The modern nation-state finds itself caught in a vise. As global forces have often pulled countries closer together in processes of economic and/or political integration or collaboration, internal pressures push them towards greater fragmentation. This observation was recently made by Andrés Rodríguez-Pose in his article The Centrifugal State: In Search of an Explanation of Why Countries Decentralise, which explores the global drive towards decentralization and devolution and the nuanced and often convoluted forces shaping it.
Since the 1970s a strong centrifugal force within the nation-state—manifesting as decentralization—has become one of the defining features of contemporary governance, reshaping polities from Britain to Brazil, Spain to China. The phenomenon transcends the simple devolution of power; it represents a fundamental reimagining of how modern states organize themselves in response to evolving demands and pressures.
The article by Rodríguez-Pose examines the drivers of this decentralization revolution and the forces propelling it. While conventional wisdom has long attributed this phenomenon to the triumvirate of democracy, economic efficiency, and regional identity, the contemporary dynamics presented in the paper demand a far more nuanced interpretation. Through the dual lenses of the efficiency-based decentralization theorem and political economy analysis, the author discusses how globalization, technological upheaval, and innovations in governance have fundamentally reshaped the relationship between political centers and periphery within countries.
The empirical evidence reveals decentralization not as a linear progression but as an intricate interweaving of economic imperatives and political will. This complexity defies simple causation, suggesting instead that the dispersal of power responds to an elaborate choreography of classical and modern forces. The paper dwells on the subtle mechanics of governmental reorganization, offering insights into the evolving architecture of multi-level governance while acknowledging the inherent challenges in isolating singular causes for these transformative trends.
Read the Open Access article:
Andrés Rodríguez-Pose. 2024. The centrifugal state: In search of an explanation of why countries decentralise. Quaestiones Geographicae 43(4). https://doi.org/10.14746/quageo-2024-0041 (PDF)
Andrés Rodríguez-Pose is the Princesa de Asturias Chair and Director of the Cañada Blanch Centre at The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE).