Description: Western democracies have retained political legitimacy since 1945 by a continuous process of adaptation to changing socio-political circumstances. Most states have changed their institutional arrangements, and reorganized their systems of local government to some degree. This book explains local government change within the wider context of institutional change. It links theories of legitimacy and institutional change to the extensive empirical and historical literature on local government reorganization. It also differentiates between institutional change and reform. Structural or historical variables are shown to play a major role in explaining why and how both reform and change take place. In particular, the rise and decline of the welfare state - and the political and policy changes associated with this - is one of the most important points of departure in the analysis. The ideas shared by the policy community explain the roles played by actors involved in shaping local governmentchange and reform. This provides the link between the macro (structural) dimension and empirical observation.

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