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Getting Along or Going Alone: Understanding Collaboration Between Local Governments and NGOs in Bolivia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 January 2018

Jami Nelson-Nuñez  and
Kate Cartwright
Jami Nelson-Nuñez*
Affiliation:
Assistant professor of political science at the University of New Mexico
Kate Cartwright*
Affiliation:
Assistant Professor in the School of Public Administration, University of New Mexico
*
jaminunez@unm.edu
kcartwright@unm.edu
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Abstract

What explains mayors’ collaboration with nongovernmental organizations in delivering public goods and services? While some successful collaborations are established, in other cases the call for NGOs to coordinate with governments goes unheeded. Collaboration minimizes the duplication of effort, maximizes information sharing, and builds capacity. Given the scholarly consensus on the importance of collaboration, we know little about it at local levels, where it may matter most. This article focuses on Bolivia, a country with deep decentralization reforms and an active NGO sector. It utilizes survey data on mayors from 2007 to provide insight into the variation in NGO–local government collaboration across a country. It argues that political context is important: mayoral turnover, greater community group engagement, and more municipal resources deter collaboration. The findings illustrate the strategic interplay between state and nonstate actors and explain the uneven geographies of partnerships in governance.

Keywords

DecentralizationBoliviamayoral politicsnongovernmental organizations
Type
Research
Information
Latin American Politics and Society , Volume 60 , Issue 1 , February 2018 , pp. 76 - 101
Copyright
Copyright © 2018 University of Miami 

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