degree of supervision from above would be logically inconsistent with
strong local capacities. But with a more moderate supervision, what might
be termed a “nationalized” infrastructure of local government can both
empower local governments to carry out policies and furnish higher-level
governments with the means to assure that local governments maintain
pursuit of egalitarian ends. Local government would be given administrative
and fiscal capacities to implement policies. The national government
would employ legal mandates, administrative supervision, and
fiscal incentives to control this pursuit from above.
This arrangement stands in clear distinction from several other logically
possible alternatives. Supervision from above without local capacities
would produce a monopoly of policy and implementation for
supralocal governments. Even weak local capacities along with strong
supervision would leave local government dependent on initiatives from
higher-level units. With weak local capacities as well as weak supervision
from above, a society-dependent local government would have to
rely on alliances with local civil society or business rather than the state.
Urban regime analysis in the United States points to precisely such a
relation between the local state and business (e.g., Sellers 2002; Stone
1989). Under conditions of full local political and fiscal autonomy,
local government would possess strong capacities without hierarchical
supervision.
Several of these other types share somewhat looser affinities with other
types of welfare states. A Christian Democratic welfare state, with strong
national welfare policies but no imperative for universalistic or egalitarian
provision, would be as consistent with the state-dependent as with the
nationalized type of local government. A welfare state that limits public
provision, such as the Liberal welfare state of the United States or United
Kingdom or possibly the Wage-Earner welfare states of Australia and New
Zealand, would be even more consistent with weak local capacities. In this
case the degree of supervision could also be as limited as in the societydependent
case. By contrast, it would difficult to imagine how full local
autonomy could correspond to any type of welfare state that carries out
national policy.
If elective affinities link welfare states to different local government
systems, then which way does the causation run? Existing historical
accounts suggest that strong local government institutions grew out of the
egalitarian, universalistic welfare state under the influence of Social
Democratic parties (Esping-Andersen 1990; Huber and Stephens 2001).
But the causation could also work the other way. An intergovernmental
infrastructure that already provided strong local government capacities
could furnish an essential prerequisite for the emergence of egalitarian,
universalistic welfare states.
To demonstrate more precisely how the vertical distribution of power
and authority in welfare states varies, the next sections will compare these
relations systematically. We conclude with a discussion of the historical