Reforming Local Governance by Devolving Powers to Districts

(Mayoralty of Baghdad)

Reforming local governance in Iraq is a must to facilitate service delivery, job creation, and encourage democratic participation, but current local governments, namely provincial councils, suffer from political instability and weak accountability. This could be attributed to the electoral system of provincial councils and the devolution of central power to the provincial level. International experiences have demonstrated the importance of strengthening accountability in order to improve service delivery, as well as strengthening the social contract between the citizen and the state.

The 2005 Iraqi constitution enshrined decentralization to provide broad administrative and financial authorities to local government to meet their constituents’ demands, but the legacy of an authoritarian, centralized regime during the pre-2003 era; the conflicting provisions within the 2005 Iraqi constitution on the nature of centre-periphery relations; and elites’ conflicting political agendas affected decentralization adversely.

As part of the Iraqi government efforts on decentralization, the institutional design of providing service delivery in Iraq has shifted recently from deconcentration to devolution of power to provincial councils. While deconcentration is considered “territorial dispersion of central power”, devolution is “the full transfer of responsibility, decision making, resources, and revenue generation to local level”.

The performance and accountability of provincial councils is very weak, as evident in low budget execution and assets disclosure, therefore, it is necessary to adopt a majoritarian electoral system or minimizing district magnitude of the current proportional representation system to strengthen accountability and obtain politically stable councils. Also, it is important to devolve power to the district level to mitigate ethno-sectarian divisions and address the free riding problem.

Devolving power to provincial councils could enforce and legitimize ethnic and sectarian identities. The demographic distribution of ethnic and sectarian groups roughly matches the boundaries of provincial councils, with the exception of some mixed provinces, namely Baghdad, Diyala, and Kirkuk. Other provinces are predominated by one ethno-sectarian identity. Thus, devolving power to the provincial level may reinforce and legitimize the mobilization of ethnic and sectarian identities to achieve political ends. Also, previous calls for establishing regions based on ethno-sectarian divides could serve as an obvious example on the existence of such a sentiment. Therefore, it is important to devolve power to the district level in Iraq, where competition will rise among groups that share the same identities, mitigating the rationale to mobilize ethnic and sectarian identities.

The lack of coordination is another major problem that has accompanied the process of decentralization in Iraq and led to a “free riding” problem, where elites at the ministerial and provincial levels blame each other for lack of services. This could be addressed by devolving power to the district level and develop budget allocation mechanisms that take into consideration district needs, generated revenues, and performance. This will probably lead to healthy competition among districts inside each province and enable constituents to “vote with their feet” by moving to adjacent districts that provide more services.

However, devolving power to the district level might risk the rise of local tyrannies. Given the tribal nature of some districts in Iraq, it is possible that prominent tribes, or even worse a militia, could capture a district and turn all its powers to its advantage. This is limited at the provincial level, as institutional design and competing power centers prevent the capture of an entire province by one tribe or militia. Therefore, having a representative and accountable local government at the district level, as well as, tasking provincial councils with supervisory and cross-districts cooperation is a must before initiating the full transfer of power.

To sum up, reforming local governance in Iraq is a must not only to improve service delivery, but also to demobilize ethno-sectarian identities and overcome the free riding problem. Given that the Iraqi government has not held elections at the district and sub-district levels, devolving powers to districts might give rise to local tyrannies, therefore, further research should address avenues for having a representative and accountable local government at the district level.