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Citizen Satisfaction with Local Public Services in Swedish Municipalities

Citizenship
Local Government
Public Administration
Katarina Roos
Umeå Universitet
Katarina Roos
Umeå Universitet

Abstract

The understanding of democratic legitimacy, has been and still is, closely associated with the input-side of political systems. However, perspectives on output-based legitimacy is equally important if we want to get a more comprehensive understanding of the democratic performance of governments. In the widest sense, democratic legitimacy can be understood as public support for the political system. It is reasonable to assume, that one condition for public support on the output-side, is that the citizenry are content with what government delivers. In this paper this is understood and measured as citizen’s general satisfaction with local public services. Previous research has found that citizens in general, have become more and more concerned about the performance and efficiency of local government. Being the closest tier of government, services provided by municipalities are often of great importance in people’s daily lives. The aim of the paper is to explore how general satisfaction with local, public services differs across individuals and across municipalities in Sweden, in order generate a deeper understanding of the drivers of general service satisfaction. Is satisfaction with some specific services more influential than others, on general satisfaction? Are users of some specific services generally more satisfied than non-users? Are there systematic differences in general satisfaction between different municipalities? These are questions that the paper examines. Swedish municipalities are responsible for the provision of most of the welfare services, such as care for children and the elderly, elementary/upper-secondary schools, social welfare, but also other services such as infrastructure, water and sewage, waste management and so forth. They enjoy a high degree of autonomy from the state. This means that the extent, as well as the accessibility and quality of public services, could vary considerably between different municipalities, and this can also be reflected in citizens’ general satisfaction with services. The data base which is used, is based on an extensive survey carried out by Statistics Sweden (SCB) in 2010. The data-set covers 50.800 respondents in 111 (of 290) Swedish municipalities. The data base has been complemented with register-based data of the partaking individuals and municipalities. Multi-level modelling is used to explore the variation.