over 50,000 social media post...

📢 🆕 NEW in LGS: 'Twitter communication in times of crisis: how do German local governments frame social media messages and how do citizens react?' Hannes Lampe & Dominik Vogel explore how different message framings affect citizen responses: #openaccess
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

When do cities propose taxes? Evidence from California municipalities, 1996–2010 What prompts city leaders to propose new taxes? While prior research emphasises voter preferences, this paper examines how fiscal constraints and city leaders’ own assessments shape municipal tax p...

📢 🆕 NEW in Local Government Studies Journal: 'When do cities propose taxes? Evidence from California municipalities, 1996–2010'. Daniel Alvord & Jennifer Nations find that city leaders’ negative evaluative assessments of fiscal outlook predict tax proposals in future years.

doi.org/10.1080/0300...

The responses of government officials to questions from local councillors: analysis from a blame avoidance perspective When legislators raise questions, their intentions are to expose executive shortcomings, as well as to prompt officials to acknowledge their responsibilities, in turn, demonstrating their professio...

📢 🆕 in Local Government Studies: 'The responses of government officials to questions from local councillors: analysis from a blame avoidance perspective' from authors Chun-Ming Tsui, Yu-Cheng Jiang & Hongwung Wang from Taiwan University #openaccess

Happy to see this one with Suzy Leland in @lgstudies.bsky.social get an issue. One of the first pieces on special district dissolution (3rd?).

What lies beneath these creatures of the state: understanding the death of specialised governments in the U.S.

📢 🆕 in Local Government Studies journal: 'Digital coproduction in Seoul: the case of Seoul’s government and citizen-led platforms' from Hanchan Hwang & Ran Kim. doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Contested waters: analysing third-party challenges in French water contract governance (2005–2023) The management of local public services, often debated during elections, is a growing concern for public authorities. When outsourced, these services can prompt legal challenges from third parties ...

📢 🆕 in Local Government Studies: 'Contested waters: analysing third-party challenges in French water contract governance (2005–2023)' by Justine Le Floch and Stéphane Saussier doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Are newcomers financially responsible? Evidence from close elections in Brazilian Municipalities This paper examines how mayors’ political experience impacts fiscal outcomes. Using a regression discontinuity design in highly-contested elections in Brazilian municipalities, we estimate the diff...

When judging papers for the the George Jones Prize, editors were also very taken with the following article, which had an early career researcher, Henrique Hott as lead author, ‘Are newcomers financially responsible? Evidence from close elections in Brazilian municipalities doi.org/10.1080/0300...

📢 🏆Simone van de Wetering wins the George Jones Prize for best paper in issue 50 of LGS with an early career researcher as lead author: ‘Facilitating citizen participation in marginalised neighbourhoods: selective empowerment in between vulnerability and active citizenship’ doi.org/10.1080/0300....

📢 🏆 Delighted to announce that Mildred Warner is the winner of the John Stewart Prize for the best paper published in issue 50 of LGS for her paper, ‘Pragmatic municipalism: privatization and remunicipalization in the US’ doi.org/10.1080/0300...
Free to access until the end of July 2026.

Cutting off the fiscal nose: the impact of anti-ESG policies on municipal borrowing costs in Oklahoma In response to a growing trend of investors choosing investments that prioritise Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) goals, some state governments have sought to prohibit state entities fro...

📢 🆕 in Local Government Studies: 'Cutting off the fiscal nose: the impact of anti-ESG policies on municipal borrowing costs in Oklahoma' from Travis Roach and Mariya Burdina doi.org/10.1080/0300...

Unsuccessful Political Parties. Exploring and Combining Party Death and Party Failure Julien van Ostaaijen and Sander Jennissen ‘I am fed up. It was interesting, fascinating, and frustrating. As a small faction it is difficult to be on top of everything and I noticed that I became l…

"I am fed up. It was interesting, fascinating & frustrating". Julien van Ostaaijen & Sander Jennissen explore why Dutch political parties lose their local representatives in this INLOGOV blog, based on the full article in Local Government Studies @peckersley.bsky.social
inlogov.com/2025/07/03/u...

The varied impact of direct democracy on local housing policies: unravelling the role of socioeconomic context Local opposition to high-density housing is a major contributor to the U.S. housing crisis, exacerbating challenges such as homelessness, food insecurity, and inequality. This study examines the ro...

📢 🆕 NEW in Local Government Studies Journal, 'The varied impact of direct democracy on local housing policies: unravelling the role of socioeconomic context' by Liu Menglin (Miley) from the University of California doi.org/10.1080/0300... #openaccess

Reelected mayors and local fiscal policy outcomes. Are incumbent mayors more competent compared to newly elected ones? This paper investigates whether the tenure in the mayoral office influences local fiscal policy. Utilizing data from Polish municipalities and employing a Regression Discontinuity Design focusing o...

📢 🆕 in Local Government Studies Journal: 'Reelected mayors and local fiscal policy outcomes. Are incumbent mayors more competent compared to newly elected ones?' by Joanna Siwińska-Gorzelak and Grazyna Bukowska

doi.org/10.1080/0300... #openaccess