Saud 6

Socit qubcoise de science politique
Protecting the Right of Local Self-Government

Author(s): Warren Magnusson
Source: Canadian Journal of Political Science / Revue canadienne de science politique, Vol. 38,
No. 4 (Dec., 2005), pp. 897-922
Published by: Canadian Political Science Association and the Socit qubcoise de science politique
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25165885 .
Accessed: 16/05/2014 05:10
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
.
Canadian Political Science Association and Socit qubcoise de science politique are collaborating with
JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Canadian Journal of Political Science / Revue canadienne de
science politique.
http://www.jstor.org
This content downloaded from 111.68.103.4 on Fri, 16 May 2014 05:10:38 AM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Protecting
the
Right
of Local
Self-Government
Warren Magnusson
University of
Victoria
To
date,
Canadian courts have followed their British and American coun
terparts
in
resisting
claims that
sovereign authority
is limited
by
a
right
of local
self-government (Supreme
Court of
Canada, 2000).
The locus of
sovereignty
has been
variously
conceived in the three
countries,
but in
no case have the courts
accepted
the idea that
municipalities
or other
local authorities have
a
share in it. The
presumption
is that the bodies
that do have the relevant
authority?Parliament
in
Britain,1
the
provin
cial
legislatures
in
Canada,2
or the individual states in the US3?have
the
right
to establish whatever
system
of local
government they
deem
appropriate. Although
some
advocates
(and
even a
few
judges)
have
sug
gested
that a
right
of local
self-government
is
implicit
in the
principles
of liberal
democracy,4
the courts have been reluctant to
recognize
such a
right
or
give
it much substance when
they
do. One
suspects
that the
judges
share in the
widespread
fear that
parochial
authorities
might
stand in the
way
of economic
progress
and administrative
efficiency,
block efforts to
improve public
services and
protect
the natural
environment,
form bas
tions of social
privilege,
undermine human
rights,
and subvert efforts to
bring people together
under wider
public
authorities.5 The courts have
erred
on the side of
caution,
and refused to turn local
self-government
into a
justiciable right.
I
propose
to
challenge
that caution. I think it is rooted in
inappro
priate
fears about the loss of
sovereignty,
which arise from a
particular
way
of
understanding
the nature and
origins
of
political authority.6
That
understanding
is at odds with most of our
best intuitions about human
capacities
for
self-government.7
We have
developed
these intuitions into
elaborate theories about the forms of order that can
emerge
from
prac
tices of human freedom. Ideas about liberal
democracy
flow from these
theories,
but there is a
long-standing
belief that
sovereign authority
is
Warren
Magnusson, Department
of Political
Science, University
of
Victoria,
P.O. Box
3050,
Victoria BC Canada V8W
3P5; wmagnus@uvic.ca
Canadian Journal
of
Political Science / Revue canadienne de science
politique
38:4
(December/decembre 2005)
897-922
? 2005 Canadian Political Science Association
(l'Association
canadienne de science
politique)
and/et
la Soci?t?
qu?b?coise
de science
politique
898 Warren Magnusson
nonetheless
necessary
to secure
any
order that
might
arise from
prac
tices of freedom. Fears about the "loss" of
sovereignty
are not
just
about
the
possibility
that
some
higher
or
external
authority might
take it
away.
They
are
also about the
collapse
of
authority:
the
possible
descent into
"anarchy."
In this
context,
the fear is that an entrenched and well-defended
right
of local
self-government
would be
a
recipe
for
reactionary,
anti
social
behaviour,
rooted in attachments to
parochial
communities with
no awareness or
understanding
of the wider world.8 Similar fears have
arisen
again
and
again
when
people
have
suggested
that
we
ought
to
put
more trust in human
capacities
for
self-government.
We have made it
this far:
extending
to
everyone
the
rights
to
vote,
speak
and act
politi
cally, allowing anyone
and
everyone
to set
up
businesses
or
charitable
foundations,
and
de-regulating many
different
aspects
of human life that
were
routinely
controlled in the
past. Perhaps
we can
go
a
little
further,
and allow
people
the
right
of local
self-government.9
In the discussion that
follows,
I will
pay particular
attention to Amer
ican
examples,
because the Americans
are
supposed
to have
gone
fur
thest in
adopting
an
"ideology
of localism." Thanks to that
ideology,
American local authorities
seem to be well
protected,
in
practice
if not
always
in law. For some
commentators,
this is the
way
things
should
be,
but most
foreign
observers
(and many
domestic
ones) deplore
the fact
that local
government
is so
highly fragmented
in the United States that it
becomes difficult to deal with area-wide
problems.
Moreover,
the
pat
tern of
fragmentation
is such that
people
are
able to seal themselves off
in suburban
compounds,
where
they
can
escape
obligations
to the wider
community,
while
providing only
for themselves
(Oliver, 2001).
Cana
dian observers cannot fail to note the
huge disparities
in
funding
for
schools and other
public
services from
one
part
of an
American metro
politan
area to another
(Dreier
et
al., 2001;
Judd and
Swanstrom, 2001).
These
disparities
are
obviously
bound
up
with the
ideology
of
localism,
which affirms the
right
of
wealthy
suburbs to
exempt
themselves from
contributions to their
poorer neighbours. Why
would
we want to encour
age
Canadians to think in such localist
terms,
or to
encourage
our courts
to affirm
people's right
to be
self-interestedly parochial?
These
are
good
questions. My
view is that
we can
and should think of a
right
of local
self-government differently,
and not use it as an excuse for
excusing
people
from their wider
responsibilities
or
inhibiting public
action on a
wider scale. The
key
is to move
away
from a
sovereigntist conception
of
political authority
and towards one that
recognizes
the
possibility (and
necessity)
for different sorts of
political authority
to co-exist with one
another. The issue is how
we are to
provide
for the
right
of local com
munities to
govern
themselves in their own
way
without
inhibiting
the
formation of wider authorities with
overlapping responsibilities.
To see
our
way
through
this
muddle,
we must attend not
only
to the
negative
Abstract.
Many people
in Canada are
frightened by
the
right
of local
self-government,
because
they
are afraid of the
privatization
of
public authority.
This article
suggests
that
municipalities
can be otherwise
conceived,
and that a
right
of local
self-government
can be vindicated without
impairing
the
capacity
of the state or
encouraging
a
debilitating privatism.
The
key
is to under
stand that
municipalities
can be non-exclusive
public authorities,
on a different
register
from
the state or civil
society.
R?sum?. La crainte de la
privatisation
des
pouvoirs publics
m?ne de nombreux Canadiens et
Canadiennes ? redouter le droit ? l'autonomie
gouvernementale
locale. Cet article
sugg?re qu'il
est
possible d'envisager
les
municipalit?s
autrement,
et
qu'on peut justifier
le droit ? l'autonomie
gouvernementale
locale sans faire entrave aux
comp?tences
de l'?tat et sans
encourager
un
privatisme
d?bilitant.
L'important
est de
comprendre que
les
municipalit?s peuvent
exercer un
pouvoir public
non exclusif dans leur
propre
zone de
comp?tence, jouant
sur un
registre
dif
f?rent de celui de l'?tat
ou de la soci?t? civile.
lessons of the American
experience,
but also to the
positive
lessons of
associative life in liberal societies
generally:
i.e.,
the
way
we allow for
the free creation and
development
of economic and social
organizations.
The
object
of
my analysis
is to articulate the
right
of local
self-government
in a
way
that clarifies the difference between this
right
and the claims to
privilege
that have sometimes been attached to it. NIMBYism cannot be
justified by
a
right
of local
self-government.
Nor can a
refusal to con
tribute to the needs of others.
Properly understood,
the
right
of local self
government actually
cuts
against
the
privatism
that
so often masks itself
as
localism.
Privatism,
Statism and Local
Autonomy
The American
legal
scholar,
Richard
Briffault,
offers a
compelling analy
sis
(1990)
of the
way
the
ideology
of localism has worked in the US to
produce
a network of
inward-looking municipalities
with
protected juris
dictions and resources.10
Key
to this
process
was a
reconceptualization
of the nature of the
municipality. Historically,
it was
assumed that obtain
ing
the status of
municipality
meant that a
place
had to be a
"relatively
built-up,
diverse and
economically
and
socially
self-contained
unit,
set
off from other localities
by
the
density
of its internal
linkages?that
is,
a
city" (361).
This view
gradually changed,
so that
by
the
early part
of the
twentieth
century
it was
accepted
that a
municipality
"could be a decen
tralized,
homogeneous,
residential
district,
economically
tied to other
localities?a suburb"
(361).
The distinction between
city
and suburb dis
appeared
in
law,
and the courts
actually
came to think of the suburb as
the
prototypical municipality.
On Briffault's
highly persuasive analysis,
suburban
municipalities
are conceived
by
the American courts as exten
sions of the home and
family,
and thus are
permitted
to behave in an
inward-looking, privatistic way.
The suburban
municipality
is considered
to be a retreat in which
people separate
themselves from the cares of the
world,
develop
a common
space
with facilities and services to their lik
ing,
and use their resources for mutual benefit. To establish
zoning reg
ulations to maintain the "character of the
community"
or to husband the
neighbourhood's
resources for
schooling
the
neighbourhood's
children
seems
perfectly
natural. The suburban
municipality may
be a
public
authority
in one
sense,
but it is rooted in
private
interests. It is
more like
a condominium or a
co-op
than a
public government.11
The fine line between
public
and
private authority
is illustrated
by
the
proliferation
of "homeowners' associations" in the United States
(McKenzie, 1994;
Blakely
and
Snyder, 1997).
These associations
are on
the model of
condominiums,
but
they may encompass huge
residential
neighbourhoods
with commercial and recreational facilities within them.
These
neighbourhoods
are
often
gated.
The streets within them
belong
to
the homeowners' association and not to the
municipality: hence,
they
are
private
roads. The association maintains its
own
police force,
and enforces
regulations
of a sort that would not be tolerated
(or
even be
legal)
in an
open
or
unprivatized part
of a
municipality.
Most of the
key public
ser
vices are
provided by
the
association,
rather than
by
the
municipality
in
which the
area is situated. For
many purposes,
the association is the local
government
in the area. The
municipality
may
be
largely
irrelevant to
residents,
especially
if
they
are childless or send their children to
private
or
parochial
schools. Ten
years ago,
Evan McKenzie calculated that about
one American in
eight
was
living
under the
government
of a
homeown
ers' association
(1994: 11).
That
figure
is
certainly higher today.
Most of
the new suburban
housing developments
in the United States are set
up
to be
governed by housing
associations. Most are
also
designed
to be
gated
communities.
Thus,
the trend is toward the further
privatization
of
local
government.
One must
speak
of further
privatization because,
if
Briffault is correct in his
analysis, ordinary
suburban
municipalities
are
already
understood as extensions of the home and
family,
and thus as
essentially private
authorities. The homeowners' association takes the
underlying
rationale for suburban
autonomy
to its
logical
conclusion,
and
capitalizes
on the
advantages
of
private authority
to make the local
gov
ernment more
repressive
and exclusive
as
well as more
congenial (com
pare
Cutler et
al.,
1999 and
Bickford, 2000).
To
couple repression
and exclusion with
privatization may
seem con
troversial,
but it should be obvious that
repression
and exclusion
are both
central to the case
for
privatization.
Public authorities are
limited in what
they
can
do,
thanks to
political pressures
and constitutional restrictions.
Private
authority
is different. We take it that it is natural for
parents
to
have
rights
of control over
their children.
Although
these
rights may
be
limited
by
law,
they
are nonetheless more
extensive than
ones we would
normally grant
to a
public authority. So,
to
privatize responsibility
for
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
901
the
care
of children
(or
the sick or
elderly)
is to
assign responsibility
to
authorities
(parents, family caregivers)
who have the
right
to be
excep
tionally
intrusive,
dictatorial and
(as
need
be) exclusionary.
This
may
be
for the best. We
certainly
assume that natural affection will
normally put
appropriate
limits on what
parents
and other
caregivers
do.
Nevertheless,
the
many
cases of domestic abuse
are a constant reminder that
private
authority
can be
gravely
misused. The other main form of
private
author
ity
is the kind that we
give
to business
corporations
and
non-profit
soci
eties. The
assumption
is that
people agree
to be
regulated
in relation to
their work when
they
take
on
employment
with a
particular body.
It is
also assumed that
a
body
can make
regulations reasonably necessary
for
the conduct of its own
activities,
even if those
regulations
bear on
people
who are not
part
of the
organization.
The
presumption
is that
people
who
come to
Disneyland
or
go
to
shop
at Wal-Mart are there
voluntarily,
and
can
choose to
go
somewhere else if
they
do not like the
regulations.
Thus,
the
private authority
in
question
can
get away
with
regulations?dress
and
speech codes,
for
example?that
would not be tolerated elsewhere.
Moreover,
the
authority
will have
rights
of exclusion that are more exten
sive than those that a
public body
could wield. The
Disney
or
Wal-Mart
people
can wall off and "clean
up"
the
spaces
at issue and
impose
strict
codes of behaviour
on
both workers and visitors. Families can
impose
"traditional values"
on their children.
And,
homeowners' associations can
enable families to band
together
to
keep
unwanted
people
out of their
own
territories.
We cannot make sense of local
autonomy
in the United States unless
we
recognize
that
municipal corporations
are at one end of a
spectrum
of institutions that have been
organized
with the
principle
of
private
authority
in mind. The
family
is a
private authority,
as
indeed is the "indi
vidual."12 There is also
an
array
of intermediate institutions that enable
families and individuals to
pursue
collective
purposes
without
assuming
the
responsibilities
of
public authority. Thus,
there are
for-profit corpo
rations, non-profit societies,
churches and other
voluntary
associations:
in
fact,
a
bewildering
array
of
organizations.
The
principle
that
emerged
in
the nineteenth
century?not only
in the United
States,
but elsewhere in
the Western world?was that
people
were free to create and maintain what
ever
organizations they
wanted for lawful
purposes and, moreover,
they
could set
up "governments"
for these
organizations, specifically
attuned
to
organizational purposes.
General laws were
established to enable incor
poration.
The laws were
designed
to facilitate the formation of
private
authorities. It was in this context that most American states
adopted leg
islation to facilitate the
incorporation
of suburbs as
separate municipali
ties.
Why
should the
principle
that enabled
people
to establish
private
authorities not be
applied
also to the most intimate of
public
authorities,
ones at the level of the local
community?
Later
on,
when it became clear
that
many
suburban
municipalities
were too small to
provide
all the
pub
lic services
demanded, legislation
was introduced to enable those munici
palities
to enter into
joint-service agreements
with their
neighbours
or to
purchase
what
they
needed from wider
public
authorities
or
private
com
panies.
Where
municipal
initiative was
lacking,
citizens could
get
the
authority
to create
special-purpose
bodies to
provide particular
services
on a
cost-recovery
basis.
By
these
means,
American states enabled sub
urbanites
(now
the
majority
of
people
in the United
States)
to create an
ever
wider
array
of
public
authorities to meet
private purposes.
The
pro
liferation of local authorities in the United States is
part
and
parcel
of a
practice
that enables the formation of innumerable intermediate bodies
that are
conceived
as emanations of the free
activity
of the
people.
Is "free
activity" private
in
principle? Many people evidently
think
so. The distinction between state and
society
is often
mapped
onto the
one between
public
and
private:
what is of the state is
public,
of
society
private.
Social
activity
is conceived as free
activity,
whereas state activ
ity
is
thought
to be the effect of coercion
(at
least in some
degree).
Thus,
the domain of freedom is the domain of
society
as
opposed
to the
state,
and
society
is
essentially
the domain of
private activity.
Hence,
privacy
and freedom
are
associated with the domain of the social. Social
activity
is differentiated into
many
different
spheres, including
those of
family,
friends, business,
religion
and charities.
Among
these
spheres
is the
neigh
bourhood
or
local
community
in which
family,
friends and
neighbours
come
together
to
provide
for their common needs and
regulate
their com
mon life. This is the root from which demands for
community
control or
local
self-government
often
spring. Self-government
in this sense is
truly
a
practice
that comes out of
"society,"
and thus is
legitimated by
the
right
ful
pursuit
of
private (individual, familial, communal)
interest and the
rightful
demand to
protect
the
private sphere
from
public/state
intru
sions. To
practice
communal
self-government,
even in the most
parochi
ally
self-interested
way,
is to exercise
freedom,
for freedom
supposedly
is not a matter of
doing
what we
ought
to
do,
but what we want to do.
This is how the
right
of local
self-government
is often conceived. The
NIMBY
syndrome
is
legitimated
in these
terms,
as are other
practices
that affirm the
right
of the local
community
to do what it wants for its
own
benefit,
regardless
of
possible consequences
to outsiders.
It is in
opposition
to this idea that the Canadian
theory
of local
gov
ernment has
developed.13 Following
British and other
European
prec
edents,
Canadian
legislatures
(backed by
the
courts)
have insisted on the
right
of "the state" to
reorganize
local
government
for the benefit of the
wider
public.
Thus,
there has not been much
sympathy
in the courts for
the idea that school boards or
municipalities
have
a
right
to
exist,
or that
the
people
who
are
under these authorities have
a
right
to maintain them.
The
presumption
is that the well
being
of the wider
society
is
dependent
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
903
on the state's
capacity
to
reorganize government
to meet
changing
needs
(and
a
changing understanding
of the state's
duties).
Government in this
context includes local
government,
so the
assumption
is that the
reorga
nization of a
province's system
of
municipal
authorities is no different
from the
reorganization
of the
Ministry
of
Transportation
or the
Ministry
of Forests. After
all,
the latter two ministries have local offices as
well,
offices that
may
be
quite important
to the communities in which
they
are
located. It
may
be
good
for the state to consult
people
about its
plans
for
reorganization,
and
we
may
well criticize
a
government
for
failing
to
consult
adequately,
but we have to concede that the
authority
to decide
how the state is to be
organized
rests with the leaders of the state and
no one else. The
system
of
municipal government,
like the
system
for
the administration of schools and
hospitals,
has to be
re-organized
from
time to
time,
and it would be
improper
to allow
parochial
authorities to
have
a veto on the
process.
These are
complicated
administrative matters
unsuitable for reference to the electorate at
large,
but in
any
case it would
be
wrong
to
give
the electors in a
particular
area a veto. The
Quebec
government's
recent moves in this direction were a
departure
from stan
dard Canadian
practice.14
The Canadian
assumption
has been that a
municipality
should be
on a
relatively large
scale
(Higgins,
1977; Magnusson, 1981;
Higgins,
1986;
Lightbody,
1995;
Tindal and
Tindal, 2000; Sancton, 2000):
it can
not
simply
be an extension of home and
family,
because it is a
public
authority.
There is a
strong
current of
opinion
in
support
of the idea
that
city
boundaries should be extended to
encompass
surrounding
sub
urbs,
so that
municipal
units will
encompass
"whole" communities
(i.e.,
ones that are
reasonably
self-contained in terms of
day-to-day
activities
like
work,
shopping
and
recreation).
It is
supposed
to be easier to
orga
nize services for a self-contained
community.
Such a
community
is also
a convenient unit for taxation and
regulation;
moreover,
planning
for
ongoing
urban
development
can be more rational and effective if the
community
is considered as a
whole. If the
city
has a
historic
identity,
a
familiar
centre,
established media of
communications,
a well-articulated
group life, political
traditions of its
own,
and a
place
in
popular
con
sciousness,
chances
are that it can sustain a
reasonably
vibrant
political
life. Suburbs
incorporated
into such a
city
will be
joining
an
entity
that
works
politically
and that has
a
reasonable measure of socio-economic
cohesion.
So,
the
city
in this
larger
sense seems to be a natural area for
local
government.
Unfortunately,
the
pattern
of urban
development
is
never as neat as
this. In
densely
settled areas like the extended "Golden Horseshoe"
(where
more than a fifth of Canadians
live),
one
city
bleeds into the
next,
and
it is difficult to draw
any
boundary
lines that seem
self-evidently
cor
rect.
Very large
urban
agglomerations
like this one are not
very
well
integrated,
and
people's
local
loyalties
are
likely
to be focused on smaller
areas. Whether the urban
agglomeration
is
large
or
small,
there is still a
problem
with
respect
to the outer boundaries.
City-based planners
have
good
reasons for
wanting
to control the
developing fringe,
but
people
living
in areas that are
still
largely
rural
are
understandably
reluctant to
be
swept
into urban authorities with which
they
can
scarcely identify
and in which
they
are
bound to have little influence. In
any
case,
there
are historic areas within
any
urbanized
area that have a claim on
people's
loyalties:
former
villages
and
townships
with their own
histories and iden
tities, planned
subdivisions and communities that have
emerged by
var
ious
processes
(including
recent
immigration).
So,
the idea of the
enlarged
city
as a
natural
political
unit is
always strongly contested,
even when
that unit
seems to make
good
sense to outsiders. In face of such resis
tance,
provincial governments
in Canada have often been
prepared
to
make
compromise
decisions that
enlarge
the scale of
municipal govern
ment,
while
retaining
traces of the historical
patterns.
The result is a
patchwork
that makes no one
very happy. Many
suburban
(and rural)
municipalities
are
very large,
and
so lack the
intimacy
that
many peo
ple
associate with local
government.
On the other
hand,
these same
municipalities
are often
lacking
the sources
of cohesion from which cit
ies can benefit. One effect of these
problems
is that local
government
boundaries
always
seem to be at issue
everywhere,
and
municipalities
generally
have less
legitimacy
than
they might
have had otherwise. This
makes it easier for the
to
go
on
tinkering
with
boundaries and functions.
The
politically
and
administratively optimal
unit of local
govern
ment is
always just
over the horizon. New theories
emerge
as fashions
change:
in the
1950s,
there were
great
worries about
organizing
the hard
services
necessary
for
rapid
urban
development;
in the
1960s,
attention
began
to shift to the soft services associated with the welfare
state;
in
the
1970s,
environmental considerations loomed
larger;
in the
1980s,
the focus was on
reducing
costs and
enhancing efficiency by adopting
private
sector models for
organization
and
management;
and in the
1990s,
people began talking
about
turning
our urban centres into
"global
cit
ies." Whatever the
theory
or the
focus,
the
premise
of "reform" tends
to be the same:
namely,
that the
province
has the
right
and
duty
to
reorganize
the
system
of local
government
in the wider
public
interest.
In the common
analysis,
that wider interest consists of such
things
as an
adequate supply
of new or
improved housing, appropriate
com
mercial and industrial facilities for
an
expanding economy,
an efficient
system
of
transportation, good (and safe)
water and
sewerage, high
quality
schools,
universally
accessible health
services,
effective
polic
ing, adequate
social
services, good parks
and recreational
facilities,
reasonably good
air
quality,
and some measure of
protection
for the
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
905
natural environment. These
good things
can
only
come
about if local
government
is efficient and effective. It is
up
to the
provincial govern
ment to
keep
the local authorities
up
to
standard,
and that means re
quiring ongoing organizational change.
Best
practice
is
always
the
goal.
In the
early years
after the Second World
War,
best
practice required
major
increases in local
expenditures.
More
recently,
the
pressure
has
been in the
opposite
direction. One effect has been that local authori
ties
(especially
school
boards)
have been
losing
their
right
to set their
own
levels of taxation.15 The
presumption
is that it is for the senior
governments
to decide what the overall tax burden should be. If the local
authorities
go
their own
way
on this
matter,
we
may
end
up
with a
larger
state and more constricted
private
sector than the central author
ities want.
The hidden truth is that
privatism
and statism are
complementary:
the one facilitates the other. In the Canadian
case,
statist
practices
are
legitimated by pointing
to the
dangers
of
privatistic
localism on
the Amer
ican model. These statist
practices
then forestall
municipal
efforts to
extend the
public
sector or
tighten
the
regulation
of
private
business.16
They
also confirm the idea that local
public
institutions are dominated
by
a state that is remote from the
people.
The
perceived
alternative
to the remote state is a
private
or
voluntary initiative,
rather than
municipal
action.
So,
statist
practices encourage
the belief that free
activity
is
private,
and that
public activity
is
necessarily
an
imposition
upon
the
people.
Since recent initiatives
by
the
are often
inspired by
the idea that best
practice
occurs in the
private
sector
(or
in the United
States,
where the
public
sector has
gone
furthest in
modeling
itself
on the
private),
the
ongoing reorganization
of local
government gives
concrete effect to the idea that
private
is
best.17
People
are thus
encouraged
to think that
they
are well advised
to free themselves from the state as much as
possible,
and find
pri
vate or
voluntary
solutions to their
problems.
The residents' associa
tion or the
community group appears
as the model of a
genuinely
local
organization,
which
emerges
from the free
activity
of
ordinary people.
If a small
municipality
is available to run on that
model,
then
people
naturally
take
advantage
of the
possibility.
Privatistic localism is thus
facilitated
by
the
practices
of
statism,
and then used to
justify
statist
measures that
intensify privatistic
localism. To
date, privatistic
local
ism has not been embraced in Canada to
quite
the same extent as in
the
US,
but the trend is
probably
in that direction. As we
know,
the American state is not weak: it
simply
is more
limited in its func
tions. Statism
on the American model
encourages privatism
and
depends upon
it. In
turning
to statism in Canada as a
way
of contain
ing privatism,
we
actually encourage
the attitudes we are
attempting
to confront.
The
Municipality
as a Form of
Authority
Municipalities
were not
always regarded
as
organs
of the state
(Gierke,
1900, 1990; Isin, 2002; Pirenne, 1925;
Reynolds,
1997;
Skinner and
Str?th, 2003;
Syed,
1966; Weber, 1978).
In
fact, they
were
originally
con
ceived as
political
authorities of a different
type: "corporations"
at one
remove
from the
royal
authorities. The state
developed
out of
royal
author
ity,
and it was not
immediately
obvious that
municipal corporations
were
part
of the state. Gerald
Frug
has
argued
that,
in the American
case,
the
identification of
municipalities
with the state
only developed
in the first
part
of the nineteenth
century (1980, 1999).
Before
that,
there was no
categorical
distinction in American law between a
municipal corporation
and
any
other kind of
corporation.
All held charters that enabled them to
wield
authority
within their own
territories and over their own
members,
clients and visitors.
They
could
develop
their own
regulations
and
police
their own realms.
They
could hold
property
in
perpetuity
and sue and be
sued. In
many
cases,
they
could
acquire property by compulsory pur
chase. The
territory
of
a
chartered
corporation
could be immense and its
authority practically
unlimited,
as the
history
of the Hudson's
Bay
Com
pany
or
the British East India
Company
demonstrates. Canal
companies,
turnpike
trusts,
sanitary
authorities and
railway companies
were fre
quently given powers
of
expropriation,
both in the British
Empire
and in
the United States.
Only gradually
did the idea take hold that there had to
be
a
clear distinction between
public
authorities,
with
rights
and
respon
sibilities of the sort associated with the
state,
and
private authorities,
with
rights
and
responsibilities
of the sort associated with civil
society.
In the
end,
some
corporations
came to be understood as
private
businesses and
others as
agencies
of the state.
Municipalities
were
assigned
to the latter
category.
Frug's point
is that
municipalities
ended
up
with less freedom than
other
corporations
as a result of this
categorical
distinction.
For-profit
corporations
and
non-profit
societies were
given
most of the constitu
tional
protections
afforded to natural individuals. A free
society
was
sup
posed
to be characterized
by
free associative life. That meant that
people
had to be free to
incorporate
themselves for
any
lawful
purpose:
eco
nomic
gain,
mutual
benefit,
charitable
endowment,
or whatever. There
had to be as much latitude as
possible
in the form of
corporate organi
zation and hence in
patterns
of
corporate government. Moreover,
the cor
porations
had to be
given great
latitude in
pursuing
their own
purposes.
A
private corporation
could
be?perhaps naturally
would be?focused
on the well
being
of a
narrowly
defined
group
of
people.
Such self
interested conduct was
only
to be
expected
when
people
had freedom.
As the doctrine of laissez
faire suggested, greater
freedom in civil soci
ety
would
actually
enhance
everyone's well-being,
since
people
would
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
907
relish their
own
freedom and seek to serve others for
purposes
of eco
nomic
gain
or
social
recognition.
Where there were
deficiencies in soci
ety nonetheless,
the state would
step
in. A well-ordered state would be
hedged
about
by
constitutional
restrictions,
however. This was
necessary
to secure freedom. Because
municipalities
were
(or ought
to
be)
essen
tially public
authorities,
they
had to be
subject
to those restrictions. The
courts were not inclined to read wide
grants
of
authority
into
municipal
charters,
for fear that
they
would be
empowering
state
agencies
in
ways
that the
sovereign legislatures
had not intended.
Thus,
the ultra vires rule
was
applied very strictly
to
municipal corporations,
whereas
private
cor
porations
were
given
more
latitude. As a
result,
municipalities
have had
to ask for
specific grants
of
power
in order to do new
things.
Even when
legislatures
have
granted general authority
to act for local
purposes,
the
courts have
interpreted
these
grants restrictively.
The
pattern
of
judicial interpretation
in Canada has been similar.
Thus,
we
have the doctrine that
municipalities
are
"creatures of the
prov
inces"
(an
echo of the American
doctrine,
called Dillon's
Rule,
that
municipalities
are creatures of the
states).
We also have restrictive inter
pretations
of the ultra vires
rule,
as
applied
to
municipalities.18
As a
result,
municipalities
often
struggle
to find
authority
to do
new
things,
and are
frequently
cautioned
by
their solicitors not to
go
too
far,
lest
they
be
sued
by
an
individual
or a
private company
whose interests were
adversely
affected
by
the initiative in
question. Timidity reigns,
because
municipal
ities are in a
grey
zone between the
sovereign authority
of the state and
the free
activity
of civil
society.
It is
significant
that
municipal
activists
have so often
appealed
to
private-sector
models as a
way
of
underscoring
the
potential
of
municipal government.
At one
time,
it was common to
say
that the
municipality
was
essentially
a
"joint-stock company" belong
ing
to the
property-holders
or residents or a
particular
area. This was
partly
to
encourage
business-like methods and forms of
organization
and
partly
to
give
clearer
(and narrower)
definition to the
purposes
of the
municipality;
however,
it was also
a
way
of
indicating
that a
municipal
ity
could and should be a
vigorous body,
entitled to wide freedom of
action on
behalf of its "shareholders." A socialistic variant of this view
was that a
municipality
was more akin to a
cooperative (Webb
and
Webb,
1975
[1920]). Ironically,
that view is now most
commonly expressed
in
the idea that a
municipality
is
essentially
a
homeowners' association
endowed with
a
wider
grant
of
public authority.
In
any
case,
there is a
tendency
to think that a
municipality
needs to be like an
organization
in
civil
society
if it is to be
really
robust.
Otherwise,
it will
just
be
a minor
agency
of the state.
The truth of the matter is that the neat divide between state and civil
society
ill suits
municipalities (compare Magnusson, 1985, 1996.)
The
mythology
of
sovereignty19
tends to conceal the fact that there have
always
been
many
authorities in the world that
are
neither
products
of
voluntary
association
nor
agencies
of the state. The state as we know it is a rela
tively
recent historical
development.
So is the autonomous individual.
Most of the authorities that humans have ever
known have
a
character
that denies
mapping
onto the modern triad of
individuals,
civil
society
and the state.
Many
of these authorities
persist.
New ones
emerge
for
reasons that are ill
analyzed
in terms of the dominant modern
categories.
In the real
world,
there
are
many
different kinds of authorities with dif
ferent claims to
legitimacy
and different
powers
at their
disposal.
This
certainly
can be a
problem,
and the doctrine of
sovereignty (and
the
pow
erful institutions associated with
it) may
assist
some
people
in
imposing
a
manageable
order. Much
escapes
such an
order,
nonetheless. If it is
effective,
the order will limit traditional and
emergent
authorities to some
degree,
but it
may
also
pervert
them in the
process.
The
simplifying
assumptions
of the order of
sovereignty
are
certainly
attractive:
they
make
it easier to think about
things
and to
put everything
into neat and
appar
ently manageable categories.
On the other
hand,
these
assumptions
induce
us to
ignore aspects
of human
reality
and to close ourselves off from
various
possibilities.
The treatment of
municipalities
is indicative of this.
What were once
potent
authorities outside the order of
sovereignty
have
been
consigned
to a
grey
area between state and civil
society,
where
they
have little
opportunity
to realize their
potential.20
To understand what has been
lost,
we need to be
cognizant
of the
history
of
municipalities.
The earliest such authorities in
Europe
had no
certain status
(Reynolds, 1997). They
were
akin to other authorities estab
lished
by
various means and in various forms at some remove from what
were
acknowledged
to be the
highest
authorities in the
land,
the ones
associated with the
king
or
emperor
on the one hand or the
pope
and his
bishops
on the other. In a number of
important
instances,
municipalities
won
recognition by
a
form of rebellion
or
simply
asserted themselves in
a
way
that
ultimately
had to be
tolerated,
even if it was not
formally
recognized
in law. The
reinterpretation
of medieval law in terms of Roman
categories
enabled the
higher
authorities to define the entities in
ques
tion as
municipalities
within
larger realms,
and to
assign corporate
sta
tus to those
municipalities.
This
began
the
long process
that culminated
in the
nineteenth-century
decisions to which
Frug
refers. One of the fic
tions introduced at an
early stage
was that
municipalities
owed their exis
tence to
grants
of
authority
from the
sovereign.
This
was
very
much
a
covering
fiction,
because it is clear that
many
cities
already
had munici
pal governments
of
a sort before there were
sovereigns
with the relevant
authority. Municipal authority
was often
aboriginal,
but this fact had to
be concealed to make sense of the
legal
fiction. Later distinctions between
entities of the state and entities of
society
are
clearly
anachronistic when
applied
to
early municipalities.
So too are
distinctions between
social,
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
909
cultural,
economic and
political activity.
In the context of the
time,
the
key thing
is that the
early municipalities
did not claim to be
religious
authorities.
Nor,
for the most
part,
did
they challenge
the
authority
of the
princes
to whom
they
owed nominal
allegiance.
A
municipality
was not
a
kingdom
of its
own,
let alone a church
apart.
It was an
authority
of a
different
type,
on
another
register.
This difference was never well theorized. The
temptation
was to think
of the
municipality
as a
civic
republic,
and hence
as a
late form of the
polis
or
city-state.
On those
terms,
there were
few
options.
Either the
municipality
had to elevate itself to the status of the most
powerful polit
ical
entities,
or it had to
accept
a subordinate
position
as a
component
of
a
larger
state. Even the
greatest
of the civic
republics,
Venice,
had to
accept
subordinate status in the end. The other
way
of
thinking
of the
municipality
was as an
intermediate association or
corporation
within a
larger society.
This
put
the
municipality
onto the same terrain
as
busi
nesses,
charitable foundations and Protestant churches. This has not been
a favourable
terrain,
either.
Caught
betwixt and
between, municipalities
have come to seem like irrelevancies: minor
agencies
of the state on the
one
hand
or
defective
organs
of civil
society
on the other.
Nevertheless,
municipalities
are the
latter-day
heirs of a tradition of
political organiza
tion that dates back at least a thousand
years (and arguably longer,
if we
consider the
experience
of the ancient
world).
What has been obscured is
the fact that
early municipalities
claimed civic freedom and
plenary polit
ical
authority,
but not
"sovereignty."
What
might
we
make of this at a
time when
sovereignty
is
being
detached from the state and other forms
of
political authority
are
proliferating
(Keane, 2003; Ougaard
and
Hig
gott, 2002; Patom?ki, 2002; Shaw, 2000; Sinclair, 2004)?
Is the munici
pality
a
model of
things
to come?
A crucial
step
is to
recognize
that different forms of
authority
can
exist side
by side,
without
being
in a hierarchical relation. The sover
eignty
model
encourages
us to think of
political authority
as
exclusive:
to
imagine
that there can
only
be one state in one
place,
that
political
authority
is located
only
in the
state,
and that there is a
sharp
distinction
between the state and the
society
it is to
govern.
We do not
always
think
in these
terms;
in
fact,
we cannot do so if we are to deal with the
prob
lems
we
confront.
Nevertheless,
the
mythology
of
sovereignty
makes us
nervous about
thinking
otherwise. We know
that,
in a
federal
system,
there are
independent governments
with
overlapping authority. Things
work out for the most
part,
but uncertainties about the ultimate locus of
authority
make
many people uneasy.
Now there are also the
treaty-based
transnational authorities like the WTO that
appear
to have
independent
authority,
at least in relation to
ordinary
countries like Canada.
So,
sov
ereignty
is
already parcelled
out
among transnational,
national and
pro
vincial authorities with
overlapping jurisdiction. Then,
there are the
"sovereignty-free"
bodies like the multi-national
corporations
or the
Roman Catholic Church. These bodies claim to be
apolitical,
but that is
a
way
of
extricating
themselves from state
authority
and
enabling
them
to
act,
politically
and
otherwise,
in a
different
key.
In countries like Can
ada,
Aboriginal
authorities offer another model of
political
bodies that
are other than
sovereign. Again,
such authorities secure themselves
by
acting
in a
different
register.
In this
case,
they
do not
pretend
to be
apo
litical,
but
they
do
say
that
they
derive their
authority
from an
indepen
dent source unrelated to the Canadian state or
Canadian
society. They
claim to
embody rights
of
self-government
that have
belonged
to First
Nations from time immemorial and that continue to be exercised in the
present (Macklem, 2001). Sovereignty
is not the
issue,21
nor is it a mat
ter of individual or associative freedom. The claim is to an
ongoing right
of
self-government
that has
nothing
to do with the
presence
or
absence
of the Canadian state or Canadian
society.
In
principle,
the
right
can be
exercised
on
the
territory
of the Canadian state and within Canadian soci
ety
without
trenching
on
the
entity
that is Canada.
Aboriginal authority
can exist side
by
side with the
authority
of the Canadian
state,
and be
no
less
political
for that.
Some will
say
that the idea that
parallel political
authorities can exist
in relative
harmony
is
just fantasy. Perhaps
so,
but
sovereignty
is also a
fantasy,
and
no
less
powerful
for that. The
question
is how we are to
respond
to the
presence
of
coexisting political
authorities. Do we need to
force all such authorities into
an
order of
sovereignty?
If
so,
why?
What
is it about the
multiplicity
of
political
authorities that makes
us so ner
vous?
Why
do
we need to tie our
political imagination
to the doctrine of
sovereignty?
Instead,
if we are to
cope
with all the
problems
we
face,
we
may
need to have different sorts of
political
authorities with different
sources of
legitimacy
and different
responsibilities.
No one sort of eco
nomic
enterprise
or
charitable venture is sufficient.
Why
do we
suppose
that the state alone is sufficient for our
political purposes?
And,
why
do
we think that all
political authority
has to be on the same
register?
To
think of the
municipality
in a different
way
is to create new
possibilities
for
political
authorities of a
distinctly
secular and non-national
character,
and this
may
be of
particular importance
now. The
possibilities
of the
municipality
deserve more serious
exploration,
not curt dismissal
on the
basis of seventeenth-
or
nineteenth-century political
theories.22
Constitutionalizing
a
Right
of Local Self-Government
Frug
reminds
us
that all the intermediate associations of modern
society
share a common
origin
in the associative life of an earlier era. In the
beginning,
there
was no
sharp
distinction between
municipalities
and other
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
911
associations,
nor was the realm of
public, political
or
governmental
activ
ity clearly distinguished
from what was
private,
social
or
voluntary.
The
crucial modern distinctions left
municipalities
in limbo. In one set of
moves,
best
exemplified by
Canadian and
European practice, they
were
reassimilated to the state.23
In another set of
moves,
exemplified by
Amer
ican
suburbanism,
they
were
pulled
to the domain of civil
society,
thanks
to an
identification with home and
family. Gradually
lost was the sense
that
municipalities
were
political
authorities of a
different
type,
which
could coexist with state and civil
society,
but be neither of the one nor
the other. What has
remained, however,
is a sense that a
municipality
is
an
organization
that
grows
out of the
problems
of
living together
in cit
ies. The
municipality
is the
elementary political
form necessitated
by
urbanism
as a
way
of life
(Wirth, 1964).
It is not about the establishment
of the true
religion,
the formation of a
national
identity,
the advancement
of a
particular
tribe
or
clan,
or the achievement of continental
or
global
supremacy.
The aims of
a
municipality
are more modest and humane.
They
have
something
to do with economic
advance,
but
they
are
equally
about
peace
on the streets and in the
markets,
security
in
people's
homes
and
neighbourhoods, friendly
interaction between
people
of different com
munities,
common
efforts to
improve
the urban
environment,
and the
pro
vision of services and facilities on which
everyone depends.
From
tending
to the
roads, drains, schools,
hospitals,
streets and
markets,
people
dis
cover interests in common and form new
loyalties.
A new
political entity
emerges.
It does not
necessarily
or even
usually displace
other
political
entities. In
fact,
it is
usually quite
vulnerable to the most
powerful
of
these other entities.
Nonetheless,
it does
produce something different,
which we
would be well advised to sustain.
The main
objections
to
giving municipalities protected
status are
bound
up
with our
anxieties about the
proper organization
of the state. If
our
municipalities
are to be
organs
of the
state,
we
do not want them to
be too small
or too resistant to
change.
We do not want to
give
them over
to
people
who are hostile
or
indifferent to the needs of the wider
society.
But
suppose
that we
thought
of
municipalities
in a
different
way,
as
enti
ties that co-existed with the state but were not
part
of it. What then?
Frug gives
us a hint when he
points
to the
processes
by
which other inter
mediate associations
are created and sustained. There are
general enabling
laws that
permit people
to create business
corporations
and
non-profit
societies with
many
different
purposes
in mind. Parallel
legislation
in
many
American states and some Canadian
provinces
enables the creation
of
new
municipalities by popular
initiative.
Usually only unincorporated
territory
is at issue:
places
that had no
municipal governments previ
ously.
On the other
hand,
some
American states allow areas to secede
from an established
municipality
and create their
own
municipal govern
ments. This
highlights
the real issue: free
incorporation
of
municipalities
could lead to the
fragmentation
of local
authority, encouraged by
the
spirit
of
privatistic
localism. Once
fragmented,
moreover,
local
authority
could
not be
consolidated,
since the obverse of the
principle
of free
incorpora
tion is that
a
municipality
cannot be dissolved without the consent of its
citizens. This is a
major difficulty,
and it lies behind
virtually
every objec
tion to the idea that
people ought
to have a
constitutionally protected
right
of local
self-government.
How could such an
objection
be overcome?
The answer is
surprisingly simple. Municipal authority
need not be
exclusive,
in relation to the state or other
municipalities.
A wider author
ity
can be formed for
purposes
of local
government,
without
abolishing
any existing municipality. Similarly,
a
smaller
authority
can
be formed
without
detracting
from the
authority
of
a
wider
body.
There is
no
mag
ical formula that will tell us how
many
authorities there should
be,
or
of
what
types,
in
any
particular territory.
Nor need there be
uniformity
from
one area to the next. The
pattern
of human settlement is
quite
varied.
Needs and tastes
change,
and
they
differ from one area to another.
So,
there is no
particular
reason for
supposing
that local
government
should
be on the same
pattern everywhere,
or
that the needs of an area are
likely
to be satisfied with one
particular
form of local
authority.
There is much
to be
done,
in
government
as in
business,
and the
proliferation
of
public
authorities can be a
sign
of
healthy
initiative,
rather than social conflict
and economic
inefficiency. Why
is it so
terrible that
a
hundred-year-old
village
retains its own
municipal
council after the area becomes
part
of a
wider
regional authority?
Is a small rural school board
a
threat to the
modernization of an
educational
system mostly
funded and controlled
by
the
provincial ministry
of education?
Why
is it
impossible
to have
health districts
or
police
forces
on a scale that
people actually
want?
Why
can
urban
neighbourhoods
not have their own
municipal
authorities?
Why
can
people
not
experiment
with authorities on a scale not favoured
by
the
politicians
and officials in the
provincial capitals?
What do we fear
other than
diversity?
Of
course,
there would be difficulties with
any arrangement
that rec
ognized people's rights
to form and maintain
municipal
authorities on
the scale
they
desire.
Relationships among
municipal
authorities and
between the
municipal
authorities and the state would
always
be at issue.
So too would relations between the various
political
authorities and
pri
vate citizens and associations that
were
ostensibly
not
political.
We have
considerable
experience
in this
regard,
however. Not
only
do we have
charters and codes of
human
rights
and established
principles
of natural
justice,
but we
also have courts and tribunals that are
charged
with
keep
ing
a watch
on
such matters.
Arguably,
it is for the state in its federal
or
provincial guise
to
develop
laws that
protect
individual
freedoms,
advance
social
justice,
enhance the
environment,
and so on.
Municipalities
are
bound to stand with at least
one
leg
on the
ground provided by
the laws
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
913
of the state. With the other
leg,
as it
were,
they
stand on the
ground pro
vided
by practices
of local
self-government.
These
practices
need not con
flict with the laws of the state. Much
municipal activity
consists in
providing
services and facilities that the state will not finance. Other activ
ity
involves
regulations particular
to the
community,
which
may supple
ment the law without
replacing
it. On the other
hand,
what
municipalities
could and should do is limited
only by
the
imagination.
It would be na?ve
to
suppose
that robust
municipalities
would never
challenge
the
higher
authorities
or
irritate their
neighbours.
The
practices
of federalism
give
us much
experience
in
dealing
with these issues without
resorting
to the
courts. Canada works
despite
the fact that the federal
government
has to
treat the
provinces
as
independent
authorities. Similar
practices
could be
applied
to the relations between
provinces, municipalities
and
Aborigi
nal authorities.
Exclusive
jurisdiction
is not
necessary
for
political
effectiveness: on
the
contrary.
It is the bane of Canadian federalism that
provinces
claim
exclusive
jurisdiction
over
education,
health
care,
housing,
social ser
vices and
many
other
things.
That
they
have much
greater responsibility
for these matters than the federal
government
is
clear,
and there is cer
tainly
no reason for the federal
government
to
duplicate
what
they
are
doing.
But,
when the
provinces fail,
as
they
often
do,
it is the
people
who suffer when the federal
government
is forestalled from
acting
because
of a
supposed
lack of
jurisdiction. Mean-spirited, negative
federalism has
been the order of the
day
for some time. There is a different
way
of think
ing
about the
possibility
that more than one
government might
act on a
particular problem.
It
may
be that what one
government
does
comple
ments the activities of the
other,
and stimulates further
improvements.
Public action is not a zero-sum
game,
as some
people
seem to
suppose.
Behind
negative
federalism is
hostility
to
public action,
fed
by
fears of
over-regulation
and over-taxation. These fears are
justified by
a
particu
lar
ideology:
the
very
ideology
that sustains
privatism
or
particularistic
localism. In
recognizing
a
right
of local
self-government,
we would be
acknowledging people's right
to
go
beyond
the limits
implicit
in that
par
ticular
ideology
and
begin developing
their communities in other
ways
(even
if that meant
having higher
taxes and more
regulations
than the
Wall Street bond traders think
appropriate).
Thanks to its
spending
power,
the federal
government
can
play
a role in
freeing municipalities
from the
strictures that
provinces
have
placed
upon
them.
It
might
be
argued
that a
right
of local
self-government
is
already
implicit
in the
"principles
of a free and democratic
society."
The courts
are not
yet persuaded
of
this,
because
they
share in the fears that this
article is intended to
dispel.
I would
go
so
far as to
say
that the
princi
ples
of a
free and democratic
society
flow from the
right
of local self
government,
rather than the other
way
around. The
right
of an
individual
to be free or of a
country
to
govern
itself are
particular
instances of
a
right
of local
self-government, properly
understood. Be that as it
may,
it
has
long
been evident that there is an intimate relation between democ
racy,
freedom and local
self-government,
a
relation that
we are still
try
ing
to
get right.
The
municipality
has been and could
again
be a
political
authority
of a different
type,
one that can flourish within a
universaliz
ing
urbanism.
Recognizing people's rights
to create and maintain munici
palities
is
important
for
opening
up
the
possibilities
for
public
action and
overcoming
the
privatism
that inhibits it. We need
freedom,
not
repres
sion and exclusion.
Notes
1 In
Britain,
the
principle
of
parliamentary sovereignty
has
long
been
unquestioned
(or
at least it was until Britain
joined
the
European Union).
In the standard nineteenth
century accounts,
local authorities had
no
inherent
right
to exist:
they
derived their
powers
from
parliamentary
statute or
royal
charter
(Loughlin, 2000).
The courts had
upheld
this view
during
the
quo
warranto
proceedings
in the late seventeenth cen
tury (Levin, 1969).
The
contrary view,
rooted in the idea that there was an "ancient
constitution" that
guaranteed
the
rights
of
Englishmen (Pocock, 1957),
still had its
exponents
in the nineteenth
century.
Joshua Toulmin Smith
(1851) argued
that
Parliament's
authority
derived from
previously existing
institutions of local self
government,
which could not be abolished
by parliamentary
statute
(compare
Green
leaf, 1975). Loughlin
et al.
(1985)
and
Loughlin (1986, 1996)
deal with more recent
British
theory
and
practice,
but the older books
give
a better overview of the evo
lution of British
thinking
until
1949,
when Canada's
judicial independence
was
finally
established
(see Redlich, 1903;
Webb and
Webb, 1906-29; Griffith, 1927; Robson,
1931; Laski, 1935; Smellie, 1946; Lipman, 1949).
2 Isin
(1992) argues
that there was a deliberate effort on the
part
of the colonial author
ities to forestall the
development
of autonomous
municipal
institutions in Canada.
Section
92(8)
of The Constitution Act
(1867) gave
the
provincial legislatures
the exclu
sive
right
to make laws in relation to
"municipal
institutions in the
province."
Accord
ing
to the
Supreme
Court of
Canada,
"municipalities
are
entirely
the creatures of
provincial
statutes"
(R.
v.
Greenbaum, [1993]
S.C.R.
674,
at
687)
and
they
"do not
have an
independent
constitutional status.
They essentially represent delegated gov
ernment." This is
despite
the fact that
"municipalities
exercise a
plenary
set of
legis
lative and executive
powers" (Nanaimo (City)
v. Rascal
Trucking
Ltd., [2000]
1 S.C.R.
342,
at
343).
In Public School Boards
'
Association
of
Alberta
v.
Alberta
(Attorney
General), [2000]
2 S.C.R.
409,
the
Supreme
Court
accepted
that school boards
were
municipal
institutions,
but
rejected
the claim that the Canadian Constitution
guaran
teed "reasonable
autonomy"
for
municipal
institutions: "School boards do not
enjoy
reasonable
autonomy
from
provincial
control.... Under
s. 93 of The Constitution
Act,
1867,
the
provinces
have
plenary jurisdiction
over education. A claim to an institu
tional
sphere
of reasonable
autonomy
is inconsistent
with,
and could
impair,
this
ple
nary power" (412).
This echoes the view of the
English High
Court in the
1680s,
which declared that "if the
contrary
had been
held,
then 'little
republics'
would
spring
up
all over the
Kingdom,
which would not be conducive to
good government." (Levin,
1969:
49).
3 The American case is
complex,
because the
principle
of
popular sovereignty
is invoked
in the
preamble
to the US Constitution as well as in the various state constitutions.
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
915
State constitutions often limit the
authority
of state
legislatures
in relation to munici
pal
and other local institutions. On the other
hand,
those same constitutions often
empower
the state electorate to
impose
restrictions on local authorities. Whatever the
arrangements, they
are conditioned
by
the
principle ("Dillon's Rule")
that
municipal
ities are creatures of the
state,
and hence have no inherent
right
to exist
(see Syed,
1966 and
Frug,
1999 for
general analysis).
4 See
Eaton, 1900-1901,
for an
attempt
to read the
right
of local
self-government
into
the US Constitution
(compare McQuillin, 1911).
American scholars have found it dif
ficult to see their
way past
the US
Supreme
Court's
ruling upholding
Dillon's Rule in
Hunter v.
City of Pittsburgh,
207 U.S.
161,
178
(1907) (however,
see
Sullivan,
2001
for one
attempt, keyed
to the 10th
Amendment).
In
Canada,
claims about a
right
of
local
self-government
have been advanced in various contexts: most
notably
in the cam
paigns against
the
"megacity" amalgamations
in Toronto
(1997-98)
and Montreal
(2000-03),
but also in the context of
provincial
efforts to
impose spending
controls
on local school boards.
Opponents
of the Toronto
amalgamation
were unable to
get
leave to
appeal
to the
highest
court
(Milroy, 2002),
and in
any
case framed their
legal
case in
relatively
modest terms. John
Sewell,
a former
mayor
of Toronto and
leading
spokesman
for Citizens for Local
Democracy (C4LD),
which
spearheaded
the cam
paign against amalgamation (Boudreau, 2000),
has broadened his efforts
through
the
Local
Self-Government
Bulletin
(available
at
http//:www.localgovernment.ca).
The bul
letin is now
sponsored by
Alan
Broadbent,
who was
instrumental in
developing
a
widely publicized proposal
for a Toronto
city
charter
(Keil, 2003).
The claims advanced
by Sewell,
Broadbent and their associates
(including
the
internationally
famous urban
ist,
Jane
Jacobs)
are more modest variants of ones that
emerged
a
generation
earlier
in Montreal
(see,
for
instance, Schecter,
1978 and
Roussopoulos, 1982; compare
Jacobs
1980, 1984).
5 Such concerns were raised before the
Supreme
Court of Canada in
Delgamuukw
v.
British Columbia
[1997]
3 S.C.R.
1010,
the
leading
case on the
Aboriginal right
of
self-government.
Lamer,
C.J. et al. took the view that even the mundane
require
ments of the wider
society,
as understood
by
the
provincial legislatures
or the federal
Parliament,
took
precedence
over
Aboriginal rights.
Constitutionally recognized aboriginal rights
are not absolute and
may
be
infringed by
the federal and
if the
infringement (1)
furthers a
compelling
and substantial
legislative objective
and
(2)
is consis
tent with the
special fiduciary relationship
between the Crown and the
aborig
inal
peoples.
The
development
of
agriculture, forestry, mining
and
hydroelectric
power,
the
general
economic
development
of the interior of British
Columbia,
protection
of the environment or
endangered species,
and the
building
of infra
structure and the settlement of
foreign populations
to
support
those
aims,
are
objectives
consistent with this
purpose.
6 This article is one of a
trio,
written for different audiences
(see
also
Magnusson,
2005a and
2005b;
it follows on from the
analysis
in
Magnusson, 1996).
7
Self-government
is a Janus-faced
concept,
since the self is both
governor
and
gov
erned. In so far as the self is
governed
in accordance with universal
principles?as
in
the Kantian notion of
autonomy?the
benefit is not for the self alone. Foucault drew
our attention to the
way
in which authorities can
govern
"at a
distance"
by inducing
people
to
govern
themselves in accordance with
particular principles.
There is now a
large
critical literature on such
practices,
under the
heading
of
"governmentality"
(see
Burchell et
al., 1991; Dean, 1999; Rose, 1999).
The issues raised in this litera
ture will not be discussed
here,
but it is worth
noting
that Foucauldian
critiques sug
gest
that the most
worrying aspect
of local
self-government
is not that local authorities
will act
against
the norms of the
larger society,
but rather that such authorities will
be all too conformist
(for
an
interesting
Foucauldian
analysis
of the
amalgamation
dispute
in
Toronto,
see
Isin, 1998).
8 The influential American
political theorist,
Iris Marion
Young,
articulates this fear in
her discussion of local
autonomy:
If the whole
society
were to be
organized
as a confederation of autonomous
municipalities,
what would
prevent
the
development
of
large-scale inequality
and
injustice among communities,
and
thereby
the
oppression
of individuals
who do not live in the more
privileged
or more
powerful
communities?
...
The
problems
of atomism are the same whether the atoms are
individuals,
house
holds or cities. At least since Hobbes it has been clear that without a sover
eign authority
to mediate and
regulate
relations between
agents,
there is
nothing
to
prevent domination,
exploitation,
and
oppression. (Young,
1990:
253)
Note the reference to Hobbes. As John Stuart Mill
put
it:
The localities
may
be allowed to
mismanage
their own
interests,
but not to
prejudice
those of
others,
nor violate those
principles
of
justice
between one
person
and
another,
of which it is the
duty
of the State to maintain a
rigid
observance. If the local
majority attempts
to
oppress
the
minority,
or one class
another,
the State is bound to intervene.
(Mill,
1991:
424)
Lying
behind most theories of
justice (including
ones
like
Young's
or
Mill's,
which
appear
to be
sympathetic
to
difference)
is a belief that normative order
requires
sov
ereign authority
for its own maintenance.
9 The
question
of whether the
people
have a
right
of local
self-government
is not the
same as the
question
of whether
municipalities
have a
right
to exist. To
put
a com
plicated point briefly:
the
right
of local
self-government
includes the
right
to
spec
ify
the relevant
localities,
and the latter
may
be different from the ones that
already
exist.
10 There are
many
other
accounts,
of course.
Syed (1966),
Teaford
(1979)
and Burns
(1994)
are
particularly helpful.
11 I am
following
Briffault's
analysis
here. The American courts have rationalized sub
urban
autonomy by treating
the
municipality
as an extension of the home. There is a
double move involved. Insofar as the
municipality
is still
regarded
as an arm of the
state
(hence
as a
public authority),
its
powers
are limited
by
the
rights
of
property
(and
other
rights
ascribed to individuals and
families). Frug (1980, 1999) analyzes
this. On the other
hand,
insofar as
the
municipality
is conceived as an extension of
the
individual,
the
family
and the
home,
it can be seen to
require
the same sort of
protections
as the latter from the
authority
of the state or the
city.
Suburban auton
omy
is rationalized as a kind of
private right,
and
municipalities
are conceived as
homeowners' associations writ
large.
This is an old
idea,
of
course,
dating
back to
the
days
when
municipalities
were conceived
as
"joint-stock companies" (compare
Teaford, 1979). My
claim is not that suburban
municipalities always
behave like
pri
vate
authorities,
only
that the rationale for suburban
autonomy
is rooted in the idea
that
private rights (or authority)
must be defended.
12 Liberals tend to make a distinction between
right
and
authority,
which enables them
to efface the
similarity
between the two. "Dieu et mon droit"
("God
and
my
right")
was the
royal
motto,
which underscored the
king's
claim to
authority.
The
king's "right"
was to rule: that
is,
to wield
political authority
as a matter of
private right.
The doc
trine of
sovereignty,
which echoed certain
precepts
of Roman
law, assigned
exclusive
political authority
to the
king (or,
in later
variants,
to the
body, representative
of the
people,
which stood in
place
of the
king).
This exclusive
authority
was a
right
of the
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
917
highest
order. It
trumped
all other
rights,
because it was
supposed
to be the condition
for such
rights
to exist
(as Young, 1990, following
Hobbes and Kant and
Mill, avers).
Every right
constitutes
an
authority
of some sort:
private
or
public,
individual
or col
lective. An individual with a
right
must have the
authority
to do
something:
to act in
self-defence,
for
instance,
or to order
people
off his or her
property.
In liberal
thought,
authority
reserved for individuals or
organizations
with
private purposes
is covered
by
the doctrine of
rights. Rights
are
supposed
to
protect
individuals or
private orga
nizations
against public
authorities.
Thus, rights
are on one side and
dangerous
author
ity
on
the other. This is a
profoundly misleading view,
which obscures the
plasticity
of distinctions between
public
and
private, right
and
authority.
13 To
speak
of a Canadian
theory
of local
government
seems
odd,
but one can trace a
certain line of
thought.
The
early
texts,
such as
Bourinot
(1887),
Shortt
(1914)
and
McKay (1914),
call attention to the British resistance to American
models,
as well as
to the attractiveness of the models themselves. Wickett
(1907)
and Munro
(1929)
write in an era in which
American-style municipal
reform is
very
much in fashion.
The influence of such
thinking
is still
apparent
when Brittain
(1951)
and Crawford
(1954)
are
writing,
but
by
the time Plunkett
(1968)
and Feldman and Goldrick
(1969)
produce
their
work,
a
very
different view has become dominant: one that criticizes
Americans for
allowing parochial
interests to stand in the
way
of "area-wide" solu
tions. Metro Toronto is
symbolic,
for it is a
government
in the wider
interest,
of a
type
that Americans seem unable to
generate (Magnusson, 1981).
Such an
authority
could not have come into existence if the
province
of Ontario had bowed to the
objec
tions of suburban
municipalities.
Most of the
supposed
advances of
postwar
Cana
dian
government
were
dependent
on the
willingness
of the
provinces (often encouraged
by
the federal
government)
to overcome local resistance to the
reorganization
of the
school
system,
health
care, welfare,
etc. The British
(or
more
broadly European)
model
was often in mind,
(see,
for
instance,
Brownstone and
Plunkett, 1983.)
The American
urban riots of the 1960s
(and later)
were taken as evidence of a failed
policy,
rooted
in an
inability
to confront the
short-sighted
self-interestedness of white suburbia. Later
analysts
have not moved far from this
opinion: compare Higgins (1977),
Tindal and
Tindal
(1979), Kaplan (1982), Magnusson
and Sancton
(1983), Higgins (1986),
Loreto
and Price
(1990),
Frisken
(1994), Lightbody (1995),
Thomas
(1997),
Graham and
Phillips
with Maslove
(1998),
Fowler and
Siegel (2002)
and McAllister
(2004). Explicit
comparisons
of the US and Canada?for
instance,
Frisken
(1986), Goldberg
and
Mercer
(1986),
Rothblatt and Sancton
(1993)
and Garber and Imbroscio
(1996)?
complicate
the
picture,
but the United States
usually
still
appears
as the anti-model
for Canadian local
government.
14 British Columbia's 2003
Community
Charter
(s. 279)
also
provides against
"forced
amalgamation"
of
municipalities,
and so this
may
be a trend in the
opposite
direction.
15 It is
significant
that British Columbia's
Community Charter,
which was
supposed
to
enhance local
autonomy,
includes
specific provision (s. 199)
for the
province
to
pre
scribe limits on local
property
taxes. Such limits have been
imposed
in several
prov
inces,
including
Ontario. This is
part
of a more
general practice (Magnusson,
1996:
217-40).
School boards in
many
of the
provinces
have lost their
right
to raise their
own funds
(except perhaps by
charitable
subscription) (see
Tindal and
Tindal,
2004:
236-39).
16 In
my view,
the
"megacity" amalgamation
in Toronto
and,
more
generally,
the amal
gamations imposed by
the Conservative
provincial government
in Ontario
are illus
trative of this
cycle (see Keil, 1998; Isin, 1998; Boudreau, 2000; Sancton, 2000).
17 This
pattern
is even more evident in Britain than Canada. The Thatcher
government's
effort to rein in the Labour Left local authorities in the 1980s was
legitimated
with
reference to the
sovereign right
of the central
government?a sovereign right
that
Labour itself had insisted
upon
in the 1960s and 1970s.
Subsequent reforms,
carried
forward
by
the current Blair
government,
have been based on American
models,
which
emphasize
consumer choice and
private
initiative
(compare
Stoker, 2003).
18 The Court has
recently
been more
generous
in its
rulings (see especially
114957 Can
ada Lt?e
(Spraytech,
Soci?t?
d'arrosage)
and Services des
espaces
verts Lt?e/
Chemlawn
v. Town
of Hudson, [2001]
2 S.C.R.
241).
19 For the standard accounts of the doctrine of
sovereignty,
see
Stankiewicz
(1969)
and
Hinsley (1986).
The best critical account is in Bartelson
(1995).
20 To be outside the order of
sovereignty
is not a
problem
in
itself,
as I
attempt
to
explain
in the
following pages.
It becomes a
problem
when
people
assume that bodies must
be either
public
or
private:
of the state or of civil
society. Then,
the
municipality,
which is on the line between the two
(Magnusson, 1985), appears
as both a lesser
body
of the state and a somewhat defective
(because
not
fully private) organization
within civil
society. Privatization,
effected if
necessary by
a
robust assertion of sov
ereign authority,
then seems like a sensible
way
of
overcoming
the
ambiguity (com
pare Dean,
1999 and
Rose, 1999).
21 Macklem
argues
that the
recognition
of
Aboriginal
claims
"requires
a
non-absolute,
pragmatic conception
of
sovereignty
that
contemplates
a
plurality
of entities wield
ing sovereign authority
within the Canadian constitutional order. The
legitimacy
of
Canadian
sovereignty
thus
depends
on constitutional
recognition
of territorial and
jurisdictional
spaces
in which
Aboriginal
societies can take root and
flourish,
which
in turn
requires reconceiving
Canadian
sovereignty
in non-absolute terms"
(2001: 7).
By invoking
a
"non-absolute, pragmatic conception
of
sovereignty,"
Macklem is able
to work round
Canada's
claim to exclusive
sovereignty.
There are
good
reasons for
lawyers
to
adopt
such a
pragmatic strategy,
but
political
scientists have
greater
free
dom. I think that it is more accurate to
say
that the First Nations claim
something
other than
sovereignty.
To
impose
the
language
of
sovereignty
onto to native claims
is to
impute
demands that are
rarely present
and to foreclose
opportunities
for
explor
ing
different
relationships
between autonomous
political
authorities.
Sovereign
subject
and
sovereign-sovereign
are not the
only possible
relations between authorities.
22 These
possibilities
have been
explored
to some extent in the urban literature
(for
example,
see
Mumford, 1938; Jacobs, 1984; Bookchin, 1987;
Peirce et
al., 1993;
Magnusson,
1996;
Williamson et
al., 2003),
but that literature has had little effect on
mainstream
political theory.
23 To
speak
of
European practice
as if it were all of a
piece
can be
misleading.
There
are
many
different
systems
of local
government
in
Europe (Loughlin,
2001; John,
2001). Nevertheless,
there are fundamental
similarities,
which are revealed
by
the
European
Charter of Local
Self-Government, adopted by
the Council of
Europe
in
1985
(European Treaty Series,
no.
122).
That
Charter, although sympathetic
to local
self-government,
nonetheless treats local authorities as "emanations of the state"
(to
quote
the characterization now
accepted
in
European law).
It does not deal with the
popular right
to create new local authorities.
References
Bartelson,
Jens. 1995. A
Genealogy of Sovereignty. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Bartelson,
Jens. 2001. The
Critique of
the State.
Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Bickford,
Susan. 2000.
"Constructing Inequality: City Spaces
and the Architecture of Cit
izenship."
Political
Theory, 28(3):
355-76.
Blakely,
Edward J. and
Mary
Gail
Snyder.
1997. Fortress America: Gated Communities in
the United States.
Washington: Brookings
Institution Press and
Cambridge,
MA: Lin
coln Institute of Land
Policy.
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
919
Bookchin, Murray.
1987. The Rise
of
Urbanization and the Decline
of Citizenship.
San
Francisco: Sierra Club Books.
Boudreau,
Julie-Anne. 2000. The
Megacity Saga: Democracy
and
Citizenship
in this Global
Age.
Montreal: Black Rose Books.
Bourinot,
John
George.
1887. "Local Government in Canada." Johns
Hopkins University
Studies in Historical and Political
Science,
5th series. Baltimore: Johns
Hopkins
Uni
versity
Press.
Briffault,
Richard. 1990. "Our
Localism,
Part II?Localism and
Legal Theory."
Columbia
Law Review 90: 346-454.
Brittain,
Horace L. 1951. Local Government in Canada. Toronto:
Ryerson.
Brownstone, Meyer,
andT. J. Plunkett. 1983.
Metropolitan Winnipeg:
Politics and
Reform
of
Local Government.
Berkeley: University
of California Press.
Burchell, Graham,
Colin Gordon and Peter
Miller,
eds. 1991. The Foucault
Effect:
Studies
in
Governmentality. Chicago: University
of
Chicago
Press.
Burns,
Nancy.
1994. The Formation
of
American Local Governments. New York: Oxford
University
Press.
Crawford,
Kenneth G. 1954. Canadian
Municipal
Government. Toronto:
University
of
Toronto Press.
Cutler,
A.
Claire, Virginia
Haufler and
Tony
Porter,
eds. 1999. Private
Authority
and Inter
national
Affairs. Albany:
State
University
of New York Press.
Dean,
Mitchell. 1999.
Governmentality:
Power and Rule in Modern
Society.
London:
Sage
Publications..
Dreier, Peter,
John
Mollenkopf
and Todd Swanstrom. 2001. Place Matters:
Metropolitics
for
the
Twenty-first Century.
2nd ed. Lawrence:
University
Press of Kansas.
Eaton,
Amasa M. 1900-1901. "The
Right
to Local Self-Government." Harvard Law Review
13:
441-54, 570-88,
638-58 and 14:
20-38,
116-38.
Feldman,
Lionel D. and Michael D.
Goldrick,
eds. 1969. Politics and Government
of
Urban
Canada. Toronto: Methuen.
Fowler,
Edmund P. and David
Siegel,
eds. 2002. Urban
Policy
Issues: Canadian
Perspec
tives. Toronto: Oxford
University
Press.
Frisken,
Frances. 1986. "Canadian Cities and the American
Example:
A
Prologue
to Urban
Policy Analysis."
Canadian Public Administration 29: 345-76.
Frisken, Frances,
ed. 1994. The
Changing
Canadian
Metropolis:
A Public
Policy Perspec
tive,
two volumes.
Berkeley:
Institute of Governmental Studies Press.
Frug,
Gerald E. 1980. "The
City
as a
Legal Concept."
Harvard Law Review 93
(6):
1053-1154.
Frug,
Gerald E. 1999.
City-Making: Building
Cities without
Building
Walls.
Princeton,
NJ: Princeton
University
Press.
Garber,
Judith A. and David L. Imbroscio. 1996. '"The
Myth
of the North American
City'
Reconsidered: Local Constitutional
Regimes
in Canada and the United States." Urban
Affairs
Review
31(5):
595-624.
Goldberg,
Michael A. and John Mercer. 1986. The
Myth of
the North American
City:
Con
tinentalism
Challenged.
Vancouver:
University
of British Columbia Press.
Graham,
Katherine A. and Susan D.
Phillips,
with Allan M. Maslove. 1998. Urban Gov
ernance in Canada:
Representation,
Resources,
and
Restructuring.
Toronto: Har
court Brace.
Greenleaf,
W.H. 1975. "Toulmin-Smith and the British Political Tradition." Public Admin
istration 53: 25-44.
Griffith,
Ernest S. 1927. The Modern
Development of City
Government in the United
King
dom and the United
States,
two volumes. London: Oxford
University
Press.
Honohan,
Iseult. 2002. Civic
Republicanism.
London:
Routledge.
Higgins,
Donald J.H. 1977. Urban Canada: Its Government and Politics. Toronto:
Macmillan.
Higgins,
Donald J.H. 1986. Local and Urban Politics in Canada. Toronto:
Gage.
Hinsley,
F.H. 1986.
Sovereignty,
second edition.
Press.
Isin,
Engin.
1992. Cities without Citizens: The
Modernity of
the
City
as a
Corporation.
Montreal: Black Rose Books.
Isin, Engin.
1998.
"Governing
Toronto without Government: Liberalism and Neo
Liberalism." Studies in Political
Economy
56: 169-91.
Isin, Engin.
2002.
Being
Political:
Genealogies of Citizenship. Minneapolis: University
of
Minnesota Press.
Jacobs,
Jane. 1980. Canadian Cities and
Sovereignty
Association. Toronto: CBC.
Jacobs,
Jane. 1984. Cities and the Wealth
of
Nations:
Principle of
Economic
Life.
New
York: Random House.
John,
Peter. 2001. Local Governance in Western
Europe.
London:
Sage
Publications.
Judd,
Dennis and Todd Swanstrom. 2001.
City
Politics: Private
Power,
Public
Policy,
third
edition. New York:
Longman.
Kaplan,
Harold. 1982.
Reform, Planning,
and
City
Politics:
Montreal,
Winnipeg,
Toronto.
Toronto:
University
of Toronto Press.
Keane,
John. 2003. Global Civil
Society? Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Keating,
Michael. 1991.
Comparative
Urban Politics: Power and the
City
in the United
States, Canada,
Britain and France.
Aldershot, England:
Edward
Elgar.
Keil, Roger.
1998. "Toronto in the 1990s: Dissociated Governance?" Studies in Political
Economy
56: 151-67.
Keil,
Roger
and
Douglas Young.
2003. "A Charter for the
People?
A research note on
the debate about
municipal autonomy
in Toronto." Urban
Affairs
Review
39(1):
87-101.
Laski, Harold,
ed. 1935. A
Century of Municipal Progress,
1835-1935. London:
George
Allen & Unwin.
Levin,
Jennifer. 1969. The Charter
Controversy
in the
City of
London, 1660?1688,
and its
Consequences.
London: Athlone Press.
Lightbody,
James,
ed. 1995.
Metropolitics: Governing
Our Cities. Toronto:
Copp
Clark.
Lipman,
VD. 1949. Local Government
Areas,
1834-1945. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
Loreto,
Richard A. and Trevor
Price,
eds. 1990. Urban
Policy
Issues: Canadian
Perspec
tives. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart.
Loughlin, John,
ed. 2001. Subnational
Democracy
in the
European
Union:
Challenges
and
Opportunities.
Oxford: Oxford
University
Press.
Loughlin,
Martin. 1986. Local Government in the Modern State. London: Sweet & Maxwell.
Loughlin,
Martin. 1996.
Legality
and
Locality:
The Role
of
Law in Central-Local Govern
ment Relations. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Loughlin,
Martin. 2000. Sword and Scales: An Examination
of
the
Relationship
between
Law and Politics. Oxford: Hart.
Loughlin,
Martin
F,
M. David Gelfand and Ken
Young.
1985.
Haifa Century of
Munici
pal
Decline,
1935-1985. London: Allen & Unwin.
McAllister, Mary
Louise. 2004.
Governing
Ourselves? The Politics
of
Canadian Commu
nities. Vancouver: UBC Press.
Macklem,
Patrick. 2001.
Indigenous Difference
and the Constitution
of
Canada. Toronto:
University
of Toronto Press.
McKay,
K.W. 1914.
"Municipal History,
1867-1913." In Canada and Its
Provinces,
vol.
18: The Province
of Ontario, part II,
eds. Adam Shortt and Arthur G.
Doughty.
Toronto:
Publishers' Association of Canada.
McKenzie,
Evan. 1994.
Privatopia:
Homeowner Associations and the Rise
of
Residential
Private Government. New Haven: Yale
University
Press.
McQuillin, Eugene.
1911. A Treatise on the Law
of Municipal Corporations. Chicago:
Callaghan
&
Company.
Protecting
the
Right of
Local
Self-Government
921
Magnusson,
Warren. 1981.
"Metropolitan
Reform in the
Capitalist City."
Canadian Jour
nal
of
Political Science 14: 557-85.
Magnusson,
Warren. 1985. "The Local State in Canada: Theoretical
Perspectives."
Cana
dian Public Administration 28
(4):
575-99.
Magnusson,
Warren. 1996. The Search
for
Political
Space:
Globalization,
Social Move
ments and the Urban Political
Experience.
Toronto:
University
of Toronto Press.
Magnusson,
Warren. 2005a.
"Urbanism, Cities,
and Local Self-Government." Canadian
Public Administration 48
(1):
96-123.
Magnusson,
Warren. 2005b. "Are
Municipalities
Creatures of the Provinces?" Journal
of
Canadian Studies 39
(2):
5-29.
Magnusson,
Warren and Andrew
Sancton,
eds. 1983.
City
Politics in Canada. Toronto:
University
of Toronto Press.
Mill,
John Stuart. 1991. On
Liberty
and Other
Essays.
Oxford: Oxford
University
Press.
Milroy,
Beth Moore. 2002. "Toronto's
Legal Challenge
to
Amalgamation."
In Urban
Affairs:
Back on the
Policy Agenda,
eds. Caroline
Andrew,
Katherine A. Graham and Susan
D.
Phillips.
Montreal &
Kingston: McGill-Queen's University
Press.
Mumford,
Lewis. 1938. The Culture
of
Cities. Dan
Diego:
Harcourt Brace.
Munro,
William B. 1929. American
Influences
on
Canadian Government. Toronto:
Macmillan.
Oliver,
J. Eric. 2001.
Democracy
in Suburbia. Princeton NJ: Princeton
University
Press.
Ougaard,
Marten and Richard
Higgott,
eds. 2002. Towards a Global
Polity.
London:
Routledge.
Patom?ki,
H. 2002.
After
International Relations: Critical Realism and the
(Re)construc
tion
of
World Politics. London:
Routledge.
Peirce,
Neal
R.,
Curtis W. Johnson and John Stuart Hall. 1993. Citistates: How Urban
America Can
Prosper
in a
Competitive
World.
Washington,
DC: Seven Locks Press.
Pirenne,
H. 1925. Medieval Cities. Princeton: Princeton
University
Press.
Plunkett,
Thomas J. 1968. Urban Canada and its Government: A
Study of Municipal Orga
nization. Toronto: Macmillan.
Reynolds,
Susan. 1997.
Kingdoms
and Communities in Western
Europe, 900-1300,
sec
ond edition. Oxford: Oxford
University
Press.
Rose,
Nikolas. 1999. Powers
of
Freedom:
Reframing
Political
Thought. Cambridge:
Cam
bridge University
Press.
Roussopoulos, Dimitrios,
ed. 1982. The
City
and Radical Social
Change.
Montreal: Black
Rose Books.
Pocock,
J.G.A. 1957. The Ancient Constitution and the Feudal Law.
Cambridge:
Cam
bridge University
Press.
Redlich,
Josef. 1903. Local Government in
England,
two volumes. London: Macmillan.
Robson,
William A. 1931. The
Development of
Local Government. London:
George
Allen
and Unwin.
Rothblatt,
Donald N. and Andrew
Sancton,
eds. 1993.
Metropolitan
Governance: American/
Canadian
Perspectives. Berkeley:
Institute of Governmental Studies Press.
Sancton,
Andrew. 2000.
Merger
Mania. Montreal and
Kingston: McGill-Queen's
Univer
sity
Press.
Shaw,
Martin. 2000.
Theory of
the Global state:
Globality
as
Unfinished
Revolution. Cam
bridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Schecter, Stephen.
1978. The Politics
of
Urban Liberation. Montreal: Black Rose Books.
Sinclair, Timothy J.,
ed. 2004. Global
governance,
four volumes. London:
Routledge.
Shortt,
Adam. 1914.
"Municipal History,
1791-1867." In Canada and Its
Provinces,
vol.
18: The Province
of Ontario, part II,
eds. Adam Shortt and Arthur G.
Doughty.
Toronto:
Publishers' Association of Canada.
Skinner, Quentin
and Bo
Str?th,
eds. 2003. States and Citizens:
History, Theory,
Pros
pects. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Smellie,
K.B. 1946. A
History of
Local Government. London:
George
Allen & Unwin.
Supreme
Court of Canada. Public School Boards
'
Association
of
Alberta v. Alberta
(Attor
ney General), [2000]
2 S.C.R. 409.
Smith,
Joshua Toulmin. 1851. Local
Self-Government
and Centralization. London: John
Chapman.
Stankiewicz, W.J.,
ed. 1969. In
Defense of Sovereignty.
New York: Oxford
University
Press.
Stoker,
Gerry.
2003.
Transforming
Local Governance: From Thatcherism to New Labour.
New York:
Palgrave
Macmillan.
Sullivan,
Jake. 2003. "The Tenth Amendment and local
government."
Yale Law Journal
112(7):
1935-43.
Syed,
Anwar H. 1966. The Political
Theory of
American Local Government. New York:
Random House.
Teaford,
Jon C. 1979.
City
and Suburbs. Baltimore: Johns
Hopkins University
Press.
Thomas, Timothy L.,
ed. 1997. The Politics
of
the
City:
A Canadian
Perspective.
Toronto:
ITP Nelson.
Tindal,
C. Richard and Susan N. Tindal. 1979. Local Government in Canada. Toronto:
McGraw-Hill
Ryerson.
Tindal,
C.
Richard,
and Susan N. Tindal. 2000. Local Government in
Canada,
fifth edi
tion. Toronto: Nelson Thomson.
Tindal,
C.
Richard,
and Susan N. Tindal. 2004. Local Government in
Canada,
sixth edi
tion. Toronto: Nelson Thomson.
Von
Gierke,
Otto. 1900. Political Theories
of
the Middle
Age. Cambridge: Cambridge
Uni
versity
Press.
Von
Gierke,
Otto. 1990.
Community
in Historical
Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge
Uni
versity
Press.
Webb, Sidney
and Beatrice Webb. 1906-29.
English
Local
Government,
eleven volumes.
London:
Longmans,
Green.
Webb, Sidney
and Beatrice Webb. 1975
[1920].
A Constitution
for
the Socialist Common
wealth
of
Great Britain.
Press.
Weber,
Max. 1978.
Economy
and
Society,
two volumes.
Berkeley
and Los
Angeles:
Uni
versity
of California Press.
Wickett, Morley S.,
ed. 1907.
Municipal
Government in Canada. Toronto:
University
of
Toronto Studies in
History
and Economics.
Williamson, Thad,
David Imbroscio and Gar
Alperovitz.
2003.
Making
Place
for
Commu
nity:
Local
Democracy
in a Global Era. New York:
Routledge.
Wirth,
Louis. 1964. On Cities and Social
Life,
ed. Albert J.
Reiss,
Jr.
Chicago: University
of
Chicago
Press.
Young,
Iris Marion. 1990. Justice and the Politics
of Difference.
Princeton,
NJ: Princeton
University
Press.

Saud 6

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Saud 6

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Socit qubcoise de science politique

Protecting the Right of Local Self-Government

You might also like