Decentralization: Concepts and Definitions

The variety of existing definitions and concepts of decentralization within the literature clearly indicates that different perspectives and incentive systems have been applied to a frequently used term. The result is a wide variety of partial and imprecise definitions of the term. The usage of the term decentralization by different scientific disciplines, such as political science (decentralization of government systems), sociology (decentralization of structures), political economy (financial decentralization), business administration (decentralization of firms), and administrative science (decentralization of administrative structures), makes a universal and semantically valid concept impossible. These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.