The political economy of Japan and the EU

Session 4: Local government and new models of political accountability

Elements of the Statement of Andreas Kiefer, Secretary General of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe

London, Chatham House,13 November 2015

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What do the experiences of Europe and Japan suggest are the benefits of greater political devolution?

I’d like to tell you a story. The 21^st century and the second half of the 20^th century have witnessed a steady devolution of powers from central government, as awareness has grown that this results in a better management of public affairs and closer proximity to the citizens.

Whether we refer to the EU principle of subsidiarity as guidelines for giving responsibilities to the level of governance closest to the citizens, the UK term of devolution or speak of decentralisation:  the movement is always in one direction, the progressive transfer of powers to lower levels of government.

As Secretary General of the Congress of the Council of Europe, I represent an organisation which is very different from the EU.  Our origins are very close to where we are today – in Saint James Palace, where the Council of Europe treaty was signed in 1949, founding the first post-war European intergovernmental organisation, a model of cooperation, like that of the United Nations, which functions on consensus, so very different in culture and mode of operation from the EU.

The Congress of Local and Regional Authorities was not part of the original blueprint of the Council of Europe.  I doubt that anybody in 1949 could have imagined that the Council of Europe would one day have such a political body as part of its institutional machinery.  But the development of the Congress within the Council of Europe is one that has important parallels in the development of local democracy across the European continent.

Our story begins 75 years ago, when a group of mayors met in Seelisberg, a small municipality in Switzerland and convened the constitutive congress of the Council of European Municipalities (CEM), the fore-runner of today’s Council of European Municipalities and Regions and an important partner for the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities.

In the Council of Europe itself, already in 1952, the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe set up a Committee on Municipal and Regional Affairs, at the instigation of Jacques Chaban-Delmas, Mayor of Bordeaux, who was also one of the main figures in the creation of the Council of European Municipalities.

This Committee decided “to convene an annual conference to be attended by representatives of all the qualified national associations of the local authorities of member countries.  By 1961, this Conference of Local Authorities had evolved into a permanent structure. In 1975 the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers recognised the need to include regional representatives and rebranded the body as the “Standing Conference of Local and Regional Authorities of Europe” at the same time giving it the status of a statutory body.

In 1994 this institution took another leap, into its present incarnation, the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe. The Congress is essentially a political organ of the Council of Europe, a consultative assembly representing local and regional governments in the 47 member states.  While it was not part of the original structure of the Council of Europe, it has slowly and steadily increased its institutional presence and political influence over the years.

This increase in the political influence of the Congress has mirrored the evolution of territorial authorities in European countries, as central governments realise that lower levels of government are much better placed to take care of a wide range of public services.

Territorial authorities in Europe are become progressively more important as political and economic actors in their own right. They are by far the biggest investors in the public sector. Their relative closeness to the citizen gives them a capacity to react to local needs and to provide policy responses more quickly and more suited to local situations. All this leads to more effective governance and to political accountability which in several cases is being awarded by higher trust od citizens in local and regional politicians and sometimes even shows a higher voter turnout in local elections.

We are seeing a new political paradigm taking shape in Europe, with the increasing power of cities and regions, reminding some of the strong city-states of the Middle Ages.

Decentralisation, giving more power to local politicians, close and accountable to the citizen, is strengthening democracy from the bottom up. A vibrant local democracy provides the building blocks, the foundations, on which democracy can flourish and renew itself at the national level.

This parallel development - of the rise of local and regional democracy in Europe on the one hand, and the growth in influence of the Congress within the Council of Europe on the other - has progressed largely thanks to a remarkable international legal text, the European Charter of Local Self-Government, a Council of Europe treaty that all 47 member states have now ratified, one of the few treaties to achieve this. 

The Charter sets out basic principles and conditions for the functioning of local democracy and the relations between different levels of government.  It has provided the inspiration for similar texts produced by UN Habitat (“International Guidelines on Decentralisation and Access to Basic Services for all” from 2009) and other regional organisations, proving that the principles that it enshrines are applicable well beyond the boundaries of Europe.

The relations between different levels of government are based on power. There is always tension between central authorities and subnational authorities, which is natural. Local democracy cannot remain static and decentralisation is not always a one-way process. We sometimes see waves of decentralisation followed by waves of recentralisation.

To ensure that the principles of the Charter do not remain a dead letter, the Congress is charged with monitoring its implementation in member states, which gives the Congress a second role in the Council of Europe as part of its monitoring machinery.

Every five years of so the Congress carries out a monitoring mission in each member state, based on political dialogue with a wide range of political authorities, to assess how the country in question is complying with the principles of the European Charter. 

The picture is never perfect, governments are always in the process of adapting to new developments, new political priorities. But it is largely thanks to the principles of the Charter and their implementation in European states, that local democracy is continuing to develop and improve in the majority of our member states.

In recent years, public authorities at all levels of government have had to face a succession of crises, the financial crisis, natural disasters and climatic threats and most recently the refugee crisis.  As governments struggle to respond to these crises, it has become clear that countries with strong local and regional authorities possess a natural resilience which enables them to cope much better with such crises than those countries which remain heavily centralised.

Other key features of the European model of local democracy are the concepts of solidarity and territorial cohesion, of spreading burdens between stronger and weaker regions and between stronger and weaker citizens, whether through transfers, taxation arrangements or social protection mechanisms.

Disaster management is another area where the strength of local and regional authorities can be critical. When Japan was struck by its triple 3/11 disaster, by a strange coincidence the Congress was again debating the issue of disaster management and developing resilience at the local level, this time as part of the United Nations “Making cities resilient” campaign.

Resilient cities are defined in various ways, but part of the concept is that of sustainability and taking control of your destiny – taking responsibility for your actions (such as in the fields of pollution, waste management, traffic control).  Subsidiarity is critical in this respect – getting the involvement of local people, listening to them, engaging with them.

To conclude, our experience of the growth of local and regional democracy in Europe, based on the principles set out in the European Charter of Local Self-Government, is that it leads to greater resilience in our societies.

Local democracy is a vital part of the European political model. It is a part of the European model of society:  The different levels of government and the complex interactions between them, the checks and balances that characterise their relations, the search for cohesion and an understanding of solidarity are the natural products of a healthy democratic process.

It is our belief that democracy and governance have to be dynamic, have to keep moving, constantly require the oxygen of new practices, new models of participation. 

It is my privilege, as SG of the Congress, to be at the heart of this dynamic in Europe.            

Thank you