Who are the relevant stakeholders to the local government context? Empirical evidences on environmental influences in the decision-making process of English Local Authorities

This article presents empirical evidence of stakeholding in the local government context. It is the result of a survey carried out with English Local Authorities in 2001. It outlines the arena in which local government make decisions by pinpointing the relevant stakeholders in the process as well as the amount of power they are perceived to represent by chief executives. The investigation has its theoretical basis in resource dependence and institutional theories, which are commonly used for explaining an organization's behaviour and performance as influenced by its environment. As an empirical contribution, the article proposes a stakeholder map for any kind of local government organizations that will help in identifying strategies for managing stakeholders.