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Local Self Government and Decentralization in South - East Europe Local Self Government and Decentralization in South - East Europe Proceedings of the workshop held in Zagreb, Croatia 6th April, 2001 Friedrich Ebert Stiftung Zagreb Office Zagreb 2001 Publisher: Friedrich Ebert Stiftung Zagreb Office Medve{~ak 10 Zagreb Printing house: Smjerokaz 2000. Zagreb, July 2001 Contents FOREWORD..........................................................................................................5 Kaliopa Dimitrovska Andrews and Zlatka Plo{tajner LOCAL GOVERNMENT IN SLOVENIA........................................................9 Gábor Balás and József Hegedüs LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT AND DECENTRALIZATION IN HUNGARY........................................................37 Inge Perko-[eparovi} THE REFORM OF LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT IN CROATIA........................................................................................................75 Ne|o Mili~evi} STATE AND PROBLEMS OF LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT IN BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA...............................................................105 Aleksandar M. Simi} LOCAL GOVERNMENT IN SERBIA............................................................128 Sleven Leki} LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT IN MONTENEGRO.................................159 Ilija Todorovski LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT AND DECENTRALIZATION IN THE REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA........................................................172 Artan Hoxha and Alma Gurraj LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT AND DECENTRALIZATION: CASE OF ALBANIA. HISTORY,REFORMES AND CHALLENGES.............................................194 Christian Pirvulescu LOCAL PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION IN ROMANIA.................................225 Nora Ananieva LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT IN THE REPUBLIC OF BULGARIA: FROM CONSTITUTIONALLY PROCLAIMED PRINCIPLES TO EFFECTIVE ACTIONS....................................................249 FOREWORD In the context of the Stability Pact for South-East Europe and in cooperation with national institutions the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES) has initiated a regional project concerning the situation and the reforms of self-government and decentralization in the countries of the region. In all of the countries in South- East Europe reform programs concerning the structures of self-government and decentralization either have been implemented or are under discussion. As all of them are societies in transition, we may presume similar problems and common interests in this field as well. By the proposed project the followingobjectives are being pursued: • Analysis of the present situation of local government (or self- government) and the reform programs in each country of the region. • Comparison of the different national systems of local government and their reform projects regarding the improvement of democratization in the society. • Exchange of experiences on the implementation of the reform programs in neighboring and West-European countries with respect to their positive and negative results or implications. • Improvement of the structure of communication and relations between communities in the region, particularly concerning cross-border activities. • Formulation of policy proposals for public discussion based on the results and recommendations of the project as contribution to the political debate. Trying to attain these intended objectives the project is designed as a process of different work steps as shown in the schematic presentation of the project design below. In detail the following activities are envisaged: • Elaboration of papers by researchers or experts analyzing the present situation and reform programs in the single countries. • Presentation of the studies in a first common workshop with the authors and experts in the field of local-self government. Discussion of the results of the national papers and elaboration of a comparative analysis. Identification of specific problems of common interest and priority. • Establishing of a stable regional expert group. • Invitation of experts on specialized questions, where further information and discussions by the expert group or decision makers are needed. • Preparation and distribution of publications of the results for public discussion with policy makers, researchers, and experts at national and local level. 5 6 In order to reach an optimum of comparability between the country papers we proposed for the first workshop in April to follow a common pattern in the elaboration and presentation of the papers. In addition to the given pattern we asked the experts not only to include problem areas in their countries, but also to report on positive examples in the sense of "best practice" models within local self-government and to explain as well, how and because of what the positive development was attained. For this purpose we identified the following six dimensions as structure of the papers, but at the same time inviting the participants to add or modify this structure if required: • Local government elections • Local government territorial organization • Legal competence of local self-government • Local public services • Local government finances and economic resources • Local situation of minorities Later on two more dimensions were added: • Participation of citizens in local self-government and activities of local lobby-groups • Communication and cross-border cooperation between the municipalities of the region Thefirst regional expert workshop on local self-government and decentralization has been successfully launched in Zagreb on April 6, 2001. In preparation of the workshop 10 country studies on the system of local self- government in South Eastern Europe (SEE), which are presented in this publication, had been collected and together with brief problem oriented summaries distributed to the workshop participants. Based on explicit interest of all participating experts in further cooperation, a regional expert team was established composed of the invited workshop participants. The team will work together with the FES Project coordinator in preparing follow-up workshops and other forms of future collaboration. The general response to the workshop input and discussion was positive and encouraging for the continuation of the project. The discussion has identified most important problem areas of local self- government in the respective countries. Several proposals concerning future workshops and other forms of cooperation have been formulated. The identified problem areas are described in the following agenda. 7 According to the presented country reports on local self-government (LSG) the main problem areas among the SEE countries are shown in the following summarized problem agenda: 1) Fiscal resources and financing of LSG. How to design a balanced distribution of fiscal resources between national government, regions and municipalities? How should fiscal services be technically organized? How to balance regional and local disparities of public services due to different levels of development and the size of LSG units? 2)Legal competences of LSG. How to design a balanced system of legal prerogatives between national government, regions and municipalities? How to overcome a high degree of centralization typical for post-socialist countries? 3)Territorial organization. How to determine the right size of LSG units? How to deal with extreme differences in size between big cities and small rural units? Should their be and what might be the design of a regional level of territorial organization? 4)Politization of LSG elections and administration. How to prevent internal party politics and interventions of national ideological conflicts into local/regional politics? 5)Development of management and administrative skills. How can the administrative and managerial capacities of policy makers and the administrative staff at local and regional level be improved? How to organize adequate training and continuous education of LSG public servants? 6)Organization of public services. What should be the status of companies providing communal services (water, energy, transportation)? At what level of territorial organization should service companies be established? 7)Protection of minorities. How to secure a satisfactory level of ethnic minorities protection at local/regional level? How to escape the dangers of either minority segregation or assimilation? 8)Participation of citizens. What kind of relationship exists between local authorities and citizens? How can effective participation of citizens in local politics be promoted? As a result of this first workshop the majority of the participants has identified financing of local self-government as topic of the next workshop. In the same way the project is supposed to be developed by similar interactive procedures between the expert group, researchers, policy makers and the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung in the future. Zagreb, June 2001 Rüdiger Pintar Head of the Regional Office Zagreb Friedrich Ebert Stiftung 8 slovenia.qxd 15. 09. 03 21:53 Page 1 Kaliopa Dimitrovska Andrews and Zlatka Plo{tajner LOCAL GOVERNMENT IN SLOVENIA INTRODUCTION Slovenia is a small country in size (covering about 20.000 km2) and population (2 million inhabitants), located at a major crossroads in Central Europe, where Roman, German and Slavic culture meet. The richness of cultural and historical experiences is an important asset in Slovenia’s potential for future economic and social development, and the variety of climate and landscape provides ideal preconditions for a wide range of different economic activities and lifestyles. Local self-government should help Slovenian
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