Decentralization or decentralisation is the process by which the activities of an organization, particularly those regarding planning and decision making, are distributed or delegated away from a central, authoritative location or group.
Health systems decentralization involves moving decision making away from centralised control and closer to the users of health services. Many countries have embarked on a process to decentralize their health systems as a means to improve their responsiveness and performance.
In practice, decentralization involves the transfer of authority and power from:
Higher to lower levels of government or from national to subnational levels of government. Government to legally independent autonomous state organisations. Government to the private sector (whether “for profit” or “not for profit”). There are four main types of decentralisation: political, administrative, fiscal, and market decentralisatio 1. Political decentralisation 2. Administrative decentralisation