Paper/Speech Details of Conference Program for the 27th NISPAcee Annual Conference Program Overview WG1: Local Government Author(s) Mihovil Skarica University of Zagreb Zagreb Croatia Title Relations between Local and County Government in Croatia: Cooperation and Competition in Europeanization Context File Paper files are available only for conference participants, please login first. Presenter Mihovil Skarica Abstract Main purpose of the paper is to investigate, analyze and evaluate developments in Croatian local government system which are related to the relations and dynamics between its first and second tier. Intensifying integration at the European level of governance opened new relevant horizons for national territorial governance, primarily through the advocacy of multi-level cooperative governance and by providing additional opportunities and challenges through EU cohesion and regional policies. Dynamics of these relations are of utmost importance to the overall adaptive capacity and collective performance of territorial governance system. Trends, problems and changes in these relations are evaluated primarily through the analysis of legislative framework of local and county functions and competences and through the interplay of other indicators such as personnel employed, financial transactions between counties and municipalities. Cooperative platforms between the levels, introduced primarily by regional development framework are critically analyzed as well. Paper covers a period from 2001 onwards, a year in which two important events coincided: a) Europeanization of Croatian public institutions began and b) constitutional and legislative changes marked the beginning of decentralization process and introduced a different, more autonomous role for local government. Preliminary findings suggest several conclusions: a) areas of contact between municipal and county level have increased resulting in their more intensive interdependence; b) relations between the levels have been differentiating and cannot be considered as uniform: different kinds of relations evolve between counties and small municipalities and between counties and largest towns; c) centralistic governance of the whole system stimulates the development of competition between the levels which endangers their collective and cooperative efforts in resolving local problems and issues and in stimulating local and regional development; d) counties have solidified their position as inevitable intersection of national sectoral policies and are of vital importance for their transmission to the local level. These relations do secure a certain level of harmonization in developmental policies but negate the subsidiarity principle by overshadowing and minimizing the role and the importance of municipal level. Following these conclusions, paper will develop a set of policy recommendations regarding territorial reorganization and decentralization process in Croatia.
