Merging, disaggregating and clustering local authorities: do structural reforms affect perceptions about local governance and democracy?

There is increasing pressure on local authorities to restructure themselves to meet current expectations from the public. Multilevel governance has emerged as one method for such restructuring. Using the results of a survey conducted among 1733 residents of local authorities in Israel, we explore the effects of three specific multilevel governance reforms–the merging, disaggregation and clustering of local government authorities–on residents’ assessments about local governance and democracy. Our findings underscore the importance of public support for the structural reform. Those who become involved in soft reforms involving bottom-up groups and voluntary coalitions that cluster together are more likely to trust their local authority, feel it responds to their needs satisfactorily and listens to them. However, the more support they express, the more their perceptions are attenuated. In contrast, residents of local authorities that amalgamated with other communities that then went through hard reforms, such as merging and disaggregation involving up-scaling and top-down reforms, had fewer positive opinions about these issues. Only residents who strongly favoured the merger had positive perceptions about local governability and participation in decision-making and were satisfied with local services and trusted the local government. We discuss these findings and draw conclusions about their implications for local structural reforms in an era of local and regional governance.