To Decentralize or Not to Decentralize, is That the Question? Nicaraguan Health Policy under Structural Adjustment in the 1990s

Abstract

Since 1990, health services decentralization in Nicaragua has been accompanied by structural adjustment, resulting in reduced equity and accountability. Sandinista efforts in the 1980s to extend access to primary care and reduce class and regional disparities in the delivery of health services were accompanied by modest attempts to increase local-level accountability and responsiveness. The escalation of war in the late 1980s transformed this effort into greater de facto decentralization. Over the past decade, Nicaragua has used decentralization policy to restructure the health system through health spending cuts and the favoring of curative over preventive services; privatization and the promotion of user fees; and confusion of lines of accountability. The authors analyze the 1990s' health policies in Nicaragua, paying particular attention to the blending of decentralization policy with the fiscal and administrative reforms advanced by the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, and other international agencies. They conclude that analyzing decentralization as a sector-specific reform that can be ameliorated through technocratic modifications is insufficient. A full understanding of the problems and possibilities of decentralization requires an analysis of the political and economic context that conditions these policies.