Financial transparency in local governments.

Abstract

This work analyses the main economic, political and socio-demographic aspects that affect the transparency of local governments. It has been taken as an evidence the Index of Transparency of Local Governments, that of the 110 biggest local governments of Spain. This index is assigned by International Transparency Spain, by means of the information that each municipality publishes in its webpage. After the empirical study, it has been noticed that the population has a good relationship with the transparency. Besides, those local governments that are capital of province have less transparency and as a result, the relationship is negative. Finally, unemployment has a negative relationship, too. These three variables have given an important result that is essential for the transparency of local governments. This empirical study also compares other studies made by different authors. The current legislation and, the importance that transparency has for citizens, have contributed to promote the divulgence of all the information of local governments.