After Decentralization: Patterns of Intergovernmental Conflict in Argentina, Brazil, Spain, and Mexico

Recent scholarship on the political determinants of decentralizationhas been useful for explaining initial decisions by nationalelites to decentralize, but the electoral independent variablesfavored by these analyses are insufficient to explain the complexprocess of decentralization over time. Distributional conflictsinvolving national chief executives and subnational governmentsoccurring after decentralization is initiated shape the processin ways that alter initial conditions. This study assesses changein the degree, pattern, and pace of decentralization in fourcountries: Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, and Spain.