市町村合併を行わなかった理由とその傾向
—— 東海三県の「市町村行財政改革に関するアンケート調査」の結果から ——

抄録

Based on the results of Tekeuchi et al.[11](2008) “a questionnaire of administrative and fiscal reform (Sep. 2006),” in three prefectures of the Tokai Region, we performed a cluster analysis for the municipalities that did not merge from 2000 to 2006 to clarify the crucial reasons for clustering these municipalities. To make the clustering more objective, we also conducted a cross tabulation analysis with the results of the questionnaires on how the Trinity Reform affects administrative and fiscal reforms of the municipalities.
The Trinity Reform, originally to increase the freedom of administrative and fiscal management of municipalities, was conducted in parallel with municipal mergers to raise the efficiency of the municipalities. After the reform, some studies tried to confirm whether or how it affected the administration and fiscal situation in the municipalities. In the Tokai Region, Tekeuchi et al.[11](2008) carried out the questionnaire survey in 2006. Additionally, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications[10](2008) investigated why the municipalities merged and the effects of the municipal merger by sending a questionnaire to all municipalities in Japan. However, both of these questionnaires only showed descriptive statistics, so the tendency of the answers for municipalities was not adequately captured.
To overcome these shortcomings, we performed both the cluster analysis and the cross tabulation analysis by using 2 questionnaires replied by the municipalities that did not merge using Chapter 1 and 3 questionnairs in Chapter 2, among 5 chapters, consisting of "1. Municipal Merger," "2. The Trinity Reform and Devolution," "3. Improvement of the Administration," "4. Future Image of the Administration of the Municipalities" and "5. Fiscal Situation of the Municipalities" in Tekeuchi et al.[11](2008) to make.
First, we classified 79 municipalities by the replies to the question, "why did your municipality not merge ?" using a principal component analysis. Based on these results, we conducted a cluster analysis. Second, we used the replies to the 3 questions, "how much was the reduction in public spending for your municipality directly required by the Trinity Reform ?" "how much was the securement of public revenue for your municipality required by the Trinity Reform ?" and "how much was the autonomy of fiscal management for your municipality allowed by the Trinity Reform?" to make a cross tabulation analysis.
From these analyses, we found that the choices: "anxiety with worsening of the efficiency in administration and finance," "value in the benefits for the residents," "decisions on fiscal administrative operations by individual municipalities" were the main benchmarks for clustering municipalities. We also found that the municipalities which did not merge had a different opinion of the Trinity Reform: The municipalities which could operate fiscal administration by themselves tended to make a positive assessment on the Trinity Reform; The municipalities which are concerned about the deterioration of fiscal administration or thought much of the benefits of their citizens tended to make a negative assessment on it.

JEL Classification: C83, E62, H70, H83