Power and Promotion: Local Governance in the MENA

Session Submission Type: Full Paper Panel

Session Description

Decentralization is often portrayed as an important tool for promoting citizen engagement, improving service delivery, increasing the representation of minorities, and accelerating democratization by diffusing power to local actors and institutions (Harb and Attallah 2015). In recent years, processes of decentralization have been implemented by many countries in the MENA. Yet, how the devolution of power plays out at the local level across state and non-state institutions as well as the role of citizens with newly gained agency to promote their interests in these processes is important and remains understudied. Employing a variety of methods and theoretical approaches combined with fieldwork across newly democratized and decentralizing autocratic contexts, the papers on this panel consider the role of citizens either seeking to gain power through elections to manage the provision of services or navigating how and where to promote their interests and gain access to services at the local level. As such, it provides a comparative analysis of when, where and how different actors--particularly those of traditionally marginalized backgrounds--gain power in local councils or engage with local service provision providers, whether state or non-state. Shalaby uses municipal election results combined with demographic and interview data to analyze where women are elected as local councilors beyond the mandated women’s quota and how this is mediated by party actors in Morocco. Employing an original, nationally-representative survey on non-state service provision, Brooke and Komer track where mosques are more likely to play a central role in the social and political lives of Tunisians. They seek to understand the conditions under which local mosques become centers of social service provision or forums for forging political linkages versus when they do not. Buehler and Gergis analyze 4000 photos of elected local councils in Morocco, coding when women gain positions of real power on the councils (as opposed to solely advisory roles) and how outward religious signals are associated with female empowerment in some municipalities versus others. Finally, Bergh and Colin leverage a recently implemented initiative in Morocco allowing citizens to petition their municipal councils to understand when citizens decide to engage with local councils and over what issues. Taken together, these works contribute to a broader theoretical understanding of power and promotion in the MENA region as well as newly decentralizing contexts more broadly.

Sub Unit

• Division 57: Middle East and North Africa Politics

Individual Presentations

• Mosques and Local Goods Provision in Tunisia - Steven Brooke, University of Wisconsin- Madison; Monica Komer, University of Wisconsin--Madison

• When (Religious) Women Get Power: Evidence from Local Politics in the Middle East - Matt J. Buehler, University of Tennessee

• Decentralization and Women’s Political Inclusion in Morocco - Marwa Shalaby, University of Wisconsin-Madison

• Citizen Petitions to Moroccan Municipalities: A Case of Asymmetrical Inclusion? - Sylvia Bergh, Erasmus University Rotterdam; Francesco Colin

Chair

• Kristen Kao University of Gothenburg

Discussants

• Allison Spencer Hartnett University of Southern California

• Scott Williamson Bocconi University