La ineficiencia económica de los procesos de descentralización

The recent devolutionary trend across the world has been in part fuelled by claims of a supposed «economic dividend» associated with the decentralization of authority and resources. The capacity of devolved administrations (with greater autonomous powers to tailor policies to local preferentes), to generate innovation in the provision of policies and public services, and to encourage greater participation and be more accountable is supposed to deliver greater economic efficiency. There is however little empirical evidence to substantiate these claims. In this paper we assess the horizontal link between devolution and regional economic growth in six national contexts (Germany, India, Italy, Mexico, Spain, and the US). We use regression models in order to test whether changes in crossregional differences in growth patterns within each country can be attributed to changes in levels of regional autonomy. The results suggest that the degree of devolution is in most cases irrelevant for economic growth and, when it matters 'as in the cases of Mexico and the US', it is linked to lower rather than greater economic efficiency.