ABSTRACT

Talking is cheap, at least in the short term; elected officials may profess their preferences for IMC and yet deny IMA organisations the necessary resources to fulfil their missions. Driven by a focus on revealed preferences for inter-municipal cooperation, the article aims to answer two questions: Why do some IMA exhibit a high level of commitment on the part of their local government members whereas others remain underutilised, reflecting a choice by local governments to retain these responsibilities themselves? How does this commitment to IMAs vary over time? We use data from 25 IMAs over a 10-year period (2008–2018) in Portugal to assess the intensity of cooperation among Portuguese local governments through stand-alone organisations. The panel analysis regression supports the hypotheses that a larger number of local governments involved in IMAs and higher levels of heterogeneity among them make cooperation more difficult. In contrast, longer interaction in IMAs reinforces the intensity of cooperation.

摘要

谈话是廉价的，至少在短期内是这样；民选官员可能会表态他们对 IMC 的偏好，但拒绝 IMA 组织完成其使命所需的资源。在关注城市间合作的显性偏好的推动下，本文旨在回答两个问题：为什么一些 IMA 表现出其地方政府成员的高度承诺，而其他 IMA 仍未得到充分利用，这反映了地方政府的选择自己保留这些责任？这种对 IMA 的承诺如何随时间变化？我们使用来自葡萄牙 10 年（2008-2018 年）25 个 IMA 的数据来评估葡萄牙地方政府通过独立组织的合作强度。面板分析回归支持了这样的假设，即参与 IMA 的地方政府数量越多，它们之间的异质性水平越高，合作难度越大。相比之下，IMA 中更长的互动会加强合作的强度。