Urban Governance Reform Index: An Alignment of Traditional Reform and Public Choice Propositions

The persistent debate on the consolidation versus fragmentation model of government is a result of a dualist conceptualization of governance reform by two competing theories-public choice and traditional reform. Both argue for reform, but their definitions of reform are diametrically opposed and there is no appropriate instrument to measure government reform. We propose an alignment of the traditional reform and public choice traditions and an instrument to measure governance reform by an index comprised of 1) form of government, 2) home-rule status, 3) methods of election, 4) number of elected officials, and 5) number of jurisdictions. The alignment of the two theoretical camps is supported by the selection of the five reform components and their particular operationalizations. © 2012 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.