Misplaced Pages

#19980

93-445: Information processing may be vertical or horizontal , either of which may be centralized or decentralized ( distributed ). The horizontally distributed processing approach of the mid-1980s became popular under the name connectionism . The connectionist network is made up of different nodes, and it works by a "priming effect," and this happens when a "prime node activates a connected node". But "unlike in semantic networks , it

186-507: A federal democracy confronts the widespread issue of political ignorance by allowing citizens to engage in foot voting , or moving to other jurisdictions with more favorable laws. He cites the mass migration of over one million southern-born African Americans to the North or the West to evade discriminatory Jim Crow laws in the late 19th century and early 20th century. The European Union follows

279-542: A "counterpoint to globalization [which] removes decisions from the local and national stage to the global sphere of multi-national or non-national interests. Decentralization brings decision-making back to the sub-national levels". Decentralization strategies must account for the interrelations of global, regional, national, sub-national, and local levels. Norman L. Johnson writes that diversity plays an important role in decentralized systems like ecosystems , social groups , large organizations, political systems . "Diversity

372-579: A centralized " welfarist " policy of entitlements which now has become a "post-welfare" policy of intergovernmental and market-based decentralization. In 1983, "Decentralization" was identified as one of the " Ten Key Values " of the Green Movement in the United States. A 1999 United Nations Development Programme report stated: "A large number of developing and transitional countries have embarked on some form of decentralization programmes. This trend

465-410: A collection of phonetic segments. Miller recognized that the correspondence between the limits of one-dimensional absolute judgment and of short-term memory span was only a coincidence, because only the first limit, not the second, can be characterized in information-theoretic terms (i.e., as a roughly constant number of bits). Therefore, there is nothing "magical" about the number seven, and Miller used

558-462: A corresponding response (learned before). Performance is nearly perfect up to five or six different stimuli but declines as the number of different stimuli increases. The task can be described as one of information transmission: The input consists of one out of n possible stimuli, and the output consists of one out of n responses. The information contained in the input can be determined by the number of binary decisions that need to be made to arrive at

651-402: A country's number of regional legislatures, elector procedures, and the order in which national and regional elections occur. Brancati holds that decentralization can promote peace if it encourages statewide parties to incorporate regional demands and limit the power of regional parties. The processes by which entities move from a more to a less centralized state vary. They can be initiated from

744-414: A decentralized system, there is no single centralized authority that makes decisions on behalf of all the parties. Instead each party, also called a peer, makes local autonomous decisions towards its individual goals which may possibly conflict with those of other peers. Peers directly interact with each other and share information or provide service to other peers. An open decentralized system is one in which

837-455: A directive in their platforms because rightist parties tend to advocate for a decrease in the role of central government. There is also strong evidence to support the idea that government stability increases the probability of political decentralization, since instability brought on by gridlock between opposing parties in legislatures often impedes a government's overall ability to enact sweeping reforms. The rise of regional ethnic parties in

930-496: A distinctive thought process. The four stages are: the sensorimotor (from birth to 2 years), preoperational (2–6 years), concrete operational (6–11 years), and formal operational periods (11 years and older). During the sensorimotor stage, newborns and toddlers rely on their senses for information processing to which they respond with reflexes. In the preoperational stage, children learn through imitation and remain unable to take other people's point of view. The concrete operational stage

1023-447: A limited capacity. According to Linden, "The capacity of STM had initially been estimated at " seven plus or minus two " items, which fits the observation from neuropsychological testing that the average digit span of healthy adults is about seven. However, it emerged that these numbers of items can only be retained if they are grouped into so-called chunks, using perceptual or conceptual associations between individual stimuli." Its duration

SECTION 10

#1732855361020

1116-443: A lower level of government while maintaining financial responsibility. While this process usually is called fiscal federalism , it may be relevant to unitary, federal, or confederal governments. Fiscal federalism also concerns the "vertical imbalances" where the central government gives too much or too little money to the lower levels. It actually can be a way of increasing central government control of lower levels of government, if it

1209-487: A modern economy. Seven plus or minus two " The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two: Some Limits on Our Capacity for Processing Information " is one of the most highly cited papers in psychology. It was written by the cognitive psychologist George A. Miller of Harvard University 's Department of Psychology and published in 1956 in Psychological Review . It is often interpreted to argue that

1302-450: A number of objects are flashed briefly, their number can be determined very quickly, at a glance, when the number does not exceed the subitizing limit, which is about four objects. Larger numbers of objects must be counted, which is a slower process. The film 1988 Rain Man portrayed an autistic savant , who was able to rapidly determine the number of toothpicks from an entire box spilled on

1395-444: A region and the central government. Dawn Brancati finds that political decentralization reduces intrastate conflict unless politicians create political parties that mobilize minority and even extremist groups to demand more resources and power within national governments. However, the likelihood this will be done depends on factors like how democratic transitions happen and features like a regional party's proportion of legislative seats,

1488-401: A respectful manner. Gauging the appropriate size or scale of decentralized units has been studied in relation to the size of sub-units of hospitals and schools, road networks, administrative units in business and public administration, and especially town and city governmental areas and decision-making bodies. In creating planned communities ("new towns"), it is important to determine

1581-580: A return to small scale living. The decentralist movement attracted Southern Agrarians like Robert Penn Warren , as well as journalist Herbert Agar . New Left and libertarian individuals who identified with social, economic, and often political decentralism through the ensuing years included Ralph Borsodi , Wendell Berry , Paul Goodman , Carl Oglesby , Karl Hess , Donald Livingston , Kirkpatrick Sale (author of Human Scale ), Murray Bookchin , Dorothy Day , Senator Mark O. Hatfield , Mildred J. Loomis and Bill Kauffman . Leopold Kohr , author of

1674-493: A strong desire for greater participation of citizens and private sector organizations in governance." Those studying the goals and processes of implementing decentralization often use a systems theory approach, which according to the United Nations Development Programme report applies to the topic of decentralization "a whole systems perspective, including levels, spheres, sectors and functions and seeing

1767-448: A systems approach. Norman Johnson of Los Alamos National Laboratory wrote in a 1999 paper: "A decentralized system is where some decisions by the agents are made without centralized control or processing. An important property of agent systems is the degree of connectivity or connectedness between the agents, a measure global flow of information or influence. If each agent is connected (exchange states or influence) to all other agents, then

1860-454: Is 1. Other prominent theories of short-term memory capacity argue against measuring capacity in terms of a fixed number of elements. Cowan also noted a number of other limits of cognition that point to a "magical number four", and different from Miller, he argued that this correspondence is no coincidence. One other process that seems to be limited at about four elements is subitizing , the rapid enumeration of small numbers of objects. When

1953-476: Is a conscious process based on explicit policies. However, it may occur as "silent decentralization" in the absence of reforms as changes in networks, policy emphasize and resource availability lead inevitably to a more decentralized system. Decentralization may be uneven and "asymmetric" given any one country's population, political, ethnic and other forms of diversity. In many countries, political, economic and administrative responsibilities may be decentralized to

SECTION 20

#1732855361020

2046-538: Is a decision about what to draw, then a plan and a sketch. During this process there is simultaneous monitoring of the process, and whether it is producing the desired accomplishment. All these steps fall under the meta component processing, and the performance component is the art. The knowledge-acquisition portion is the learning or improving drawing skills. Information processing has been described as "the sciences concerned with gathering, manipulating, storing, retrieving, and classifying recorded information". According to

2139-402: Is able to hold very limited amounts of information for very limited amounts of time. This phenomenon is very similar to having a picture taken with a flash. For a few brief moments after the flash goes off, the flash it seems to still be there. However, it is soon gone and there is no way to know it was there. Short term memory holds information for slightly longer periods of time, but still has

2232-425: Is accomplished by the institution of reforms that either delegate a certain degree of meaningful decision-making autonomy to sub-national tiers of government, or grant citizens the right to elect lower-level officials, like local or regional representatives. Depending on the country, this may require constitutional or statutory reforms, the development of new political parties , increased power for legislatures ,

2325-480: Is already familiar with—the incorporation of new information into a label that is already well rehearsed into one's long-term memory. These chunks must store the information in such a way that they can be disassembled into the necessary data. The storage capacity is dependent on the information being stored. For instance, span is lower for long words than it is for short words. In general, memory span for verbal contents (digits, letters, words, etc.) strongly depends on

2418-418: Is characterized by the developing ability to use logic and to consider multiple factors to solve a problem. The last stage is the formal operational, in which preadolescents and adolescents begin to understand abstract concepts and to develop the ability to create arguments and counter arguments. Furthermore, adolescence is characterized by a series of changes in the biological, cognitive, and social realms. In

2511-406: Is coupled with a growing interest in the role of civil society and the private sector as partners to governments in seeking new ways of service delivery ... Decentralization of governance and the strengthening of local governing capacity is in part also a function of broader societal trends. These include, for example, the growing distrust of government generally, the spectacular demise of some of

2604-558: Is defined to be unique properties of entities, agents, or individuals that are not shared by the larger group, population, structure. Decentralized is defined as a property of a system where the agents have some ability to operate "locally." Both decentralization and diversity are necessary attributes to achieve the self-organizing properties of interest." Advocates of political decentralization hold that greater participation by better informed diverse interests in society will lead to more relevant decisions than those made only by authorities on

2697-399: Is done through deregulation , the abolition of restrictions on businesses competing with government services, for example, postal services, schools, garbage collection. Even as private companies and corporations have worked to have such services contracted out to or privatized by them, others have worked to have these turned over to non-profit organizations or associations. From the 1970s to

2790-410: Is like the secretary of the brain. It decides what needs attention and how to respond. The central executive then leads to three different subsections. The first is phonological storage, subvocal rehearsal, and the phonological loop. These sections work together to understand words, put the information into memory, and then hold the memory. The result is verbal information storage. The next subsection

2883-472: Is made up of three different components: creative, analytical, and practical abilities. Creativeness is the ability to have new original ideas, and being analytical can help a person decide whether the idea is a good one or not. "Practical abilities are used to implement the ideas and persuade others of their value". In the middle of Sternberg's theory is cognition and with that is information processing. In Sternberg's theory, he says that information processing

Information processing (psychology) - Misplaced Pages Continue

2976-485: Is made up of three different parts, meta components, performance components, and knowledge-acquisition components. These processes move from higher-order executive functions to lower-order functions. Meta components are used for planning and evaluating problems, while performance components follow the orders of the meta components, and the knowledge-acquisition component learns how to solve the problems. This theory in action can be explained by working on an art project. First

3069-488: Is not a constant even when measured in a number of chunks. The number of chunks a human can recall immediately after presentation depends on the category of chunks used (e.g., span is around seven for digits, around six for letters, and around five for words), and even on features of the chunks within a category. Chunking is used by the brain's short-term memory as a method for keeping groups of information accessible for easy recall. It functions and works best as labels that one

3162-533: Is not a single node that has a specific meaning, but rather the knowledge is represented in a combination of differently activated nodes"(Goldstein, as cited in Sternberg, 2012). There are several proposed models or theories that describe the way in which we process information. Every individual has different information overload point with the same information load because individuals have different information-processing capacities. Sternberg 's theory of intelligence

3255-403: Is not limited in terms of bits but rather in terms of chunks . A chunk is the largest meaningful unit in the presented material that the person recognizes—thus, what counts as a chunk depends on the knowledge of the person being tested. For instance, a word is a single chunk for a speaker of the language but is many chunks for someone who is totally unfamiliar with the language and sees the word as

3348-678: Is not linked to other kinds of responsibilities and authority. Fiscal decentralization can be achieved through user fees, user participation through monetary or labor contributions, expansion of local property or sales taxes, intergovernmental transfers of central government tax monies to local governments through transfer payments or grants , and authorization of municipal borrowing with national government loan guarantees. Transfers of money may be given conditionally with instructions or unconditionally without them. Market decentralization can be done through privatization of public owned functions and businesses, as described briefly above. But it also

3441-513: Is of 5–20 seconds before it is out of the subject's mind. This occurs often with names of people newly introduced to. Images or information based on meaning are stored here as well, but it decays without rehearsal or repetition of such information. On the other hand, long-term memory has a potentially unlimited capacity and its duration is as good as indefinite. Although sometimes it is difficult to access, it encompasses everything learned until this point in time. One might become forgetful or feel as if

3534-497: Is the part of the brain that modulates reward sensitivity based on changes in the levels of neurotransmitters (e.g., dopamine ) and emotions . In short, cognitive abilities vary according to our development and stages in life. It is at the adult stage that we are better able to be better planners, process and comprehend abstract concepts, and evaluate risks and benefits more aptly than an adolescent or child would be able to. In computing, information processing broadly refers to

3627-472: Is the visuospatial sketchpad which works to store visual images. The storage capacity is brief but leads to an understanding of visual stimuli. Finally, there is an episodic buffer. This section is capable of taking information and putting it into long-term memory. It is also able to take information from the phonological loop and visuospatial sketchpad, combining them with long-term memory to make "a unitary episodic representation. In order for these to work,

3720-516: The Atkinson-Shiffrin memory model or multi-store model, for information to be firmly implanted in memory it must pass through three stages of mental processing: sensory memory , short-term memory , and long-term memory . An example of this is the working memory model. This includes the central executive, phonologic loop, episodic buffer, visuospatial sketchpad, verbal information, long-term memory, and visual information. The central executive

3813-473: The financial crisis of 2007–2008 . One example of economic decentralization, which is based on a libertarian socialist model, is decentralized economic planning . Decentralized planning is a type of economic system in which decision-making is distributed amongst various economic agents or localized within production agents. An example of this method in practice is in Kerala , India which experimented in 1996 with

Information processing (psychology) - Misplaced Pages Continue

3906-414: The 1957 book The Breakdown of Nations – known for its statement "Whenever something is wrong, something is too big" – was a major influence on E. F. Schumacher , author of the 1973 bestseller Small Is Beautiful: A Study of Economics As If People Mattered . In the next few years a number of best-selling books promoted decentralization. Daniel Bell 's The Coming of Post-Industrial Society discussed

3999-751: The 1990s, there was deregulation of some industries, like banking, trucking, airlines and telecommunications, which resulted generally in more competition and lower prices. According to the Cato Institute , an American libertarian think-tank, in some cases deregulation in some aspects of an industry were offset by increased regulation in other aspects, the electricity industry being a prime example. For example, in banking, Cato Institute believes some deregulation allowed banks to compete across state lines, increasing consumer choice , while an actual increase in regulators and regulations forced banks to make loans to individuals incapable of repaying them, leading eventually to

4092-563: The People's Plan campaign . Emmanuelle Auriol and Michel Benaim write about the "comparative benefits" of decentralization versus government regulation in the setting of standards. They find that while there may be a need for public regulation if public safety is at stake, private creation of standards usually is better because "regulators or 'experts' might misrepresent consumers' tastes and needs." As long as companies are averse to incompatible standards, standards will be created that satisfy needs of

4185-560: The Stone Age" through not just chiefdoms and states, but empires and today's "hegemonic core states". Christopher K. Chase-Dunn and Thomas D. Hall review other works that detail these cycles, including works which analyze the concept of core elites which compete with state accumulation of wealth and how their "intra-ruling-class competition accounts for the rise and fall of states" and their phases of centralization and decentralization. Rising government expenditures, poor economic performance and

4278-832: The United Kingdom's Labour Party appealed to Scottish constituents by creating a semi-autonomous Scottish Parliament in order to neutralize the threat from the increasingly popular Scottish National Party at the national level. In addition to increasing the administrative efficacy of government and endowing citizens with more power, there are many projected advantages to political decentralization. Individuals who take advantage of their right to elect local and regional authorities have been shown to have more positive attitudes toward politics, and increased opportunities for civic decision-making through participatory democracy mechanisms like public consultations and participatory budgeting are believed to help legitimize government institutions in

4371-449: The appropriate population and geographical size. While in earlier years small towns were considered appropriate, by the 1960s, 60,000 inhabitants was considered the size necessary to support a diversified job market and an adequate shopping center and array of services and entertainment. Appropriate size of governmental units for revenue raising also is a consideration. Even in bioregionalism , which seeks to reorder many functions and even

4464-407: The basis of decentralization that can lead to local efficiency, equity and development." Columbia University 's Earth Institute identified one of three major trends relating to decentralization: "increased involvement of local jurisdictions and civil society in the management of their affairs, with new forms of participation, consultation, and partnerships." Decentralization has been described as

4557-412: The books in a later interview, Toffler said that industrial-style, centralized, top-down bureaucratic planning would be replaced by a more open, democratic, decentralized style which he called "anticipatory democracy". Futurist John Naisbitt 's 1982 book "Megatrends" was on The New York Times Best Seller list for more than two years and sold 14 million copies. Naisbitt's book outlines 10 "megatrends",

4650-414: The boundaries of governments according to physical and environmental features, including watershed boundaries and soil and terrain characteristics, appropriate size must be considered. The unit may be larger than many decentralist-bioregionalists prefer. Decentralization ideally happens as a careful, rational, and orderly process, but it often takes place during times of economic and political crisis,

4743-471: The capacity of short-term or working memory to a number of chunks. Nonetheless, Cowan has proposed that working memory has a capacity of about four chunks in young adults (and less in children and older adults). Tarnow finds that in a classic experiment typically argued as supporting a 4 item buffer by Murdock, there is in fact no evidence for such and thus the "magical number", at least in the Murdock experiment,

SECTION 50

#1732855361020

4836-985: The capital Helsinki to the provinces. The centre supports substantial subsidies that limit potential economic and political centralization to Helsinki. Political decentralization does not come without its drawbacks. A study by Fan concludes that there is an increase in corruption and rent-seeking when there are more vertical tiers in the government, as well as when there are higher levels of subnational government employment. Other studies warn of high-level politicians that may intentionally deprive regional and local authorities of power and resources when conflicts arise. In order to combat these negative forces, experts believe that political decentralization should be supplemented with other conflict management mechanisms like power-sharing , particularly in regions with ethnic tensions. Four major forms of administrative decentralization have been described. Fiscal decentralization means decentralizing revenue raising and/or expenditure of moneys to

4929-575: The centers of authority (" top-down ") or from individuals, localities or regions (" bottom-up "), or from a "mutually desired" combination of authorities and localities working together. Bottom-up decentralization usually stresses political values like local responsiveness and increased participation and tends to increase political stability. Top-down decentralization may be motivated by the desire to "shift deficits downwards" and find more resources to pay for services or pay off government debt. Some hold that decentralization should not be imposed, but done in

5022-406: The children Sacks observed may have pre-counted the matches in the box. There is also evidence that even four chunks is a high estimate: Gobet and Clarkson at Brunel University London conducted an experiment and found that over half of the memory recall conditions yielded only about two chunks. Research also shows that the size, rather than the number, of chunks that are stored in short-term memory

5115-511: The cognitive area, the brain's prefrontal cortex as well as the limbic system undergoes important changes. The prefrontal cortex is the part of the brain that is active when engaged in complicated cognitive activities such as planning, generating goals and strategies, intuitive decision-making, and metacognition (thinking about thinking). This is consistent with Piaget's last stage of formal operations. The prefrontal cortex becomes complete between adolescence and early adulthood. The limbic system

5208-428: The community level as the entry point at which holistic definitions of development goals are from the people themselves and where it is most practical to support them. It involves seeing multi-level frameworks and continuous, synergistic processes of interaction and iteration of cycles as critical for achieving wholeness in a decentralized system and for sustaining its development." However, it has been seen as part of

5301-478: The creation of local political units, and encouragement of advocacy groups . A national government may decide to decentralize its authority and responsibilities for a variety of reasons. Decentralization reforms may occur for administrative reasons, when government officials decide that certain responsibilities and decisions would be handled best at the regional or local level. In democracies, traditionally conservative parties include political decentralization as

5394-400: The decentralization of Ancient Greece . Since the 1980s a number of scholars have written about cycles of centralization and decentralization. Stephen K. Sanderson wrote that over the last 4000 years chiefdoms and actual states have gone through sequences of centralization and decentralization of economic, political and social power. Yildiz Atasoy writes this process has been going on "since

5487-421: The demands of minorities for a greater say in local governance, the general weakening legitimacy of the public sector and global and international pressure on countries with inefficient, undemocratic, overly centralized systems. The following four goals or objectives are frequently stated in various analyses of decentralization. In decentralization, the principle of subsidiarity is often invoked. It holds that

5580-543: The end, an extension of centralization." In 1863, retired French bureaucrat Maurice Block wrote an article called "Decentralization" for a French journal that reviewed the dynamics of government and bureaucratic centralization and recent French efforts at decentralization of government functions. Ideas of liberty and decentralization were carried to their logical conclusions during the 19th and 20th centuries by anti-state political activists calling themselves " anarchists ", " libertarians ", and even decentralists. Tocqueville

5673-404: The entry of peers is not regulated. Any peer can enter or leave the system at any time ... Decentralization in any area is a response to the problems of centralized systems. Decentralization in government, the topic most studied, has been seen as a solution to problems like economic decline, government inability to fund services and their general decline in performance of overloaded services,

SECTION 60

#1732855361020

5766-439: The expression only rhetorically. Nevertheless, the idea of a "magical number 7" inspired much theorizing, rigorous and less rigorous, about the capacity limits of human cognition. The number seven constitutes a useful heuristic, reminding us that lists that are much longer than that become significantly harder to remember and process simultaneously. Later research on short-term memory and working memory revealed that memory span

5859-453: The eyes of marginalized groups. Moreover, political decentralization is perceived as a valid means of protecting marginalized communities at a local level from the detrimental aspects of development and globalization driven by the state, like the degradation of local customs, codes, and beliefs. In his 2013 book, Democracy and Political Ignorance , George Mason University law professor Ilya Somin argued that political decentralization in

5952-425: The fall of a regime and the resultant power struggles. Even when it happens slowly, there is a need for experimentation, testing, adjusting, and replicating successful experiments in other contexts. There is no one blueprint for decentralization since it depends on the initial state of a country and the power and views of political interests and whether they support or oppose decentralization. Decentralization usually

6045-402: The fifth of which is from centralization to decentralization. In 1996 David Osborne and Ted Gaebler had a best selling book Reinventing Government proposing decentralist public administration theories which became labeled the " New Public Management ". Stephen Cummings wrote that decentralization became a "revolutionary megatrend" in the 1980s. In 1983 Diana Conyers asked if decentralization

6138-424: The floor, apparently subitizing a much larger number than four objects. A similar feat was informally observed by neuropsychologist Oliver Sacks and reported in his book 1985 The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat . Therefore, one might suppose that this limit is an arbitrary limit imposed by our cognition rather than necessarily being a physical limit. Autism expert Daniel Tammet has suggested, however, that

6231-426: The following factors as determinants of decentralization: Historians have described the history of governments and empires in terms of centralization and decentralization. In his 1910 The History of Nations Henry Cabot Lodge wrote that Persian king Darius I (550–486 BC) was a master of organization and "for the first time in history centralization becomes a political fact." He also noted that this contrasted with

6324-447: The information is on the tip of the tongue . Another approach to viewing the ways in which information is processed in humans was suggested by Jean Piaget in what is called the Piaget's Cognitive Development Theory . Piaget developed his model based on development and growth. He identified four different stages between different age brackets characterized by the type of information and by

6417-457: The larger urban areas, while rural areas are administered by the central government. Decentralization of responsibilities to provinces may be limited only to those provinces or states which want or are capable of handling responsibility. Some privatization may be more appropriate to an urban than a rural area; some types of privatization may be more appropriate for some states and provinces but not others. The academic literature frequently mentions

6510-409: The limit of short-term memory cannot easily be characterized as a constant "magic spell" either, because memory span also depends on other factors besides speaking duration. For instance, span depends on the lexical status of the contents (i.e., whether the contents are words known to the person or not). Several other factors also affect a person's measured span, and therefore it is difficult to pin down

6603-505: The local information make decisions and in a more timely fashion; that their taking responsibility frees upper management for long term strategics rather than day-to-day decision-making; that managers have hands on training to prepare them to move up the management hierarchy; that managers are motivated by having the freedom to exercise their own initiative and creativity; that managers and divisions are encouraged to prove that they are profitable, instead of allowing their failures to be masked by

6696-500: The longest list of items (e.g., digits, letters, words) that a person can repeat back in the correct order on 50% of trials immediately after the presentation. Miller observed that the memory span of young adults is approximately seven items. He noticed that memory span is approximately the same for stimuli with vastly different amounts of information—for instance, binary digits have 1 bit each; decimal digits have 3.32 bits each; words have about 10 bits each. Miller concluded that memory span

6789-427: The lowest or least centralized authority that is capable of addressing an issue effectively should do so. According to one definition: "Decentralization, or decentralizing governance, refers to the restructuring or reorganization of authority so that there is a system of co-responsibility between institutions of governance at the central, regional and local levels according to the principle of subsidiarity, thus increasing

6882-483: The most centralized regimes in the world (especially the Soviet Union) and the emerging separatist demands that seem to routinely pop up in one or another part of the world. The movement toward local accountability and greater control over one's destiny is, however, not solely the result of the negative attitude towards central government. Rather, these developments, as we have already noted, are principally being driven by

6975-672: The national level. Decentralization has been described as a response to demands for diversity. In business, decentralization leads to a management by results philosophy which focuses on definite objectives to be achieved by unit results. Decentralization of government programs is said to increase efficiency – and effectiveness – due to reduction of congestion in communications, quicker reaction to unanticipated problems, improved ability to deliver services, improved information about local conditions, and more support from beneficiaries of programs. Firms may prefer decentralization because it ensures efficiency by making sure that managers closest to

7068-455: The national politics of parliamentary democracies is also heavily associated with the implementation of decentralization reforms. Ethnic parties may endeavor to transfer more autonomy to their respective regions, and as a partisan strategy, ruling parties within the central government may cooperate by establishing regional assemblies in order to curb the rise of ethnic parties in national elections. This phenomenon famously occurred in 1999, when

7161-483: The need for decentralization and a "comprehensive overhaul of government structure to find the appropriate size and scope of units", as well as the need to detach functions from current state boundaries, creating regions based on functions like water, transport, education and economics which might have "different 'overlays' on the map." Alvin Toffler published Future Shock (1970) and The Third Wave (1980). Discussing

7254-488: The number of objects an average human can hold in short-term memory is 7 ± 2. This has occasionally been referred to as Miller's law . In his article, Miller discussed a coincidence between the limits of one-dimensional absolute judgment and the limits of short-term memory. In a one-dimensional absolute-judgment task, a person is presented with a number of stimuli that vary on one dimension (e.g., 10 different tones varying only in pitch) and responds to each stimulus with

7347-622: The overall profitability of the company. The same principles can be applied to the government. Decentralization promises to enhance efficiency through both inter-governmental competitions with market features and fiscal discipline which assigns tax and expenditure authority to the lowest level of government possible. It works best where members of the subnational government have strong traditions of democracy, accountability, and professionalism. Economic and/or political decentralization can help prevent or reduce conflict because they reduce actual or perceived inequities between various regions or between

7440-422: The overall quality and effectiveness of the system of governance while increasing the authority and capacities of sub-national levels." Decentralization is often linked to concepts of participation in decision-making, democracy, equality and liberty from a higher authority. Decentralization enhances the democratic voice. Theorists believe that local representative authorities with actual discretionary powers are

7533-481: The post- Revolution French Directory leadership created a new government structure. The word " décentralisation " came into usage in the 1820s. "Centralization" entered written English in the first third of the 1800s; mentions of decentralization also first appear during those years. In the mid-1800s Tocqueville would write that the French Revolution began with "a push towards decentralization" but became, "in

7626-481: The principle of subsidiarity , which holds that decision-making should be made by the most local competent authority. The EU should decide only on enumerated issues that a local or member state authority cannot address themselves. Furthermore, enforcement is exclusively the domain of member states. In Finland, the Centre Party explicitly supports decentralization. For example, government departments have been moved from

7719-583: The process by which the activities of an organization, particularly those related to planning and decision-making, are distributed or delegated away from a central, authoritative location or group and given to smaller factions within it. Concepts of decentralization have been applied to group dynamics and management science in private businesses and organizations, political science , law and public administration , technology , economics and money . The word " centralisation " came into use in France in 1794 as

7812-488: The rise of free market -influenced ideas have convinced governments to decentralize their operations, to induce competition within their services, to contract out to private firms operating in the market, and to privatize some functions and services entirely. Government decentralization has both political and administrative aspects. Its decentralization may be territorial, moving power from a central city to other localities, and it may be functional, moving decision-making from

7905-419: The selected stimulus, and the same holds for the response. Therefore, people's maximum performance on a one-dimensional absolute judgment can be characterized as an information channel capacity with approximately 2 to 3 bits of information, which corresponds to the ability to distinguish between four and eight alternatives. The second cognitive limitation Miller discusses is memory span . Memory span refers to

7998-526: The sensory register takes in via the five senses: visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory, and taste. These are all present since birth and are able to handle simultaneous processing (e.g., food – taste it, smell it, see it). In general, learning benefits occur when there is a developed process of pattern recognition. The sensory register has a large capacity and its behavioral response is very short (1–3 seconds). Within this model, sensory store and short term memory or working memory has limited capacity. Sensory store

8091-444: The system is highly connected." University of California, Irvine 's Institute for Software Research's "PACE" project is creating an "architectural style for trust management in decentralized applications." It adopted Rohit Khare 's definition of decentralization: "A decentralized system is one which requires multiple parties to make their own independent decisions" and applies it to Peer-to-peer software creation, writing: In such

8184-410: The time it takes to speak the contents aloud. Some researchers have therefore proposed that the limited capacity of short-term memory for verbal material is not a "magic number" but rather a "magic spell," i.e. a period of time. Baddeley used this finding to postulate that one component of his model of working memory , the phonological loop , is capable of holding around 2 seconds of sound. However,

8277-457: The top administrator of any branch of government to lower level officials, or divesting of the function entirely through privatization. It has been called the " new public management " which has been described as decentralization, management by objectives, contracting out, competition within government and consumer orientation. Political decentralization signifies a reduction in the authority of national governments over policy-making. This process

8370-467: The use of algorithms to transform data—the defining activity of computers; indeed, a broad computing professional organization is known as the International Federation for Information Processing ( IFIP ). It is essentially synonymous with the terms data processing or computation , although with a more general connotation. Decentralized Decentralization or decentralisation is

8463-438: The words: agricultural-industrial federation. All my political ideas boil down to a similar formula: political federation or decentralization." In the early 20th century, America's response to the centralization of economic wealth and political power was a decentralist movement. It blamed large-scale industrial production for destroying middle-class shop keepers and small manufacturers and promoted increased property ownership and

8556-620: Was an advocate, writing: "Decentralization has, not only an administrative value but also a civic dimension since it increases the opportunities for citizens to take interest in public affairs; it makes them get accustomed to using freedom. And from the accumulation of these local, active, persnickety freedoms, is born the most efficient counterweight against the claims of the central government, even if it were supported by an impersonal, collective will." Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865), influential anarchist theorist wrote: "All my economic ideas as developed over twenty-five years can be summed up in

8649-410: Was the "latest fashion" in development administration. Cornell University 's project on Restructuring Local Government states that decentralization refers to the "global trend" of devolving responsibilities to regional or local governments. Robert J. Bennett's Decentralization, Intergovernmental Relations and Markets: Towards a Post-Welfare Agenda describes how after World War II governments pursued

#19980