Robert Andrew Young

In Foundations of Governance, experts from each of Canada's provinces come together to assess the extent to which municipal governments have the capacity to act autonomously, purposefully, and collaboratively in the intergovernmental arena.

"Drawing on a great many in-depth interviews with government officials and front-line workers, contributors provide a comparative assessment of approaches to immigrant settlement in nineteen Canadian municipalities. This is complemented by a discussion of the federal government's role in this policy field, and by a comprehensive introduction and conclusion, which ground the book historically and thematically, synthesize its key findings, and provide recommendations for addressing the challenges related to intergovernmental cooperation, settlement service delivery, and overall immigrant outcomes. Individual chapters examine the mechanics of public policy-making but also tell a story about diverse and innovative approaches to immigrant settlement in Canada's towns and cities, about gaps and problems in the system, and about the ways in which governments and communities are working together to facilitate integration."--Pub. desc.

"Strong movements are afoot in Canada to decentralize the design and delivery of many programs, and to clarify federal and provincial responsibilities. This volume presents contributions from practitioners and observers of this trend. It includes sweeping papers on the comparative evolution of federations, and on the question of whether decentralization is inherently conservative. There are also chapters on decentralization in health care, possible reallocations of programs and tax revenues, the extent of overlap and duplication in service delivery, and fiscal decentralization. Each paper is followed by a commentary."--BOOK JACKET.