Given the recent increase in targeted state grants within primary schools, this study aims to examine target grants as a policy tool. It seeks to understand how actors perceive governance through state grants and to identify potential conflicts between the state and municipalities. The empirical data consist of interviews with stakeholders from municipal and state levels. The study employs a new institutional perspective, applied across three dimensions: (1) mistrust-based vs. trust-based governance, (2) centralisation vs. decentralisation, and (3) political vs. professional governance. The analysis indicate that the conflict between national equality and municipal autonomy influences actors' perceptions of governance. The results indicate that state grants are viewed as tools for demonstrating political action and addressing inequality, but they also produce negative side effects, such as increased administrative costs for municipalities. Governance through targeted grants is perceived as being based on mistrust, and their design risks steering municipal operations. Additionally, the study shows that actors' perceptions of state grants are driven by competing institutional logics, which may create tensions between the state and municipalities. In conclusion, the study presents a model that unifies these dimensions. The model illustrates the trade-off between strong state governance through targeted grants and broader, more general grants resulting in weaker state governance.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:su-230768 |
| Date | January 2024 |
| Creators | Gonzales, Diana |
| Publisher | Stockholms universitet, Statsvetenskapliga institutionen |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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