This chapter describes the key features of governance in the four cities through an overview of the relevant institutions, reforms and actors. We take as a starting point of our research the 74th Constitutional Amendment Act 1992 (CAA), which defi nes a new framework of administrative and political decentralisation in the urban context. Since local government is a state subject in the Indian federal system, the states were required to adopt conformity legislations so that the 74th CAA could be implemented. The states have thus played a major role in the decentralisation process from its very inception, and this chapter will repeatedly underline the importance and implications of that role. Yet we will also argue that decentralisation has coincided with and has been related to changes in civil society and society at large, as well as in the economy, and that the increasing number of different types of actors has made a state-centric vision practically obsolete.