This article establishes a connection between institutional changes at local levels of government and local autonomy under federated political dynamics. To this end, the article examines how local governments in Brazil and South Africa gained administrative and fiscal autonomy by creating new municipalities. Focusing on the institutional incentives for those changes, the article identifies and analyses why the increase in the number of municipalities in Brazil and its reduction in South African affected the power of their respective local governments. The findings suggest that by using different processes to reinvent new local governments and creating intergovernmental institutions for cooperation, local political actors in both countries increased their power vis-à-vis other levels of government.
Local government; federalism; federated co-ordination; decentralization; intergovernmental relations; institutional changes; administrative and fiscal reforms
