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Municipality size, political efficacy and political participation: a systematic review

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  • Joshua McDonnell

Abstract

It is an old adage that local government is a training ground for democracy. Its human scale means that political amateurs can contribute effectively and meaningfully to the politics of a state. But in a political climate seemingly driven to consolidate local government into ever larger units, can a not so local local government still elicit an efficacious and participatory citizenry? This paper explores the effect of municipality population size on two important aspects of democratic culture: political efficacy and political participation. Via a two-part systematic review, the paper examines how extant empirical literature bears on the relationship between size and both of these aspects, hypothesising that political efficacy plays a mediating role between size and participation. The findings are unequivocal: citizens of smaller municipalities feel a greater sense of political efficacy and participate to a greater degree in local politics.

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  • Joshua McDonnell, 2020. "Municipality size, political efficacy and political participation: a systematic review," Local Government Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(3), pages 331-350, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:flgsxx:v:46:y:2020:i:3:p:331-350
    DOI: 10.1080/03003930.2019.1600510
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    Cited by:

    1. Malte Möck, 2021. "Patterns of Policy Networks at the Local Level in Germany," Review of Policy Research, Policy Studies Organization, vol. 38(4), pages 454-477, July.
    2. Young Bae & Byung-Deuk Woo & Sungwon Jung & Eunchae Lee & Jiin Lee & Mingu Lee & Haegyun Park, 2023. "The Relationship Between Government Response Speed and Sentiments of Public Complaints: Empirical Evidence From Big Data on Public Complaints in South Korea," SAGE Open, , vol. 13(2), pages 21582440231, April.
    3. Dagmara Kociuba & Waldemar Kociuba, 2023. "Variants of Boundary Changes—A Case Study of Poland," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(6), pages 1-17, June.
    4. Bolgherini Silvia & Mollisi Vincenzo, 2024. "Does Size Really Affect Turnout? Evidence from Italian Municipal Amalgamations," Working papers 091, Department of Economics and Statistics (Dipartimento di Scienze Economico-Sociali e Matematico-Statistiche), University of Torino.

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