Do changing institutions matter? : the role of the local councillors in Flanders after the local government reform

Due to the 2001 federal state reform in Belgium the authority on local government has been transferred from the federal level to the regional level. This resulted in 2005 in the first Flemish Local Government Act. To strengthen the role of the local council and its councillors was one of the main formal goals of this reform. This implies a reinforcement of the councillors’ controlling role, a quality improvement of the council meetings and a reorientation from detail handling towards broad long term issues during the debates. The Local Government Act offers the councillors several tools to achieve a stronger council. This paper deals with two questions: 1. To what extent do the local councillors use these tools? 2. To what extent does the use of these tools lead to a strengthened local council? Our analyse is based on Bekkers’ framework, distincting the rational, the political, the cultural and the institutional policy approach. We examine to what extend these approaches can explain the shifts in the local councils behaviour. Our data material result from a survey organized in 2009. This survey was directed at all local councillors (including mayors and aldermen) and all city managers. We are able to compare these different actors’ views on the Local Government Act. We conclude that the impact of these models is rather limited to explain the potential strengthening of the local council. At least we must conclude that the strengthening of the local council, as a result of institutional innovation, will not occur from one day to the next.