Determinants of voluntary online local budget transparency : a case study from Croatia / Katarina Ott, Velibor Mačkić, Mihaela Bronić, Branko Stanić.
Determinants of voluntary online local budget transparency : a case study from Croatia / Katarina Ott, Velibor Mačkić, Mihaela Bronić, Branko Stanić.
Sažetak

This article analyses the determinants of the voluntary online local budget transparency (OLBT) of Croatian local governments. Budget transparency is one of preconditions for enabling citizens’ participation and improving public sector outcomes; however, the previous empirical results are ambiguous and inconclusive, with particular gaps for ex-socialist, fiscally centralized countries. To contribute to the existing literature, this article uses the principal-agent and legitimacy theories and non-linear panel data models for the 2015-2017 period to analyse 128 cities and 428 municipalities in Croatia. The findings show that local governments with higher residents’ per capita income, population, Internet access, and administrative and fi scal capacity voluntarily publish more budget documents online. Policy recommendations point to the urge for the reform of the country’s territorial and fi scal organisation, the promotion of budget transparency in less developed cities/ municipalities and for education of citizens about budgets. The main study limitation is the absence of a qualitative analysis of observed documents.; Rad analizira odrednice dobrovoljne transparentnosti proračuna lokalnih jedinica (OLBT) u Hrvatskoj. Premda proračunska transparentnost predstavlja preduvjet participaciji građana i poboljšavanja ishoda u javnom sektoru, rezultati istraživanja su nejasni i neuvjerljivi, gotovo nepostojeći za post-socijalističke, fiskalno centralizirane države. Doprinos rada je primjena modela agenta i principala te teorije legitimnosti na primjeru jedne takve zemlje. Primjenom nelinearne panel analize na uzorku od 128 gradova i 428 općina u razdoblju od 2015. do 2017. godine utvrđeno je da lokalne jedinice s većim dohotkom po stanovniku, brojem stanovnika, boljim pristupom internetu, većim administrativnim i fi skalnim kapacitetom dobrovoljno objavljuju više proračunskih dokumenata. Preporuke ukazuju na potrebu reforme teritorijalnog i fiskalnog ustroja države, promicanja dobrih praksi proračunske transparentnosti u manje razvijenim gradovima i općinama te educiranja građana o proračunu. Glavno o graničenje istraživanja jest odsustvo kvalitativne analize dokumenata.