In the Republic of Slovenia, we face fragmentation of municipalities at a local level, where many of them are small, financially dependent and do not meet the legal requirements. Their solution to these issues is inter-municipal cooperation which benefits both small and large municipalities. It is implemented in different forms and for different purposes, but the two most important are increase in efficiency and achieving a mutually beneficial relationship.
In this thesis, with the descriptive method, the field of local self-government and inter-municipal cooperation is presented in theory and in legislation. Using the case study method, the presented theory is applied to municipalities of Celje, Štore, Vojnik and Dobrna, thus analyzing their inter-municipal cooperation. Using the interview method, we determined all implemented forms, researched others and made an overview of their advantages and disadvantages. With the collected forms we were able to test the hypothesis.
Based on empirical research, we concluded that there are fourteen cases of inter-municipal cooperation in the selected municipalities. Twelve of those are conducted formally and two informally. From a functional point of view, there are six cases in the field of public services and four in the field of administrative tasks. Taking into account the criteria of participating municipalities, we have nine cases of inter-municipal cooperation, where all four selected municipalities participate and five cases, where only two municipalities participate.
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