Analysis of local governance level in villages of Tonekabon city using TOPSIS method

Governance is the art of guiding organizations and communities. What determines the local nature of governance is the degree of participation in achieving the goals and aspirations of the local community. The aim of this study was to analyze the level of local governance and the factors affecting it in local governments (rural and Islamic councils) in the villages of Tonekabon city with a descriptive-analytical research approach. The statistical population of the study includes two groups of institutions in charge of rural management (including 50 villagers or members of Islamic councils and district experts) and 384 heads of households living in 36 villages of more than 50 households in 5 districts. In order to analyze the level of rural local governance, one-sample t-statistic and Fan TOPSIS were used and in order to analyze the factors affecting rural governance, Pearson correlation coefficient and multivariate linear regression were used. Indicators of local governance include participation, legitimacy, accountability, responsibility, central justice, collective agreement, transparency and efficiency and effectiveness and factors affecting local governance including internal factors (organizational characteristics, manpower) and external factors (spatial location, Social and cultural characteristics, economic characteristics). The results showed that local governments are not in a good position in terms of local governance indicators with an average score 2.9. Also, the level of local governance is average in 61.1% of villages. At the same time, the results of regression show that internal factors explain 76.6% and external factors 96.4% of changes in rural governance. In the field of internal factors of Dehyari degree, Dehyari income, age and Dehyari experience with standard coefficient of 0.768; 0.379 and 0.232 and in the field of external factors of village , village population, weight and population density with standard coefficient of 0.411; 0.361 and 0.223 are the most important variables affecting rural governance.