Local Government and Governance in Germany Challenges, Responses and Perspectives

The book aims at outlining key political, functional, administrative and financial features of Germany’s local government system and at placing them in a (European) comparative perspective. In pursuing an “institutionalist” approach it focuses on discussing whether, how and why the position and activities of local government in the intergovernmental (“multi-level”) setting have changed vis-à-vis multiple challenges and crises. Among the latter tasks such as coping with the energy crisis, the influx of asylum seekers and refugees, the digitization of local administration and the Covid19 pandemic loom large.

Ranking among the functionally and politically strongest among European countries Germany’s local government plays an important role in the German federal system and beyond in the European Union. Over the years it has proved a remarkable problem solving and innovative capacity. Hence, the German case may attract the attention of a European and international audience interested in local government and governance and practices.

Chapter 1. Introduction.- Chapter 2. Position and Functions of Local Government in Germany’s Federal Multi-Level System.- Chapter 3. Local Political Actors and Processes.- Chapter 4. Local Administration.- Chapter 5. Digitisation of Public and Local Administration.- Chapter 6. Local Government Personnel.- Chapter 7. Local Government Finances.- Chapter 8. Provision of Public and Personal Social Services.- Chapter 9. Combatting Unemployment.- Chapter 10. Assisting of Asylum Seekers and Refugees.- Chapter11. Involvement in the “Energy Transition” (“Energiewende”).- Chapter 12. Extended Responsibilities in the School Sector.- Chapter 13 Responses to the Covid-19 Pandemic.- Chapter 14. “Comeback” of Local Government in East Germany Following German Unification.- Chapter 15. Summary and Conclusions.

Hellmut Wollmann born in 1936. In 1970-71 Kennedy Memorial Fellow at Harvard University. Professor of Public Administration at the Free University of Berlin (1974 to 1993) and at Humboldt University of Berlin (1993-2003). Chairman (1980-1996) of the IPSA Research Committee on the Comparative Study of Local Politics and Government. Guest professorships among others in Moscow, Beijing, Tokyo, Paris, Florence and Gothenburg). Main fields of research and publications on comparative government and public administration with a focus on subnational levels. Among recent publications: Public and Social Services in Europe (co-edited with I. Kopric and G. Marcou) Palgrave 2016, Introduction to Comparative Public Administration (co-authored with S. Kuhlmann and R. Reiter), 3rd ed., Edward Elgar 2024/25.