Economic development directly manifests itself in the form of employment at the local level. This paper examines the ability of local politics to shape this development in a competitive federalist environment by examining how local party-political developments affect local economic development in Swiss small and medium-sized towns (SMSTs). Local economic development in the form of employment is a central local policy domain in federal and polycentric Switzerland. This paper argues that party-political influence is conditional on the characteristics of four distinguished economic sectors that differ in their dependence on the regional context. By analyzing the panel data of all Swiss SMSTs, the paper finds that local party-political developments only systematically precede growth in the residential economy, while regional processes determine the economic sectors in ambiguous ways. The grip of local politics on the development of export-oriented economies therefore is not guided by party-political development and more influential at regional levels.
This paper explores the structure of elite disagreement about the ideological or nonideological character of municipal politics. I propose two possible relationships between a representative's own ideology and their beliefs about the character of municipal politics: an "ends-against-the-middle" pattern, in which ideologues on the left and right embrace an ideological vision of municipal politics, whereas moderates insist that municipal politics is not ideological; and an "asymmetric visions" pattern, in which individuals on the left endorse an ideological view of municipal politics and those on the right oppose it. I use new survey data from more than 800 mayors and councillors in Canada to assess these possible relationships. While both are supported by the data, the asymmetric visions pattern is the stronger of the two: the nonideological view of municipal politics is most firmly embraced by municipal politicians of the moderate right, while the ideological vision is most common among representatives on the left. This pattern, I argue, is in keeping with a century of municipal political history and should be incorporated into our theories of municipal elections, representation, and policy disagreement.