Executive Summary: "Myanmar is undergoing governance reforms of historic significance, resulting in changes to subnational and local governance, decentralization, and the nature of central-local relations. Traditionally, Myanmar has been an agrarian society but urban areas are increasingly important—with almost a third of the population now residing in cities and towns. In this context, municipal governance is assuming greater importance to the country?s development and political transition. While the 2008 Constitution and subsequent reforms have delegated some functions to the 14 newly-established state and region governments and established new mechanisms at the township level, Myanmar remains a highly centralized state. However, municipal governance is a nascent exception to this. All of Myanmar?s townships now have Development Affairs Organizations (DAOs) (si-bin tha-ya-ye apwe in the Myanmar language) which are important urban agencies with responsibilities for providing a significant range of social services and for overseeing local economic governance. The key characteristics of DAOs are as follows: * They are the only fully decentralized government agencies under the control of state and region governments. * They are unique as they are fully self-funded, must use their revenues in the township where they were collected, and they have significant discretion over revenue use. Every other subnational governance actor receives its budget one way or another from the Union Government. * They are major social service providers, providing services that range from urban water, sewage, garbage collection, roads and bridges, to street lighting and drainage, and they also oversee local economic governance through issuing licenses and permits to local businesses, collecting taxes and fees, and holding auctions to operate local ferries and toll roads. * They are the only local government actors overseen by a dedicated local committee—the Township Development Affairs Committee (TDAC)—which has decision-making power and the majority of its members are elected by the community..."