Introduction - the significance of local power in theory and practice, Chris Pickvance and Edmond Preteceille; centralized economic control in a decentralized welfare state - Danish central-local government relations 1970-1986, Jens Tonboe; the difficulty of control and the ease of structural reform - British local government in the 1980s, Chris Pickvance; the relationship between local and federal government policy in the Federal Republic of Germany, Hartmut Haeusserman; from centralization to decentralization - social restructuring and French local government, Edmond Preteceille; economic development policy in the U.S. federal system under the Reagan administration, Susan Fainstein and Norman Fainstein; local power in Canada - stakes and challenges in the restructuring of the state, Pierre Hamel and Lizette Jalbert; conclusion - towards a comparative analysis of state restructuring and local power, Chris Pickvance and Edmond Preteceille.
