Overview of Territorial Reforms between 2012 and 2021

Changes in the number of Local/Regional Governments

This first section of the study focuses on the changes in the numbers of Local and Regional Governments (LRGs) between 2012 and 2021, examining both the broad comparative trends as well as any specificities observed pertaining to the different tiers of governance.

General comparative trends

Amongst the 40CEMRcountries covered by this study, there are 36 unitary countries (including regional states like Spain and Italy), four with federal systems and eight countries^[1] have an intermediary tier of governance, e.g. provinces or counties, and more than half^[2] have a regional government.

One major development that stood out was the fact that territorial reforms have been introduced in a sizeable majority of the 40 countries covered by the study. A quarter^[3] however experienced no change in the number of territorial governments during the period studied. Of this 25% ofCEMRcountries that did not observe any change in the number of their subnational governments, eight of these also included regional authorities.

The second trend that was noteworthy shows the majority of changes taking place at the local or municipal tier. We therefore regrouped the countries so as to compare changes in Europe at the local level only and reclassified them into categories according to whether or not these changes were insignificant (below 10%), moderate (between 10 and 50%) or major (change greater than 50%). This can be seen in Figure 1 and Table 1 below.

Table 1.1 - Changes in the number of local governments between 2012 and 2021

Northern Europe
Estonia	-65,0%
Latvia	-64,7%
Norway	-17,2%
Iceland	-9,2%
Finland	-8,0%
United Kingdom	-6,7%
Denmark	0%
Lithuania	0%
Sweden	0%

Eastern Europe
Ukraine	-84,6%
Georgia	-7,2%
Hungary	-0,72%
Poland	-0,08%
Moldova	0%
Romania	0%
Slovakia	0%
Czech Republic	0,13%
Bulgaria	0,4%

Southern Europe
Albania	-83,6%
Turkey	-47,4%
Portugal	-30%
North Macedonia	-4,7%
Italy	-2,3%
Israel	-1,2%
Croatia	0%
Cyprus	0%
Malta	0%
Serbia	0%
Spain	0%
Slovenia	0,5%
Greece	2%
Bosnia and Herzegovina	6%
Kosovo	13,9%
Montenegro	19,0%

Western Europe
Netherlands	-15,8%
Austria	-11,1%
Germany	-5,9%
France	-5%
Luxembourg	-3,8%
Belgium	-1,4%

It is interesting to note that a large number of territorial reforms that took place over the past decade seem mainly focused on reducing the number of local governments in order to establish larger units. In the case of Finland for example, there were 23 municipal amalgamations from 2013 to 2021, with a decrease in the number of municipalities from 336 to 309, and an increase in the size of local governments. In Albania, 12 regions were created even as municipalities were reduced from 373 to 61. In Malta, five regional councils were established in 2021 (previously called “Regional Committees”), following the Local Government Reform Process and the publication of Act No. XIV of 2019. Their legal basis was strengthened and the powers of these regional councils were boosted. Many of the examples listed below confirm this pattern of a decrease in the number of municipalities and/or an increase in amalgamations over the years.

^[1] Belgium, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Ukraine

^[2] Twenty-six countries possess a regional level: Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Moldova, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Ukraine, United Kingdom

^[3] Eleven countries: Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Lithuania, Malta, Moldova, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden

In-depth look at each level of governance

Municipal/communal governments

In general, the municipal/communal tier of government is the tier of government that has undergone the greatest change in recent years and is also where the overall decrease in number is undeniable. Yet, while this has been validated across the 40 countries that responded to CEMR’s survey, there are also some divergent cases.

Of the 22 countries^[1] where the number of municipalities decreased, the decrease in the number of municipalities in 13 countries^[2] was limited (from 0 to 10%). In 3 countries,^[3] the number of municipalities fell between 10% and 20% and, in Portugal by 30%. In Turkey, the number of municipalities decreased by more than 45%. The most significant decreases were seen in Ukraine (-85%), Albania (-84%), Estonia (-65%) and Latvia (-65%).^[4]

Nevertheless, there are cases in seven countries where the number of municipalities has increased over the period under observation. In Bulgaria (increase of +0.4%), the Czech Republic (+0.13%), Greece (+2%) and Slovenia (+0.5%), the increase recorded was minimal. A more perceptible increase could be witnessed in Bosnia and Herzegovina (+6%) and Kosovo (+14%). However, the biggest increase of note was in Montenegro (+19%).

In 11 countries,^[5] the number of municipalities has remained unchanged over the last decade.

Intermediate governments

An intermediate tier, meaning that there are provinces or counties functioning both as an administrative and a political unit, currently exists in eight countries.^[6]Most of the countries that have this intermediary tier also have regional governments, with the exception of Hungary and the Netherlands.Generally speaking, there have been no significant changes in the number of this tier of subnational government. The difference ranges between 0.0% to 2.7%, as shown in Table 1.2.

Table 1.2 – Changes in the number of intermediate governments between 2012 and 2021

Western Europe
France	-1,0%
Germany	-0,3%
Belgium	0%
Netherlands	0%

Eastern Europe
Ukraine	-72,1%
Hungary	0%
Poland	0,3%

Southern Europe
Italy	-2,7%

Source: TERRI Survey 2021 |CEMR^[7]

Box 1 – Finland takes a local leap: counties created to tackle health

In Finland, a new “self-government level” is being established: 21 counties in charge of well-being services. The Health and Social Services reform bill was adopted by the Finnish Parliament in June 2021.^[8] For the first time, counties are being established that will be entrusted with the organisation of health and social services and rescue services from the local government level (municipalities and joint municipal authorities).^[9]

At first glance, this reform seems to amount to the creation of a new deconcentrated level of the central government, particularly since the three pertinent Ministries in this area will be appointing advisory boards for the “wellbeing services counties” and will conduct annual negotiations to monitor, assess, and direct the organisation of services in the counties.

Nonetheless, a county council, elected by direct popular vote, will constitute the highest decision-making body of each well-being service county. The first county elections will be held on 23 January 2022.

Two exceptions, found in Finland (see box 1) and Ukraine, are worth highlighting. In the latter, administrative and territorial reforms introduced from 2015 to 2021 led to significant changes in the territorial structure of the country. A voluntary amalgamation process has been underway since 2015, resulting not only in the reduction of territorial communities or “hromadas”^[10] at the local tier, which dropped from 11,517 to 1,775, but also at the intermediate tier, where the administrative units termed “rayons” shrunk from 488 to 136.^[11] According to the Association of Ukrainian Cities and the Ukrainian Association of District and Regional Councils, the district councils lost all their competencies following the 2020 territorial reform.^[12]

Regional governments

Based on the responses to the questionnaire, 26 of the countries surveyed have a regional tier of governance.^[13] Over the past decade, there has been no change in the number of regional tiers in 24 of these countries.

In two countries however, the number of regions greatly decreased: in France (decrease of -33%) and in Norway (-42%). In the case of Norway, decentralisation and government reforms were prompted by the goal of cutting costs, as well as to adapt services to citizens’ needs and improve democratic accountability. In Malta, a regional tier of government was created in 2021.

Table 1.3 – Changes in the number of intermediate governments between 2012 and 2021

Northern Europe
Norway	-42%
Latvia	0%
Finland	0%
United Kingdom	0%
Denmark	0%
Sweden	0%

Eastern Europe
Czech Republic	0%
Georgia	0%
Moldova	0%
Poland	0%
Romania	0%
Slovakia	0%
Ukraine	0%

Southern Europe
Albania	0%
Bosnia and Herzegovina	0%
Croatia	0%
Greece	0%
Israel	0%
Italy	0%
Malta	100%
Portugal	0%
Serbia	0%
Spain	0%

Western Europe
France	-33%
Austria	3%
Germany	0%
Belgium	0%

Source: TERRI Survey 2021 |CEMR^[7]

In conclusion, the territorial reforms that have taken place within the past decade have been implemented predominantly at the local tier, followed by changes occurring at the regional tier, with only few changes happening at the intermediate tier. These findings are in line with the data and statistics from earlier studies carried out by the OECD^[15] and UCLG^[16] at the global level that highlighted similar decentralisation tendencies. These developments have oftentimes led to increased municipal autonomy, strengthening the link between citizens and local decision-making bodies.

To some extent, these reorganisations can be traced back to the last economic and financial crisis in 2008, which spurred a major push towards cost savings in the provision of public services, as fragmented municipal services were often seen as an obstacle to achieving greater cost efficiency. This desire for more cost effectiveness at the municipal tier may have accelerated the pace towards intermunicipal cooperation and hastened the rising role of regions. Later in the study, we will assess how and to what extent these changes have influenced the number and/or types of local and regional governments (LRGs).

^[1] Albania, Austria, Belgium, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Luxembourg, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom

^[2] Belgium, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, North Macedonia, Poland, United Kingdom

^[3] Austria, Netherlands, Norway

^[4] As of 1st July 2021, there will be 42 municipalities in Latvia, as set forth in the Administrative Territorial Reform approved by the Saeima in its final reading on Wednesday, 10 June 2021

^[5] Eleven countries: Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Lithuania, Malta, Moldova, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden

^[6] Belgium, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Ukraine

^[7] The geographical regions have been listed according to the United Nations’ system of classification of European countries. Reference used: https://unstats.un.org/unsd/methodology/m49/

Layout inspired by the following source: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/03003930.2018.1530660?needAccess=true, p. 2ff

^[8] For more information, see: https://soteuudistus.fi/en/-/1271139/government-proposal-for-health-and-social-services-reform-and-related-legislation-proceeds-to-parliament

^[9] For more information on the establishment of new counties in connection with health reforms, see Part 3.A

^[10] Territorial communities

^[11] For more information, see PLATFORMA’s publication: https://platforma-dev.eu/fr/new-publications-decentralisation-and-local-public-administration-reform-in-georgia-moldova-and-ukraine/

^[12] Decision of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine (assembly) on formation of rayons (July 17, 2020)

^[13] The twenty-seven countries are: Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Malta,Moldova, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Ukraine, United Kingdom

^[14] The geographical regions have been listed according to the United Nations’ system of classification of European countries. Reference used: https://unstats.un.org/unsd/methodology/m49/