The Municipal Administration Quality Index (MAQI) provides a comparative assessment of the technical, bureaucratic, economic, and political profiles of Italian municipalities

Overview

The Municipal Administration Quality Index (MAQI) is a composite index for 7,574 out of 7,901 Italian municipalities, available for the period 2001-2021. It captures objective information about bureaucratic quality and capacity, local politicians' characteristics, and local governments' economic and fiscal performance. It is based on a unique, newly assembled dataset containing rich information about multiple aspects of Italian municipalities.

Why Municipal Administration Quality?

The quality of local institutions is a recognized driver for economic development.

Administrative capacity is a premise for institutional quality and is crucial for the efficiency of local institutions in delivering public services and managing funds. 

A recent, renewed interest in the study of local administrative capacity has surged as a consequence of the introduction of the EU Cohesion Policy and the Italian National Recovery and Resilience Plan, whose implementiation directly involve municipalities.

On this premises, we believe in the importance of having a credible instrument to assess local public administration quality, such as MAQI, a composite index grounded in objective data.

Objectives

MAQI is an important tool for government officials, civil society actors, citizens, and researchers, as it

• helps pinpoint geographical areas in need of policy action

• aids local governments in more effectively meeting their challenges and needs

• promotes increased citizen involvement in local public affairs

• helps addressing research questions on a more localized scale than previously possible

• can facilitate the identification of best practices and pinpoint areas that require improvement

• can boost the effectiveness of place-based policies (e.g., the EU Cohesion Policy or the Italian National Recovery and Resilience Plan) at the local level

• can help investigating the conditions to attract external funding and managing effectively the financed projects

• can help understanding the conditions that better support startups and local entrepreneurs, enhancing firm productivity and innovation performance

 MAQi and its components

You can find further details about the composition of each pillar and access the final MAQI browsing the sections of our website. 

Comprehensive information about data sources and methodology can be found in our Working Paper.

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