Gobierno y política local en México: luces y sombras de las reformas descentralizadoras

Abstract

Throughout the last three decades, a great variety of devolution and decentralization reforms has been implemented in Mexico. These reforms have certainly modified the intergovernmental competencies, and have vested state and municipal governments with a greater responsibility in key policy areas such as education, health and local infrastructure. This article examines the main phases of this decentralization process in order to identify some persistent dilemmas in Mexican federalism, particularly in municipal governments. As a main argument, this article shows the inexistence of a coherent and integrated strategy that guided the decentralization process; as well as great emphasis in “formal” and legal reforms, instead of “soft” reforms that could have strengthen intergovernmental coordination and communication among levels of government. As consequence of this formal but, at the same time, disarticulated approach, it is possible to observe the reproduction of “multiplied centralisms” in Mexican states and municipalities. The persistence of authoritarian institutional arrangements at the state level, the inexistence of reforms oriented towards the professionalization of public bureaucracies at the local level, and the distortions introduced by a highly centralized fiscal system, have favored conflictive intergovernmental relations. The lack of integration of the decentralization process in Mexico in the last three decades, then, allowed the persistence of a centralistic view of the policy process, and it has inhibited the development of strong local governments and fluid intergovernmental relations. At the end of this chapter, I present a reflection on the future of Mexican federalism.