Services in the city: governance and political economy in urban service delivery
This discussion paper reviews literature on the political economy of four key urban services: solid waste management, water supply, transport, and urban health services. The four sector reviews demonstrate the importance of governance factors – partly rooted in physical, economic, social and political differences between rural and urban environments – in shaping service delivery in urban environments. While there are important variations between and within urban environments, urban service sectors display common as well as distinct characteristics in respect to the goods provided, their market failure traits, and their task- and demand-related qualities. At the same time, and often as a result of these sector characteristics, urban environments display patterns of common governance constraints, such as prevalence of certain political market imperfections, a proneness to policy, regulatory and managerial incoherence, and demand-side collective action challenges.