For the last decade the media have been mentioning and suggesting the regionalisati-on, i.e. creation of regions, of Slovenia but this has still not been implemented. Political parties and representatives of municipalities are involved in the discussion on a particu-lar matter both highlight and address the problem of uneven regional development in Slovenia.
There are numbers of reasons that confirm Slovenia’s urgent needs two levels of local self-government. Regionalisation would alleviate the internal development problems and facilitate to fill the void between the state and municipalities, assure the implemen-tation of the decentralization process and decrease the difference in the economic de-velopment among Slovenian municipalities.
Regionalisation would allow the state to transfer many duties and responsibilities to regional jurisdiction, such as health services, education, social care and welfare, trans-port infrastructure and also a share of administrative tasks together with the funds and personnel necessary for carrying out these tasks. Regionalisation would also strengthen cross-border cooperation of Slovenian local communities.
Article 120 in the Constitution of Austria provides for the formation of regional federati-ons of municipalities, it has not been put into practice in Austria as well. The regulati-on is under the jurisdicion of Federal constitutional legislation and the implementation is executed by provincial legislation. Austria is divided into nine autonomous federal pro-vinces. In accordance, nine different provincial acts regulating the local self-government were adopted.
The topic of regionalization has been discussed for over a decade, however, the gene-ral public is still not adequately informed. This is confirmed by only 11 percent referen-dum turnout in the year 2008. Therefore, the main focus of diploma thesis is to pre-sent the necessity, purpose, duties and competences of decentralized regions. The thesis also highlights and explains the variety of challenges and dilemmas regarding the implementaion of regionalisation since the held referendum.
The proposed aims and goals of diploma thesis have been achieved. It is concluded that the regionalisation of Slovenia into eight regions is the most rational decision. Slo-venia is characterised by a high degree of concentration of fiscal, administrative, judici-al, executive and lawmaking powers, therefore two-level local self-government would significantely advance the decentralization. Regionalizaton would classify Slovenia on the third level of regional subdivisions in NUTS (the Classification of Territorial Units for Statistics) developed and regulated by the European Union for computation of regional statistics.
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