Intergovernmental Social Transfers and the Welfare State: Menace or Promise?

A collaborative cross-national study involving teams from eight countries has examined how local social service officials and local politicians seek discretionary influence over targeted national grants for local social services in education and health. It is found that local need and local political orientation have little bearing on local success in obtaining discretionary concessions over rules, allocation, and reporting of such funds. On the contrary, local actors are valued for their ability to circumvent national guidelines, often with the assistance of intermediate-level officials. Administrators are rewarded for their skills in exploiting national grants for local purposes and in interpreting complex rules to fit local preferences. Politicians tend to see themselves as troubleshooters, but generally prefer not to become involved in local social assistance problems. The results show that, despite efforts to cut back social spending, an important reservoir of professional and administrative talent exists at the local level which has probably helped preserve local social services during a period of cutbacks. In more prosperous times, these same persons will be poised to revive the surge of local social spending seen in the early 1970s and thereby extend the institutional intricacy of welfare states.