Poli 425 City Government Week 2 PDF

POLI 425 - City Government - Week 2 - Institutions Jack Lucas | University of Calgary The Municipality as a Corporation The Puzzle In 2018, the Ontario PC government under Doug Ford passed a law to abolish nearly half of Toronto’s wards, reducing the total number of wards from 44 to 25. Th...

POLI 425 - City Government - Week 2 - Institutions Jack Lucas | University of Calgary The Municipality as a Corporation The Puzzle In 2018, the Ontario PC government under Doug Ford passed a law to abolish nearly half of Toronto’s wards, reducing the total number of wards from 44 to 25. The City of Toronto fought the decision in court and lost In 2024, the Alberta UCP government under Danielle Smith passed a law creating political parties in Calgary and Edmonton despite widespread opposition to the idea among both politicians and the general public The puzzle: why do these cities seem to be subject to decisions by another government? The City as a Corporation: Historical Development When the territory that would become Canada was handed to the British by the French more than 250 years ago, at the end of the Seven Years’ War, there was no local government. Why? Because local government was dangerous Why is local government dangerous? In the 18th and 19th century, British colonies are governed by a small group of ruling elites The lesson of the American Revolution for the British rulers: local government is a dangerous thing to offer! It leads to the dangerous notion that the unorganized masses are in fact a “people” The City as a Corporation: Historical Development “You suggest an idea of incorporation. Repeated experience has proved it to be a most powerful engine in the hands of an unprincipled demagogue…they are useful for purposes of police, but more useful for the purposes of faction.” Letter to Lieutenant-Governor Simcoe In the 1830s, things begin to change: more liberal group of British rulers. “The want of municipal institutions has been and is the most glaringly remarkable in Quebec and Montreal” (Lord Durham) By the 1840s and 1950s, many local communities are “incorporated” as municipal governments Legacies of the Historical Development The city as a “corporation” A corporation is a “person” in law: Perpetual succession Capacity to sue and be sued Ability to possess land Common seal and name Power to issue rules and regulations binding on members Municipal governments exist as “corporations” in law The municipality exists by virtue of another level of government. As of 1867, municipalities are the constitutional responsibility of the provinces Two approaches: the “Baldwin Act” model and the “Vancouver” model Municipal “Autonomy” and “Creatures of the Province” Legally speaking, the municipality is a “creature of the province” Toronto v. Ontario 2021 https://decisions.scc-csc.ca/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/ item/19011/index.do To find out about municipal government we must first look at provincial statutes: https://open.alberta.ca/publications/m26 Municipal “autonomy” is the municipal government’s ability to act independently under their governing statutes Fiscal autonomy: the amount of flexibility that municipalities have to decide how they get their money Policy autonomy: policy areas in which municipalities can make law Democratic institutions autonomy: the extent to which the municipality can control its own democratic institutions Municipal Fiscal Autonomy Across the globe, according to Kitchen, McMillan, and Shah (2019), the most common sources of municipal revenue are (in decreasing order) property taxes, personal income taxes, taxes on sales (hotels, billboards), taxes on billboards. Canadian municipalities rely more heavily on property taxes than is typical in other countries. Municipal Fiscal Autonomy Source: Taylor and Dobson, 2020 Municipal Policy and Democratic Institutions Autonomy Municipalities are responsible for somewhat varying policies across Canada; we’ll discuss this in detail next week! Governance autonomy also varies; to be discussed in future classes! Municipal Autonomy: What Municipal Leaders Want Pair and Review What does it mean to say that local governments are “corporations”? In Canada’s federal system, provincial and federal governments each enjoy constitutionally protected areas of jurisdiction. Do municipal governments have constitutionally protected jurisdiction? Suppose that you wanted to understand what local governments in Saskatchewan are allowed to do. Where would you go for this information? Define “fiscal” and “policy” and “democratic institutions” autonomy. Dimensions of Local Authority Dimensions of Local Authority Since municipalities are “creatures of the provinces” there’s plenty of variation in local institutional features Variation across provinces (because provinces have jurisdiction) Variation within provinces (municipal types, special city charters) Horak, Kurs, and Taylor provide a framework for thinking about this institutional variation in terms of “authority concentration” — variation in “the local structure of decision-making authority” Geographic authority: community councils, ward vs. at-large elections (we’ll discuss this in another class!) Legislative authority: political parties (we’ll discuss this in another class!) Executive authority Service delivery Executive Authority Weak mayor vs. Strong mayor systems: Strong mayor: the mayor is directly responsible for running the city bureaucracy (the “CEO” of the municipality) and has authority to appoint municipal bureaucracy. Does not sit on council. Weak mayor: mayor does not control the bureaucracy or the council. If the mayor loses an important vote on council….they lose a vote! That’s it. What powers do mayors in a “weak” system have? Act as spokesperson for the municipality Act as informal agenda-setter for municipal council Sit on committees, boards, agencies, etc. In BC: extra power to reconsider council decisions, appoint committees Executive Authority - “Strong” Mayors in Ontario In 2022, Premier Doug Ford made changes to mayoral powers in cities in Ontario. Initially Toronto and Ottawa, then expanded further. Provincial priorities. Extra mayoral powers when those powers are used to advance “provincial priorities” - initially the priorities focus on building new housing and infrastructure to support new housing Council-administration relationship. Power to appoint the CAO, power to hire and fire municipal managers (within limits), power to hire and fire chairs of ABCs, power to reorganize city’s administrative structure Mayor-council relations: power to create and appoint council committees, power to veto bylaws passed by council provided that it has to do with the budget or a provincial priority, initiate the budget process How much are they used? Data coming soon! Service Delivery Some municipal services are delivered “in house” by a department of the municipality itself. Others are outsourced to special agencies, boards, commissions, or corporations (ABCs). Examples: Police commissions - in Calgary, the police commission is two councillors and ten members of the community (three appointed by province). Library boards - in Calgary, there are eight public members and no more than two councillors with 5-10 members total Enmax board - Board of Directors appointed by City of Calgary Motivations: (a) “Non-political” (b) advisory / inclusion (c) capacity-building (d) multi-level governance. But consequences for fragmentation of authority! Canadian Municipal Attributes Portal Choose three municipalities, at least one of which must be in Ontario Answer the following questions about these municipalities: How much do these municipalities vary in the mayor’s executive authority? Do these municipalities have an executive committee? Do they vary in the presence or absence of an executive committee? How common are agencies, boards, and commissions in these municipalities? How much do they vary in the presence or absence of ABCs? Are they similar or different? Overall, how would you describe the “concentration of authority” in these municipalities in terms of executive and service delivery authority? Causal Inference: A Crash Course Causal Inference: Why We Care Much of what we care about in politics is descriptive in nature: How many incumbents win re-election in municipal elections? Is inequality shrinking or growing in Canada? Which neighbourhoods in Calgary are the most politically active and engaged? Which are the least engaged? But much of what we care about in political science is about the effects of the things we care about. That is, about causal inference. What is the effect of electing more women on policy outcomes? What is the effect of negative campaigning on vote share? What is the effect of place-based social identity on voting behaviour? In this class we’ll talk about lots of causal questions and we’ll also get a taste for causal research in our field experiment assignment Causal Inference: The Three Core Pieces The counterfactual: what would the outcome have been in an alternative universe? What would my earnings be if I went to college instead of university? Causal question: what is the effect of attending university on earnings? What would council approval rates be if Jeromy Farkas had been elected instead of Gondek? Causal question: what is the effect of Gondek’s election on council approval rates? We can’t observe alternative universes. But we can use randomization to creating “ceteris paribus” conditions in the aggregate. For this reason, the gold standard for causal inference in social science is the experiment or randomized controlled trial. Experimental Research: An Example Hypothetical research question: what is the effect of door-knocking on a candidate’s vote share in municipal elections? Step 1: Counterfactual logic: For a non-knocker: what would this candidate’s vote share be in the alternative universe where they did knock on doors? For a knocker: what would this candidate’s vote share be in the alternative universe where they didn’t knock on doors? Step 2: Randomization logic: randomize some candidates to knock on doors and some candidates to refrain from knocking on doors. Experimental Research: An Example Step 3: Run an experiment: Randomly assign some candidates to knock on doors and some candidates to refrain Measure the vote share of the candidates who door-knocked and the candidates who did not door-knock Compare the average vote share of the door-knockers to the average vote share of the non-knockers. This is the average treatment effect. N 1 1 0 ∑ ATE = (yi − yi ) N i=1 Experimental Research: Practical Details and Design An experimental project has an outcome variable (the thing we care abotu that we’re measuring) and a treatment variable (the cause that we’re manipulating). What is the effect of Tylenol on headaches? Outcome variable = experience of headache pain. Treatment variable = taking Tylenol. Your turn! Imagine an experiment. What’s the outcome variable? What’s the treatment variable? What is the effect of listening to a speech by Jyoti Gondek on support for the Green Line LRT project? What is the effect of newspaper coverage of local elections on incumbent re-election rates? What is the effect of income on support for redistributive taxation? Experimental Research: Our Field Experiment Our research questions: What is the effect of calling 311 on having a local problem addressed? How does the effect of calling 311 vary across neighbourhoods? The experimental logic: Counterfactual: would this problem have been addressed if 311 had been called (or 311 had not been called)? Randomization: randomly assign some problems to be identified to 311 and some problems not to be identified to 311 Our variables: Our outcome variable: whether the problem we identified was addressed. Our treatment variable: whether the problem was identified using the 311 service. Plus we’re making things even spicier with a “interaction” variable: the socio- economic status of the community. Questions for Re ection and Review What does it mean to say that municipalities are “corporations”? What does it mean to say that municipalities are “creatures of the province”? Why were local governments considered “dangerous” by British colonial leaders? Describe the four dimensions of concentration of authority outlined in Horak, Kurs, and Taylor (2024). Describe the “strong mayors” powers introduced by Doug Ford in Ontario. Do these changes make Ontario mayors into “strong mayors” in the American sense? What is an “ABC” in local government? What are the main motivations for creating “ABCs”? How do they complicate policy making and political authority in municipalities? Which municipalities does the Canadian Municipal Attributes Portal include, according to Horak, Kurs, and Taylor (2024)? Explain the “counterfactual logic” of causal inference. What is a counterfactual? How is it relevant to causal inference? How does randomization allow us to measure effects even though we don’t have access to alternative universes? Think of an example of an effect in the world of city politics that you’d love to be able to measure. What would the experiment look like? Is such an experiment practically feasible? fl