The Case for Decentralized Federalism by Ruth Hubbard & Gilles Paquet

Author:Ruth Hubbard & Gilles Paquet [Hubbard, Ruth & Paquet, Gilles]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9786613667465
Goodreads: 16683372
Publisher: University of Ottawa Press
Published: 2010-11-09T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 6

Toward an Autopoietic Federalism

Ruth Hubbard and Gilles Paquet

A system is autopoietic when its function is primarily geared to self-renewal.

—Erich Jantsch

Introduction

In democratic confederal systems, the debate about centralization and decentralization is a debate about means—about different ways in which a particular governance regime might crystallize structurally, arguing in favour of one form over the other. But such a discussion makes little sense unless one can identify, ever so loosely, the long-run objective being pursued—not the precise end products that are sought, but the process one wishes to sustain.

Federalism is a collaborative governance regime that is attempting to respond to the heterogeneous challenges of pluralistic, rapidly evolving environments. It is an amalgam of structures, processes and mechanisms that are meant to generate both the requisite amount of coordination to deal effectively with the variety of citizens’ demands as well as a timely capacity to transform (through social learning) in the face of changing environments and/or evolving priorities (Paquet 1977, 2005: chapter 13). In the public sector governance world, the last half-century has brought a slight centralization-to-decentralization drift; one that has been bemoaned by some and celebrated by others. A parallel evolution in private sector governance has seen the emergence of hybrid organizational forms pioneered by concerns like Benetton, that have transformed their production process away from a focus on vertical control and economies of scale (the V form) toward one (the H form) geared to horizontal and transversal networking, which generates flexibility and variety at low costs in the face of significant and ongoing change, while maintaining and even improving quality and self-renewal.

Our hypothesis is that this drift ought to be welcomed for two reasons. First, it is clear that only by devolving decision making to local arenas is there any likelihood that a differentiated population (with diverse views about the nature of ‘the good’) can hope to receive public goods and services in keeping with its diverse preferences. Second, because of the polycentric nature of their governance, decentralized arrangements are more likely to generate the necessary experimentation as well as the essential quick learning of new means and ends.

However logical it may be, this argument is unlikely to be persuasive unless a strategy aimed at reinforcing this drift can be shown to be technically feasible, socially acceptable, implementable, and not too politically destabilizing (Taylor 1997). Indeed, it has been the main counter-argument of the phalanx of centralizers that decentralization may be theoretically desirable but it is unworkable in practice. In fact, for most centralizers, the only choice is between centralization and chaos.

In this chapter we proceed in five stages. First, we examine the general organizational drift from Big G (Government) to small g (governance) triggered by the need to provide variety, flexibility and fast social learning at low cost. Second, we identify major blockages that have slowed the process of social learning underpinning this evolution, and some ways in which they can be overcome. Third, we take notice, succinctly, of attacks on decentralization that argue it is unworkable, overly costly and inequitable (among other things), and show these criticisms to be ill founded.

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