Applications for the World Bank’s free Municipal Finances E-course from October 27 to December 19, 2014 are now available. This course for local leaders and officials, think tanks, national institutions, and World Bank Staff aims to improve knowledge and skills for the management of local finances. Extract from perspectives of local governments, content for this course includes being…
The results of the August 2014 Quick poll are in, and people were pretty strongly divided among three choices: Announcements for courses, conferences or awards News and trends on decentralization and local governance Profiles of organizations working on participatory local governance. Our colleagues were not as interested in literature reviews, but did make several recommendations…
The World Bank has published a book titled Municipal Finances: A Handbook for Local Governments, targeting local-level decision makers and addresses daily issues cities and municipalities face in managing finances. The handbook reviews lessons learned in municipal financial management and provides a guide for municipalities to conduct self-evaluations and to chart needed reforms. “This handbook aims to help…
Re-posted from www.alda-europe.eu ALDA – The European Association for Local Democracy – is an organisation dedicated to the promotion of good governance and citizen participation at the local level. It is made up of over 160 members comprising local authorities and civil society organisations in the enlarged Europe. Recently, new forms of interaction between citizens and…
Re-posted from sunlightfoundation.com As part of our international program, the Sunlight Foundation have been working to expand public access to government information on a global scale. To help achieve this goal, we frequently engage in knowledge sharing and provide technical expertise and capacity to like-minded organizations in other countries. Exchanges between Sunlight staff and members of…
The Organization of Regions United/Forum of Regional Governments and Global Associations of Regions (ORU/FOGAR) is an international organization that promotes the voice of sub-national governments about global governance on the world stage. The main objectives of ORU/FOGAR are to: Raise the voice of regions within the globalization process to highlight their concerns, establish common proposals,…
In April of this year, the president of Lebanon launched a draft bill for administrative decentralization. The following article analyzes provisions in this new draft law. Reprinted from The Lebanese Center for Policy Studies (LCPS) June 2014 By Sami Atallah, LCPS Executive Director The new decentralization draft law may not solve all the country’s ills but, if…
Nominations for the United Nations Sasakawa Award for Disaster Risk Reduction are now being accepted until October 31, 2014. The Sasakawa award seeks to recognize local and national governments, civil society organizations, research institutions, individuals or private sector organizations that have demonstrated leadership in managing disaster risk at the national, local or community level. The 2015 theme is Shaping…
This year, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) announced a local systems framework that outlines the agency’s vision to promote development that is “locally owned, locally led and locally sustained.” Through this new approach, USAID seeks to engage in more local partnerships to help local communities be the engines of their own growth. In…
Reprinted from actlocalfirst.org Written by Daniel Balaban on July 3, 2014 The number of projects, NGO’s and international organizations involved with aid is constantly increasing, but effectiveness is still a challenge. Receiving large amounts of foreign aid does not guarantee that the countries will improve their national institutions. Many of them rely almost completely on…
