26^th Session of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities – 25 to 27 March 2014

Being a local councillor today

Statement by Marcel BOOGERS, Member of the Council for Public Administration and Professor in innovation and regional governance, University of Twente, Netherlands

It’s not easy being a local councillor today. Not in my country, the Netherlands, and not in other countries either. Local councillors spend more time and put more effort in the administration of their municipality, but it’s hard for them to show clear results and successes.  Their workload has increased and so has the complexity and dynamics of their work, but the public appreciation of their efforts has diminished. As a consequence, local councillors are leaving politics more often or are choosing not to stand for re-election. Political parties are facing more serious recruitment problems when they are looking for candidates for local council elections.

It’s never been easy to be a local councillor of course. Social problems reveal at first at a local level, and it’s at this level that first solutions have to be found. Local councils took up the first challenges of industrialization and urbanisation in the early 20^th  century, as they do with the challenges that migration, environmental problems or demographic change bring about nowadays. That’s never been an easy job, but two things have changed dramatically. And it’s because of these changes that being a local councillor today is more demanding and less rewarding. I’m an optimist, though. I see developments in the ways in which local councillors define their role – developments which can adjust the position of local councillors to the changing circumstances. 

Let me first depict the two developments that have changed the work of councillors so dramatically.  The first development is the change from government to governance: the focal point of local decision making processes is not the town hall or local government office, but the interplay between local governments, governments at regional, national and EU level, business firms and third sector organizations in the fields of housing, healthcare and arts. This multilevel and governance character of the local policy making process is at odds with democratic notions of local self-government by local councils. Although local councils have a small influence on the outcomes of local policy making processes, most of them strongly feel responsible for it, which results in substantial frustrations. Also because local politicians are commonly being held responsible for the consequences of local policies which they haven’t been able to control.

The multilevel part of the multilevel governance problem can be dealt with by organizing multilevel political power through party-political channels. Many local councillors do so, and they sometimes also have debates about regional developments with local councillors of neighbouring municipalities.

The governance part of the multilevel governance challenge is much more complicated, though. In the first place are local policies highly dependent on the contributions of third sector organizations and business firms. Their influence on local policy making easily diminishes the power or local councils. Secondly, the relation between government and society is rapidly changing. Not only because of austerity measures but also because of social changes, society is taking up more responsibilities for the provision of public services in many fields. Volunteer workers, sports clubs, neighbourhood organizations and other social organizations develop various projects that strengthen the liveability of neighbourhoods and villages. All these citizen-led initiatives put local councillors for complex questions. When it’s not the representatives but the citizens themselves who take responsibility for local matters, what should the role of local councillors be?

This is only the first development that has complicated the work of local councillors. The second development is not about democratic control, but about the representative function of local councillors. Who they are representing and what, is not as clear as it used to be. Political parties are facing a rapid membership decline in nearly all European countries, trust in politicians and their parties is at a low level and voter turnout at local elections is decreasing to levels below 50%. Moreover, local elections are second-order elections, which means that national electoral trends have a strong impact on local election results. Hence, the linkages between local councillors and their constituencies – that used to be organized through party-political organizations and elections – are weakening. Although many of these difficulties are common for all tiers of government, they are especially a problem for local councillors. According to popular belief they should be more close to their constituency, but in fact they aren’t. As a result, the claim of local councillors that they can speak on behalf of the local citizen, is losing its credibility.

Being a local councillor today is difficult. That’s for sure. Local councillors in the Netherlands are looking for new ways of dealing with these difficulties and according to international literature, they are not alone in Europe. In the Netherlands, I participated in the ‘Local Council of the future’-project (‘Gemeenteraad van de toekomst’) in which 50 local councillors from different municipalities discussed about the problems they are facing and in which they experimented with new councillor roles. At about the same time, the Dutch Council for Public Administration made a local translation of their advice to national government and parliament about politics and government in a networked society.

What the results of both projects have in common, is that the new role of local councillors is being defined in in terms of meta-governance. Instead of neglecting the complexity of multi-level governance, local councillors are actively influencing the structure of governance networks. Instead of being lost in these networks, they are organizing checks and balances by empowering citizen and interest groups. Instead of speaking on behalf of citizen in policy making processes, they are speaking with their constituencies about the ways citizen could be engaged in these processes. Instead of directly influencing the outcomes of policy making, they are influencing outcomes by shaping the policy making process. Are all interests involved in the project and if not, what can be done about that? That’s what meta-governance is about and that’s what many local councillors define as their new role.

Of course this involves a cultural change. And cultural changes are never easy to make. Moreover, there are strong institutional interests involved that benefit from the existing status quo. First, political parties fear that meta-governance will lessen their ability to realize their political goals. In fact, meta-governance is about the relations between state and society and therefore highly political; but when political goals are formulated in more detail, meta-governance will be a problem for parties. Secondly, meta-governance will challenge the power position of mayors, aldermen and the leaders of business firms and third sector organizations. Local councillors will actively try to change the ba;lance of powers in local governance networks; and the powers that be will have to get used to that. Finally, meta-governance involves attitudinal changes for councillors. They are difficult, but necessary to strengthen the position of local councillors. Being a local councillor tomorrow will be different, that’s for sure.