Instituto de Estudios Políticos y Derecho Público "Dr. Humberto J. La Roche"
de la Facultad de Ciencias Jurídicas y Políticas de la Universidad del Zulia
Maracaibo, Venezuela
Esta publicación cientíca en formato digital es continuidad de la revista impresa
ISSN-Versión Impresa 0798-1406 / ISSN-Versión on line 2542-3185Depósito legal pp
197402ZU34
ppi 201502ZU4645
Vol.41 N° 76
Enero
Marzo
2023
ISSN 0798-1406 ~ Depósito legal pp 198502ZU132
Cues tio nes Po lí ti cas
La re vis ta Cues tio nes Po lí ti cas, es una pu bli ca ción aus pi cia da por el Ins ti tu to
de Es tu dios Po lí ti cos y De re cho Pú bli co “Dr. Hum ber to J. La Ro che” (IEPDP) de la Fa-
cul tad de Cien cias Ju rí di cas y Po lí ti cas de la Uni ver si dad del Zu lia.
En tre sus ob je ti vos fi gu ran: con tri buir con el pro gre so cien tí fi co de las Cien cias
Hu ma nas y So cia les, a tra vés de la di vul ga ción de losre sul ta dos lo gra dos por susin ves-
ti ga do res; es ti mu lar la in ves ti ga ción en es tas áreas del sa ber; y pro pi ciar la pre sen ta-
ción, dis cu sión y con fron ta ciónde las ideas y avan ces cien tí fi cosconcom pro mi soso cial.
Cues tio nes Po lí ti cas apa re ce dos ve ces al año y pu bli ca tra ba jos ori gi na les con
avan ces o re sul ta dos de in ves ti ga ción en las áreas de Cien cia Po lí ti ca y De re cho Pú bli-
co, los cua les son so me ti dos a la con si de ra ción de ár bi tros ca li fi ca dos.
ESTA PU BLI CA CIÓN APA RE CE RE SE ÑA DA, EN TRE OTROS ÍN DI CES, EN
:
Re vicyhLUZ, In ter na tio nal Po li ti cal Scien ce Abs tracts, Re vis ta In ter ame ri ca na de
Bi blio gra fía, en el Cen tro La ti no ame ri ca no para el De sa rrol lo (CLAD), en Bi blio-
gra fía So cio Eco nó mi ca de Ve ne zue la de RE DIN SE, In ter na tio nal Bi blio graphy of
Po li ti cal Scien ce, Re vencyt, His pa nic Ame ri can Pe rio di cals In dex/HAPI), Ul ri ch’s
Pe rio di cals Di rec tory, EBS CO. Se en cuen tra acre di ta da al Re gis tro de Pu bli ca cio-
nes Cien tí fi cas y Tec no ló gi cas Ve ne zo la nas del FO NA CIT, La tin dex.
Di rec to ra
L
OIRALITH
M. C
HIRINOS
P
ORTILLO
Co mi té Edi tor
Eduviges Morales Villalobos
Fabiola Tavares Duarte
Ma ría Eu ge nia Soto Hernández
Nila Leal González
Carmen Pérez Baralt
Co mi té Ase sor
Pedro Bracho Grand
J. M. Del ga do Ocan do
José Ce rra da
Ri car do Com bel las
An gel Lom bar di
Die ter Nohlen
Al fre do Ra mos Ji mé nez
Go ran Ther born
Frie drich Welsch
Asis ten tes Ad mi nis tra ti vos
Joan López Urdaneta y Nilda Marín
Re vis ta Cues tio nes Po lí ti cas. Av. Gua ji ra. Uni ver si dad del Zu lia. Nú cleo Hu ma nís ti co. Fa-
cul tad de Cien cias Ju rí di cas y Po lí ti cas. Ins ti tu to de Es tu dios Po lí ti cos y De re cho Pú bli co
“Dr. Hum ber to J. La Ro che”. Ma ra cai bo, Ve ne zue la. E- mail: cues tio nes po li ti cas@gmail.
com ~ loi chi ri nos por til lo@gmail.com. Te le fax: 58- 0261- 4127018.
Vol. 41, Nº 76 (2023), 186-206
IEPDP-Facultad de Ciencias Jurídicas y Políticas - LUZ
The impact of decentralization on the
administrative service delivery speed in
dierent elds
DOI: https://doi.org/10.46398/cuestpol.4176.10
Yurіі Turovets *
Tetyana Kaganovska **
Tatiana Filipenko ***
Anastasiia Filipenko ****
Olha Kravchuk *****
Abstract
Using an analytical and documentary-based methodology,
the objective of the study was to establish the relationship
between the degree of decentralization and the speed of delivery
of administrative services at the local level in dierent elds in
European countries and Ukraine. The study involved indicators
of the speed of delivery of administrative services (company registration,
building permit and land registration) according to the World Bank’s Doing
Business methodology. The relationship identied between the degree of
decentralization and the speed of administrative service delivery at the
local level was the basis for establishing that the time to register a company
and obtain a building permit decreases as a function of the higher degree
of decentralization. The time to register property increases as the degree of
decentralization increases, which is partly explained by the complexity of
the administrative procedure models and their duration. It is concluded
that, a comparison of the speed of providing administrative services
(business registration, construction permit, land registration) in Ukraine
with the average indicator of a group of countries revealed signicantly
better results in Ukraine.
* PhD of Law Sciences, Associate Professor, Department of Criminal Law and Procedure Leonid Yuzkov
Khmelnytskyi University of Management and Law, 29000, Khmelnytskyi, Ukraine. ORCID ID:
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1110-9234
** Doctor of Law Sciences, Professor, Rector, V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University, 61058, Kharkiv,
Ukraine. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4427-2038
*** Doctor of Science in Public Administration, Professor, Department of Public Management and
Administration of educational and Scientic Institute of management Mariupol State University,
03037, Kyiv, Ukraine. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9870-0889
****PhD of Law Sciences, Associate Professor, Department of Law, Faculty of Law and Economics, Mariupol
State University, 03037, Kyiv, Ukraine. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9628-7426
***** PhD in Political Sciences, Associate Professor at the Department of Social and Humanitarian
Sciences, Educational and Scientic Humanitarian Institute, Admiral Makarov National University of
Shipbuilding, 54007, Mykolayiv, Ukraine. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7802-1934
Recibido el 15/12/22 Aceptado el 16/01/23
187
CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 41 Nº 76 (2023): 186-206
Keywords: public administration; decentralization of management;
administrative services; local self-government bodies; impact
of decentralization.
El impacto de la descentralización en la velocidad de
prestación de servicios administrativos en diferentes
campos
Resumen
Mediante una metodología de base analítica y documental, el objetivo
del estudio fue establecer la relación entre el grado de descentralización
y la velocidad de prestación de servicios administrativos a nivel local en
diferentes campos en los países europeos y Ucrania. El estudio involucró
indicadores de la velocidad de entrega de servicios administrativos
(registro de empresa, permiso de construcción y registro de propiedad) de
acuerdo con la metodología Doing Business del Banco Mundial. La relación
identicada entre el grado de descentralización y la velocidad de prestación
de servicios administrativos a nivel local fue la base para establecer que el
tiempo para registrar una empresa y obtener un permiso de construcción
disminuye en función del mayor grado de descentralización. El tiempo
de registro de la propiedad aumenta a medida que aumenta el grado de
descentralización, lo que se explica en parte por la complejidad de los
modelos de procedimientos administrativos y su duración. Se concluye que,
una comparación de la velocidad de prestación de servicios administrativos
(registro de empresas, permiso de construcción, registro de propiedad) en
Ucrania con el indicador promedio de un grupo de países reveló resultados
signicativamente mejores en Ucrania.
Palabras clave: administración pública; descentralización de la gestión;
servicios administrativos; órganos de autogobierno
local; impacto de la descentralización.
Introduction
The development of territorial communities is one of the key issues in
the public administration system. The need to improve the eectiveness
of the territorial entities, to ensure the ability to perform functions of the
state at the local level require new approaches to the distribution of power
at dierent hierarchical levels. The economic and social reform policy in the
context of strengthening the regional and local capabilities of self-governing
entities oers the concept of decentralization of power.
188 Yurіі Turovets, Tetyana Kaganovska, Tatiana Filipenko, Anastasiia Filipenko y Olha Kravchuk
The impact of decentralization on the administrative service delivery speed in dierent elds
This model of the distribution of power is widely used both in the world
as a whole (123 countries started administrative decentralization processes
during 1970-2014 (Tester, 2021)) and in the European Union. Signicant
experience has been accumulated regarding dierent approaches to the
organization of the distribution of resources and powers in view of the
growing role of subnational levels of public administration in the EU
countries. An important result of decentralization is an eective and open
system of territorial organization of power in the country.
Decentralization involves strengthening the capabilities, responsibility
and eectiveness of the public administration system at the local level,
and improving the provision of public needs. In turn, these processes
create problems related to the growth of territorial distinctions in terms
of development, nancial and administrative capacity, and the possibilities
of providing administrative services by the public administration system.
Balanced approaches to providing decentralization with a nancial
component can improve the eciency of resource allocation and use,
ensuring the territorial community’s ability to full spatial development
tasks and expanding the opportunities of inclusive solutions. This is crucial
for both European countries and Ukraine, which has recently implemented
a decentralization reform.
The discussion on the construction of a centralized or decentralized
system of public administration is quite old. Key political issues in the
current debate on the development are reducing centralized control and
delegating power to local authorities. Decentralization policies assign
local self-government bodies an institutional role to implement the
achievements of democracy through leadership training, political stability,
local consultation and more eective public accountability.
The liberal approach emphasizes decentralization for better
organizational eciency in providing goods and services, for environmentally
sustainable development, and in promoting local development through
citizen participation. The researchers’ interest in the consequences of
decentralization for the economy focused mainly on economic growth, and
some studies indicate that there is an optimal level of decentralization that
maximizes the growth rate of the economy (Martinez-Vasquez et al., 2017;
Camões, 2022; Canare, 2022).
Public administration and scal decentralization reform increase the
autonomy of territorial entities and reduce dependence on the state budget.
Local self-government bodies improve public welfare and the service
quality on the basis of expanded management of their own nances. In this
connection, multi-level management models have gained key importance
in the political mechanisms of European countries in recent decades,
thereby strengthening the capabilities of local self-government bodies.
The transition from the creation of facilities to service delivery sets up an
189
CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 41 Nº 76 (2023): 186-206
environment which provides citizens with an opportunity to choose service
providers from the perspective of their own benet and quality (Mihálik et
al., 2019).
Decentralization of administrative, scal and political powers has made
local authorities able to provide the population with basic services that
contribute to the quality of life and well-being in the community. Researchers
of decentralization processes consider the importance of formal political
institutions, which, by means of reform, change the approach to public
services through institutional mechanisms associated with democratic
development. There is an opinion that the quality of public services was
inuenced by the inadequate professional level of the employees, the lack
of basic administrative infrastructure, etc. As a result, it can be dicult to
meet public needs even with available resources and powers. At the same
time, global experience shows that fair local elections, transparency, citizen
participation, capacity of civil servants and existing basic infrastructure are
key factors for eective decentralization in order to improve service delivery
at the local level (Sujarwoto, 2017).
Decentralization has enhanced interest in local politics and public
services, while local-level democratic processes have increased competition
in local political struggle (Ziegenhain, 2015). It is important to have
sucient powers and nancial resources in view of the possibility of
decentralization to improve the work of local self-government bodies by
responding to the direct citizens’ participation requests. The institutional
models of decentralization dier from country to country, but they are
all based on the democratization of the eective public service delivery
processes (Nishimura, 2022).
Decentralization can be considered as a process in which local political
and institutional actors receive varying degrees of autonomy in relation to
central public authorities. This implies a change in the relationship between
the national and local levels in the eld of rights and responsibilities and
the expansion of the powers of authorities at the local level (Borrett et al.,
2021). The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development
considers the transfer of powers, responsibilities and resources from central
authorities to subnational authorities with a certain degree of autonomy as
an important aspect of decentralization (OECD, 2019).
The decentralization consists of political, administrative and scal
aspects. The decentralization reform may be implemented at a dierent pace
and depth in dierent countries in view of their launch at dierent time and
established needs. The decentralization of the above three aspects will be
asynchronous, but the interaction between them is important. So, attempts
to measure decentralization will have certain limitations, as any approach
to this issue must provide for the denitions, concepts and methods used by
researchers, which will aect the results (Borrett et al., 2021).
190 Yurіі Turovets, Tetyana Kaganovska, Tatiana Filipenko, Anastasiia Filipenko y Olha Kravchuk
The impact of decentralization on the administrative service delivery speed in dierent elds
Administrative decentralization involves the transfer of responsibility
for the provision of public services from central authorities to the territorial
communities. Fiscal decentralization involves the transfer of authority
over the revenues and expenditures of the budget to local self-government
bodies (Chaudhary and Iyer, 2022). Political decentralization is based on
the model of the exercise of power by autonomous local authorities elected
directly by citizens. Administrative decentralization speeds up decision-
making at the operational level, thereby preventing delays caused by
the need to transfer issues to a higher level of the hierarchical authority
structure (Gardi et al., 2020).
The existing need to determine the degree of decentralization raises
the issue of creating the required methodology. Approaches to the
decentralization indices became clearer in the academic environment in
the late 1990’s. Decentralization indices are based on a ranking system that
classies sub-national entities based on their degree of territorial autonomy
through evaluation. Researchers determine institutions and institutional
resources, styles of intergovernmental relations, party ties, and political
leadership as the main dimensions of territorial capacity (Harguindéguy et
al., 2021).
There are other approaches that, for example, demonstrate the degree
of decentralization in the EU countries based on a special study of the
distribution of powers, including on the legal basis for dierent governance
structures in the EU Member States (Harguindéguy et al., 2021; European
Committee of the Regions, 2022). The general degree of decentralization
in the EU country can be determined using the available data on the level
(index) of scal, political and administrative decentralization.
The decentralization processes, providing for the autonomy of the
territorial entity, contribute to the expansion of meeting the needs of
individuals and legal entities. One of the important directions is the
provision of administrative services by local self-government bodies.
Studies show that local self-government bodies with a higher degree of
nancial (scal) decentralization reduce their own expenses and increase
the number of public services.
Besides, increased accountability of local self-government bodies based
on local tax transparency can improve local service delivery (Bianchi et al.,
2021). Delegating administrative powers to local authorities can improve
public service delivery, taking into account the availability of information,
understanding the needs of citizens or conducting monitoring at the local
level (Chaudhary and Iyer, 2022).
When considering the issue of satisfaction with the administrative
services by local self-government bodies, one of the key parameters is their
delivery speed in dierent elds, which may indicate a certain administrative
191
CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 41 Nº 76 (2023): 186-206
capacity of the authorities at the local level. Based on the foregoing, the
aim of the study is to nd out the degree of inuence of decentralization
processes on the speed and quality of administrative services provided at
the local level in dierent elds in European countries and Ukraine. The
aim involved the following research objectives:
1. Dene of the degree of decentralization;
2. Identify the terms of the main widespread administrative services
in dierent elds;
3. Determine the correlation between the degree of decentralization
and the administrative service delivery speed;
4. Comparison of the time of administrative service delivery in Ukraine
with certain global indicators.
1. Methods
The methodological approach of the research is divided into several
stages: making a list of countries to be analysed; determination of the
administrative service delivery speed; determination of the degree
of decentralization; nding a relationship between the degree of
decentralization and the administrative service delivery speed; comparison
of average European indicators of the administrative service delivery with
Ukrainian ones.
It is proposed to include the EU countries in the sample to be analysed
(Belgium, Latvia, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Spain, Poland, the
Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Slovenia, France, Italy, Portugal, Croatia,
Estonia, Austria, Lithuania, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, Slovakia,
Luxembourg, Cyprus, Ireland, Malta).
The time of administrative service delivery to the customer (consumer)
is determined in accordance with the following services: company
registration, construction permit and property registration. These types
of administrative services are selected as one of the most widespread,
suciently complex in terms of registration procedures and the availability
of relevant data.
Separate indicators of the World Bank’s Doing Business methodological
approach assessment were used to obtain data on the time of administrative
service delivery. Doing Business indicators include sections that directly
address the time of the relevant administrative service delivery (World
Bank, 2020a; World Bank, 2020b). The Decentralization Index of EU
countries (European Committee of the Regions, 2022; Harguindéguy et al.,
2021) was used as an indicator of the degree of decentralization. Possible
192 Yurіі Turovets, Tetyana Kaganovska, Tatiana Filipenko, Anastasiia Filipenko y Olha Kravchuk
The impact of decentralization on the administrative service delivery speed in dierent elds
dependencies of the administrative service delivery speed on the degree
of decentralization of the country are determined based on the selected
indicators using a graphic method (scatter diagram).
The comparative analysis determined the level of administrative services
in Ukraine relative to the EU high income countries and OECD.
2. Results
It should be noted when analysing such administrative services as
company registration, construction permit and property registration in the
EU countries that the processes of execution of individual documents will
take into account certain features. The specied features include the work
regulations of public authorities authorized to deliver a particular service,
and the number of procedures provided for by the regulations of a particular
country, which must be carried out for obtaining this administrative permit/
service.
Data on the time of administrative service delivery are provided in the
World Bank’s Doing Business report (World Bank, 2020a; World Bank,
2020b) as separate indicators that characterize the state of the provision
of administrative services in 190 countries of the world in 2020. A graphic
analysis will be conducted on the basis of available data on the time for
company registration, obtaining construction permits and property
registration in individual countries of the European Union and the number
of administrative procedures provided for by the current legal acts of each
country (Figure 1).
193
CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 41 Nº 76 (2023): 186-206
Figure 1. Speed of administrative service delivery in selected EU countries,
days (World Bank, 2020b).
Analysis of time for administrative service delivery (Figure 1) shows
signicant dierences between countries. For example, the company
registration in the studied countries ranges from 3.5 (Denmark, Estonia,
Netherlands) to 37 days (Poland). At the same time, property registration
takes from 2.5 (Netherlands) to 135 days (Poland). A construction permit
service takes much longer to complete: from 64 days (Denmark) to 507
days (Cyprus).
For a better understanding of eective service provision, it is possible
to determine the conditional speed of one administrative procedure as an
illustrative example with a view to dierent approaches to the company
registration processes determined by the national legislation of each
country (Figure 2).
194 Yurіі Turovets, Tetyana Kaganovska, Tatiana Filipenko, Anastasiia Filipenko y Olha Kravchuk
The impact of decentralization on the administrative service delivery speed in dierent elds
Figure 2. The time of company registration, the number of administrative
procedures and the conditional speed of the administrative procedure (World
Bank, 2020b).
The study of the degree of decentralization of selected EU countries,
carried out in accordance with the existing methodical approach, showed
that the indices of general decentralization range from 0.8 (Ireland, Malta)
to 2.5 (Latvia, Germany). As noted above, the general Decentralization Index
consists of the indices of scal, political and administrative decentralization.
It should be noted on the basis of these directions that the countries are in
the range from 0 (Malta) to 3 (Germany, Sweden) according to the Fiscal
Decentralization Index. Ireland (1.2) obtained the minimum index of
political decentralization, while Latvia, Germany obtained the maximum
– 2.5. The Administrative Decentralization Index was the lowest level in
Ireland (0.6) and the highest in Denmark (2.5) (European Committee of the
Regions, 2022; Harguindéguy et al., 2021).
The dependence of the speed (time) of obtaining a building permit on the
degree of decentralization can be identied in Gretl using graphical analysis.
The conducted analysis based on the scatter diagram demonstrates the
general trend of most of the studied countries (Figure 3). The trend proves
that when the degree of decentralization increases, the time of providing an
administrative service (a construction permit) decrease. The indicators of
Cyprus, where the time-of-service provision — 507 days — was recorded,
can be considered the most signicant deviation.
195
CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 41 Nº 76 (2023): 186-206
Figure 3. The relationship between the time of obtaining a construction
permit (days) and the degree of decentralization.
We can see a similar situation in the analysis of the dependence of the
time of company registration on the degree of decentralization (Figure
4). The indicators of Poland (37 days) can be distinguished, which are
signicantly dierent from the general trend.
196 Yurіі Turovets, Tetyana Kaganovska, Tatiana Filipenko, Anastasiia Filipenko y Olha Kravchuk
The impact of decentralization on the administrative service delivery speed in dierent elds
Figure 4. The relationship between the time of company registration and the
degree of decentralization.
The situation is the opposite when the dependence of the time of
property registration on the degree of decentralization is analysed (Figure
5). A certain increase in the time of obtaining an administrative service is
noticeable with an increase in the degree of decentralization in the country.
Poland’s indicators (135 days) dier signicantly from the general trend.
197
CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 41 Nº 76 (2023): 186-206
Figure 5. The relationship between the time of property registration and the
degree of decentralization.
In general, it should be noted that the property registration and the
company registration procedures take signicantly less time (with the
exception of Poland) than obtaining a construction permit in the EU
countries.
The reform of the system of local self-government and territorial
organization of power in Ukraine has been ongoing since 2014. This
provides for complex reforms in key areas aimed at establishing democratic
institutions, ensuring coordination of the interests of the state and territorial
communities, improving the quality of life through decentralization (Siryk
et al., 2021).
The indicators of the number of procedures required to obtain an
administrative service (company registration, construction permit,
property registration) in Ukraine and the average indicator for a group of
countries (Europe and Central Asia; high income OECD countries) (Table
1) are compared blow.
198 Yurіі Turovets, Tetyana Kaganovska, Tatiana Filipenko, Anastasiia Filipenko y Olha Kravchuk
The impact of decentralization on the administrative service delivery speed in dierent elds
Table 1. Number of procedures in the provision of administrative services, 2020
(World Bank, 2020c).
Indicator Ukraine Europe and
Central Asia High income
OECD countries
Company registration
procedures (number) 6 5.2 4.9
Construction permit
procedures (number) 10 16.2 12.7
Property registration
procedures (number) 7 5.5 4.7
Table 1 shows that the indicators of Ukraine slightly exceed the average
data for the group of countries “Europe and Central Asia2 and “the OECD”,
and, for example, the indicator for a construction permit turned out to be
better in Ukraine.
The speed of administrative service delivery (enterprise registration,
construction permit, property registration) in Ukraine and the average
indicator for a group of countries (Europe and Central Asia; high income
OECD countries) will be analysed in the same way (Figure 6). The obtained
results show that these indicators are signicantly better in Ukraine: the
time spent on obtaining an administrative permit is almost 2 times less
than the maximum value in the “company registration” group, 1.5 times
less than the maximum value in the “property registration” group, and 2.3
times less in the “construction permit” group.
Figure 6. Time of administrative service delivery (days), 2020 (World Bank,
2020c).
199
CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 41 Nº 76 (2023): 186-206
In September 2022, a survey was conducted among employees of local
self-government bodies (442 respondents) as part of the PROSTO Project
“Support to Services Accessibility in Ukraine” in partnership with the All-
Ukrainian Association of United Territorial Communities (Prosto, 2022).
The purpose of the survey was to nd out the level of basic administrative
services in Ukraine by various entities of government bodies authorized to
provide relevant services. Figure 7 illustrates the results of the assessment
of administrative procedures.
Figure 7. Assessment of the provision of the most requested administrative
services in Ukraine in 2022, points (Prosto, 2022).
The above assessment indicates a signicantly high level of administrative
services in the eld of land resources, social services, obtaining permits
and certicates, etc. in Ukraine. Most of the entities authorized for the
provision of administrative services received the highest score from half
of the respondents for the quality of services, and one entity received
the highest score from more than a third of the respondents. In general,
the decentralization processes in Ukraine enabled reducing the time of
providing administrative services at the local level and the quality of these
services improved.
200 Yurіі Turovets, Tetyana Kaganovska, Tatiana Filipenko, Anastasiia Filipenko y Olha Kravchuk
The impact of decentralization on the administrative service delivery speed in dierent elds
3. Discussion
So, the public administration decentralization processes, which transfer
the state functions from the central to the local level, have a positive eect on
the organization of administrative services and can inuence social results
through the simplication of approaches, social responsibility, meeting the
needs of individuals and legal entities.
A review of academic approaches to assessing the degree of
decentralization showed that there is no single best approach. The research
involved an approach based on the methodology of determining the general
Decentralization Index, which is based on a combination of administrative,
scal and political decentralization. An important methodological
limitation is that the denition, with the exception of the scal dimension,
of indicators that measure decentralization depends on researchers and
experts collecting and evaluating reliable information (Borrett et al., 2021).
The limitations of the study are the use of data only for the selected
European countries, as there are no methodologically similar decentralization
indexes for a larger number of countries, where a comprehensive index
based on political, administrative, and scal decentralization is used. It is
appropriate to use countries of the world with dierent levels of economic
development and degree of decentralization for further extended analysis.
The conducted research demonstrates that feedback reveals the
dependence of the speed of obtaining a construction permit and company
registration on the degree of decentralization. An increased degree of
decentralization, i.e., an increased political, administrative and scal
capacity of local authorities, enables to reduce the administrative service
delivery time. This is implemented mainly by reducing the number of
administrative procedures or speeding up certain procedures.
The issues related to urban planning documents, land use, compliance
with the current re prevention, sanitary and epidemiological, construction
legislation in the course of obtaining a construction permit fall under the
powers of the territorial community. Coordination, transfer of documents
between authorized government bodies takes place in a short period of
time, thereby increasing the speed of providing administrative services
while expanding administrative functions of local self-government bodies.
The same applies to company registration, the procedure of which
remains shorter and more simplied compared to all the studied
administrative services. In this case, the simplication is enhanced by the
aspiration of local self-government bodies for stimulating the environment
for the development of entrepreneurial initiative and operation of companies
that pay taxes to the local budget, through administrative law mechanisms
(World Bank, 2020d; World Bank, 2020e; World Bank, 2020f).
201
CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 41 Nº 76 (2023): 186-206
The dependence of the time of property registration on the degree of
decentralization can be distinguished in the general understanding of the
state of aairs regarding the administrative service delivery speed. In this
case, there is (mostly) a noticeable increase in the time of administrative
service delivery with increased degree of decentralization. The countries in
which property registration procedure is quite quickly: the Netherlands (2.5
days), Lithuania (3.5 days), Denmark (4 days), Sweden (7 days) should be
single out here. Although these countries have a dierent Decentralization
Index, all of them are characterized by a fairly prompt certication of
ownership — no more than a week.
At the same time, countries with a high degree of decentralization
(Germany, Finland) have indicators of administrative service delivery
speed of 52 and 61.5 days, respectively, which are almost comparable to
countries with average values of the Decentralization Index (Slovenia,
property registration time — 50.5 days; France, property registration time
– 42 days).
In our opinion, some procedures that involve preliminary property
registration (verication of collateral, sales agreement certication) and
post-registration procedures provided by local self-government bodies
increase the time the said administrative service delivery. For example, in
Latvia, property registration procedures include verication of ownership
rights in the Land Cadastre, denial of the local self-government body
regarding immovable property, entry of information into the Land Cadastre.
The expansion of the powers of the local self-government body in Latvia
in the property registration process includes the denial to use the property
for the performance of municipal functions. In the event that the local self-
government body does not provide an answer within the period specied by
law, the ownership may be transferred to the applicant after 27 days (World
Bank, 2020e).
The practice of registering ownership rights to real estate in Germany
also has national features related to the expansion of the powers of local
authorities. The applicant must obtain a waiver of pre-emptive rights
from the municipality within 14 days. Besides, 20 days are allocated for
the procedures related to the entry of relevant data into the land cadastre
(notication, cancellation of encumbrances).
It takes 15 days to pay the real estate transfer tax and receive a notice
from the tax authority, and the directly nal stage of registering the new
owner in the land register takes the same 15 days (World Bank, 2020f).
Therefore, it can be argued that excessive coordination of procedures at the
local level complicates the provision of an administrative service (property
rights registration) and increases the overall time of the procedure.
202 Yurіі Turovets, Tetyana Kaganovska, Tatiana Filipenko, Anastasiia Filipenko y Olha Kravchuk
The impact of decentralization on the administrative service delivery speed in dierent elds
An important limitation is the need to understand the dierences in the
decentralization systems of Ukraine and European countries. Governing
bodies in the EU Member States at the regional and local levels can receive
common EU resources that enable strengthening local development and
the distribution of powers between the state and sub-national components.
For countries with signicant budget constraints, this allows co-nancing
of development projects and improving the ability to provide high-quality
administrative services.
Besides, the direction of decentralization in the EU Member States is more
related to the regional level, and current social issues are focused on the level
of territorial communities. Transfer of the focus of management decision-
making and administration to the community level enables minimizing
the costs of providing public goods and stimulating their provision, which
implies further improvement of the institutional environment.
The issue of providing services in decentralized management systems
is actively discussed in the academic literature. The problem of the quality
of serviced provided by local self-government bodies and its inequality
within the country is discussed. Some researchers are uncertain about the
above issue, because the capabilities of local authorities are inuenced by
many factors: local taxation conditions, lack of accountability mechanisms,
targeted transfers, equalization models, infrastructure provision needs, etc.
(Arends, 2020).
Local authorities should apply dierent technologies, methods, systems
and strategies to solve service delivery problems, taking into account the
complexity of criteria that aect management and decision-making to
improve the quality of life (Bostanci and Erdem, 2020). The impact and
results of the models used by local self-government bodies to provide
services at the local level (self-provision, use of municipal enterprises, use
of private enterprises, inter-municipal cooperation) are also important
(Schoute et al., 2018).
The successful implementation of local self-government reforms
requires institutional and administrative capacity, as well as the use of
innovative approaches and tools. It should be added that decentralized
governance for eective service delivery requires professional and qualied
personnel in local self-government bodies; further improvement of the
legislative framework of decentralized governance systems; acceleration
and economic eciency of the administrative services (Sabir et al., 2021).
The specied terms for the provision of administrative services, which
were used in the study, may be shorter in practice than those determined
according to the applied methodology. This may be inuenced by the
expanded use of electronic governance, the submission of most documents
in electronic form, changes in the legal framework regarding the reduction
203
CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 41 Nº 76 (2023): 186-206
of certain terms, the transition to the implementation of a single registration
body.
The fairly good results obtained for Ukraine may be adjusted for the
worse, because the study did not take into account the eects of possible
corruption factors and the specics of the human factor. Although it should
be noted that in recent years, Ukraine has taken signicant steps to shorten
the terms of providing administrative services and minimized bureaucratic
and corruption factors in many areas of public services. Further studies
should include the indicators of a larger number of countries that have
actively implemented the decentralization reform, and an expanded list of
administrative services provided at the local level.
Conclusion
Therefore, the state mainly tries to solve organizational, administrative
and nancial issues in the process of providing administrative services.
It tries to attract the necessary resources in order to strengthen its own
capacity, including the provision of services, to speed up administrative
procedures, to improve quality of services provided at the local level. The
decentralization reform provided for the transfer of certain functions of the
state to the subnational level, which expanded the capabilities of local self-
government bodies in terms of administrative, political and scal areas. But
the degree of decentralization of dierent countries is dierent.
This study involved a methodological approach based on the
Decentralization Index of the EU member states. This enabled clarifying
certain regularities of the impact of the degree of decentralization on the
administrative service delivery speed. The study found that the time of
a construction permit and company registration procedures decreases
with increased degree of decentralization. At the same time, a slight
increase in property registration time is noticeable with a higher degree of
decentralization.
The analysis of property registration systems and procedures in the
selected countries demonstrates the legislative and procedural complexity
of property registration processes and the rather long terms of coordination
of some issues by local self-government bodies, which partially explains the
obtained result. A comparison of the terms of the provision of administrative
services in Ukraine with the average indicators of certain groups of countries
demonstrates a greater eciency of the provision of services in Ukraine
than in the countries selecting for the comparison.
The study proves that the further implementation of the decentralization
reform provides the results of improving the quality of local services in
204 Yurіі Turovets, Tetyana Kaganovska, Tatiana Filipenko, Anastasiia Filipenko y Olha Kravchuk
The impact of decentralization on the administrative service delivery speed in dierent elds
the future in view of the current changes in the legislative framework,
strengthening of scal capacity, creation of innovative mechanisms of
interaction with local self-government bodies. But it is also important to
take into account the peculiarities of each particular country, which are
determined by the general level of economic development, the peculiarities
of economic activity, the institutional environment, the development of the
electronic government system, the transparency and accountability of the
public administration system, the eectiveness of anti-corruption policy,
etc.
Bibliographic References
ARENDS, Helge. 2020. “The dangers of scal decentralization and public service
delivery: A review of arguments” In: Politische Vierteljahresschrift. Vol.
61, No. 3, pp. 599-622.
BIANCHI, Nicola; GIORCELLI, Michela; MARTINO, Enrica Maria. 2021.
“The eects of scal decentralization on publicly provided services
and labor markets” In: National Bureau of Economic Research. No.
w29538. Available online. In: http://www.nber.org/papers/w29538.
Consultation date: 27/10/2022.
BORRETT, Camille; TUGRAN, Tugce; GANCHEVA, Mariya; ZAMPARUTTI,
Tony. 2021. “Developing a decentralisation index for the committee of the
regions division of powers portal” In: European Committee of the Regions.
Available online. In: https://data.europa.eu/doi/10.2863/841455.
Consultation date: 27/10/2022.
BOSTANCI, Bülent; ERDEM, Nuri. 2020. “Investigating the satisfaction
of citizens in municipality services using fuzzy modelling” In: Socio-
Economic Planning Sciences. Vol. 69, No. 100754.
CAMÕES, Pedro J. 2022. “Types of decentralisation and governance: Evidence
from across the world” In: Journal of Public Aairs. Vol. 22, No. 3, pp.
112-129.
CANARE, Tristan. 2022. “Decentralization and welfare: Evidence from a panel
of countries” In: Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics. Vol. 93,
No. 3, pp. 767-796.
CHAUDHARY, Latika; IYER, Lakshmi. 2022. The importance of being local:
Administrative decentralization and human development. Available
online. In: http://sites.nd.edu/lakshmi-iyer/les/2022/10/Chaudhary_
Iyer_AdministrativeDecentralization_2022Oct15.pdf. Consultation
date: 27/10/2022.
205
CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 41 Nº 76 (2023): 186-206
EUROPEAN COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS. 2022. Decentralization Index.
Available online. In: https://portal.cor.europa.eu/divisionpowers/
Pages/Decentralization-Index.aspx. Consultation date: 27/10/2022.
GARDI, Bayar; SULAIMAN, Vian; SAEED, Hama; ALI, |Ranjdar;
SULAIMAN, Ameena; MAHMOOD, Shelan Azeez; AL-KAKE, Farhad;
HAMAWANDY, Nawzad Majeed. 2020. “The eect of capital competence
on the protability of development and investment banks in Turkey” In:
Solid State Technology. Vol. 63, No. 6, pp. 12571-12583.
HARGUINDÉGUY, Jean-Baptiste Paul; COLE, Alistair; PASQUIER, Romain.
2021. “The variety of decentralization indexes: A review of the literature”
In: Regional and Federal Studies. Vol. 31, No. 2, pp. 185-208.
MARTINEZ-VASQUEZ, Jorge; LAGO-PEÑAS, Santiago; SACCHI, Agnese.
2017. “The impact of scal decentralization: A survey” In: Journal of
Economic Surveys. Vol. 31, No. 4, pp. 1095-1129.
MIHÁLIK, Jaroslav; HORVÁTH, Peter; ŠVIKRUHA, Martin. 2019. “Give me
liberty or give me money: The scal decentralization and autonomy of
regional governance in Slovakia” In: European Journal of Government
and Economics. Vol. 8, No. 1, pp. 96-109.
NISHIMURA, Kenichi. 2022. “How does decentralization aect the
performance of municipalities in urban environmental management in
the Philippines?” In: Lex Localis-Journal of Local Self-Government. Vol.
20, No. 4, pp. 715-738.
OECD. 2019. Making decentralisation work. A Handbook for Policy-Makers,
OECD Multi-level Governance Studies, OECD Publishing, Paris. Available
online. In: https://dx.doi.org/10.1787/g2g9faa7-en. Consultation date:
27/10/2022.
PROSTO. 2022. Results of a survey of local governments on the provision of
administrative services. Available online. In: https://prosto.in.ua/
ua/novyny/novyny/rezultati-opituvannya-oms-shchodo-nadannya-
administrativnikh-poslug#_ftn1. Consultation date: 27/10/2022.
SABIR, Bawan Yassin; OTHMAN, Baban Jabbar; GARDI, Bayar Ismael,
NECHIRWAN, Burhan; HAMZA, Pshdar Abdalla; SORGULI, Sarhang;
AZIZ, Hassan Mahmood; AHMED, Shahla Ali; ALI, Bayad Jamal;
ANWAR, Govand. 2021. “Administrative decentralization: The transfer
of competency from the ministry of education to general directorates” In:
International Journal of Rural Development, Environment and Health
Research. Vol. 5, No. 3.
SCHOUTE, Martijn; BUDDING, Tjerk; GRADUS, Raymond. 2018.
“Municipalities’ choices of service delivery modes: The inuence
206 Yurіі Turovets, Tetyana Kaganovska, Tatiana Filipenko, Anastasiia Filipenko y Olha Kravchuk
The impact of decentralization on the administrative service delivery speed in dierent elds
of service, political, governance, and nancial characteristics” In:
International Public Management Journal. Vol. 21, No. 4, pp. 502-532.
SIRYK, Zinoviy; POPADYNETS, Nazariy; PITYULYCH, Mykhaylo; CHAKII,
Olha; IRTYSHCHEVA, Inna; PANUKHNYK, Olena; HYK, Vasyl;
FEDOTOVA, Yana; ROHOZIAN, Yuliia; LYSYAK, Nataliia. 2021.
“Decentralization of local self-government under the conditions of
administrative-territorial reform in Ukraine” In: Accounting. Vol. 7, pp.
781-790.
SUJARWOTO, Sujarwoto. 2017. “Why decentralization works and does
not works? A systematic literature review.” In: Journal of Public
Administration Studies, Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 01-10.
TESTER, Aron. 2021. “Extending the State: Administrative Decentralization
and Democratic Governance Around the World” In: PhD thesis. Available
online. In: https://escholarship.org/uc/item/8hn8445z. Consultation
date: 27/10/2022.
WORLD BANK. 2020a. Doing Business 2020. Washington, DC: World
Bank. Available online. In: https://elibrary.worldbank.org/doi/
abs/10.1596/978-1-4648-1440-2. Consultation date: 27/10/2022.
WORLD BANK. 2020b. Doing Business 2004-2020. Available online. In:
https://archive.doingbusiness.org. Consultation date: 27/10/2022.
WORLD BANK. 2020c. Ease of doing business in Ukraine. Available online.
In: https://archive.doingbusiness.org/en/data/exploreeconomies/
ukraine#DB_dwcp. Consultation date: 27/10/2022.
WORLD BANK. 2020d. Doing Business 2020. Economy Prole Czech Republic.
Available online. In: https://archive.doingbusiness.org/content/dam/
doingBusiness/country/c/czech-republic/CZE.pdf. Consultation date:
27/10/2022.
WORLD BANK. 2020e. Doing Business 2020. Economy Prole Latvia.
Available online. In: https://archive.doingbusiness.org/content/
dam/doingBusiness/country/l/latvia/LVA.pdf. Consultation date:
27/10/2022.
WORLD BANK. 2020f. Doing Business 2020. Economy Prole Germany.
Available online. In: https://archive.doingbusiness.org/content/dam/
doingBusiness/country/g/germany/DEU.pdf. Consultation date:
27/10/2022.
ZIEGENHAIN, Patrick. 2015. Institutional engineering and political
accountability in Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines. Institute of
Southeast Asian Studies. Singapore.
www.luz.edu.ve
www.serbi.luz.edu.ve
www.produccioncienticaluz.org
Esta revista fue editada en formato digital y publicada
en enero de 2023, por el Fondo Editorial Serbiluz,
Universidad del Zulia. Maracaibo-Venezuela
Vol.41 Nº 76
