State Governance or Local Agency? Determining Refugee Settlement in Norwegian Municipalities

Abstract

The commitment to make provision for huge numbers of asylum seekers challenges Norway’s welfare state. Each year central government requests most local governments to receive a certain number of refugees. Local governments are free to accept or decline, and many are hesitant. The ensuing implementation gap stems from this central-local goal conflict and a decentralized decision-making system, embedded in an ideology of local autonomy and in local authorities seeking to accommodate state goals through feasible solutions. The focus is on the Chief Municipal Executive (CME, ‘rådmann’), the head of the municipal administration who exercises agency over government affairs. How do central state instruments influence this local agent and what are the consequences for settlement decisions? Economic incentives are the most important state tools in settlement decisions. Central information strategies, government appeals and persuasion seem, how- ever, to be less effective. In line with agency theory, CMEs’ sovereign assessments of the impact of state requests on local burdens and benefits are shown to be the main factor determining settlement decisions.