Local governments are administrative office that
are smaller than a
state. The term
is used to contrast with offices at
nation-state level, which are referred to as
the
central government,
national government, or (where
appropriate)
federal
government.
In modern
nations, local governments usually
have same powers as national governments do. They usually have some
power to raise
taxes, though these may be
limited by central
legislation. In some
countries local government is partly or wholly funded by
subventions from central government taxation. The question of
Municipal Autonomy—which powers
the local government has, or should have, and why—is a key question
of
public administration and
governance. The institutions of local
government vary greatly between countries, and even where similar
arrangements exist, the terminology often varies. Common names for
local government entities include state,
province,
region,
department,
county,
prefecture,
district,
city,
township,
town,
borough,
parish,
municipality,
shire and
village. However all
these names are often used informally in different countries &
local government is the legal part of central Govrment.
Main articles on each country will usually contain some information
about local government, or links to an article with fuller
information. The rest of this article gives information or links
for countries where a relatively full description is
available.
Afghanistan
Afghanistan
was traditionally divided into provinces governed
by centrally appointed governors with considerable autonomy in
local affairs. There are currently 34 provinces.
During the
Soviet occupation and the development of country-wide resistance,
local areas came increasingly under the control of mujaheddin groups that were largely independent
of any higher authority; local commanders, in some instances,
asserted a measure of independence also from the mujaheddin
leadership in Pakistan
,
establishing their own systems of local government, collecting
revenues, running educational and other facilities, and even
engaging in local negotiations. Mujaheddin groups retained
links with the Peshawar parties to ensure access to weapons that
were doled out to the parties by the government of Pakistan for
distribution to fighters inside Afghanistan.
The Taliban set up a shura (assembly), made up of senior Taliban
members and important tribal figures from the area. Each shura made
laws and collected taxes locally. The Taliban set up a provisional
government for the whole of Afghanistan, but it did not exercise
central control over the local shuras.
The process of setting up the transitional government in June 2002
by the Loya Jirga took many steps involving local government.
First, at the district and municipal level, traditional shura
councils met to pick electors—persons who cast ballots for Loya
Jirga delegates. Each district or municipality had to choose a
predetermined number of electors, based on the size of its
population. The electors then traveled to regional centers and cast
ballots, to choose from amongst themselves a smaller number of loya
jirga delegates— according to allotted numbers assigned to each
district. The delegates then took part in the Loya Jirga.
The warlords who rule various regions of the country exert local
control. The transitional government is attempting to integrate
local governing authorities with the central government, but it
lacks the loyalty from he warlords necessary to its governing
authority. More traditional elements of political authority—such as
Sufi networks, royal lineage, clan strength, age-based wisdom, and
the like—still exist and play a role in Afghan society. Karzai is
relying on these traditional sources of authority in his challenge
to the warlords and older Islamist leaders. The deep ethnic,
linguistic, sectarian, tribal, racial, and regional cleavages
present in the country create what is called "Qawm" identity,
emphasizing the local over higher-order formations. Qawm refers to
the group to which the individual considers himself to belong,
whether a subtribe, village, valley, or neighborhood. Local
governing authority relies upon these forms of identity and
loyalty. i love you
Argentina
Argentina
is a federation of 23 provinces and the federal
capital of Buenos
Aires
. During the 19th century there was a bitter
struggle between Buenos Aires and the interior provinces, and there
has long been an element of tension regarding the division of
powers between the central government and provincial bodies. The
federal government retains control over such matters as the
regulation of commerce, customs collections, currency, civil or
commercial codes, or the appointment of foreign agents. The
provincial governors are elected every four years.
The constitutional "national intervention" and "state of siege"
powers of the president have been invoked frequently. The first of
these powers was designed to "guarantee the republican form of
government in the provinces." Since the adoption of the 1853
constitution, the federal government has intervened over 200 times,
mostly by presidential decree. Under this authority, provincial and
municipal offices may be declared vacant, appointments annulled,
and local elections supervised. Between 1966 and 1973, all local
legislatures were dissolved and provincial governors were appointed
by the new president. A restoration of provincial and municipal
government followed the return to constitutional government in
1973. After the March 1976 coup, the federal government again
intervened to remove all provincial governors and impose direct
military rule over all municipalities. Since 1983, representative
local government has been in force again.
Until 1996, the President appointed the mayor of Buenos Aires, and
by law, the president and Congress controlled any legislation that
affected the city. Constitutional reforms that year led to an
elected mayoral position, and a 60-member Poder Legislativo
(legislative power). The members are elected by proportional
representation to four-year terms.
Australia
Local government is the 3rd type of government in
Australia, after Federal and State.
Canada
Canada
has a
federal system with three orders of government. The largest
is the federal government, followed by the provincial and
territorial governments. At the root level is the municipal (or
local) government. Municipal governments are controlled by the
provincial (or territorial) order of government.
Egypt
Local
government traditionally enjoyed limited power in Egypt
's highly
centralized state. Under the central government were
twenty-six governorates (sing., muhafazah; pl., muhafazat). These
were subdivided into districts (sing., markaz; pl., marakaz) and
villages (sing., qaryah; pl., qura) or towns. At each level, there
was a governing structure that combined representative councils and
government-appointed executive organs headed by governors, district
officers, and mayors, respectively. Governors were appointed by the
president, and they, in turn, appointed subordinate executive
officers. The coercive backbone of the state apparatus ran downward
from the Ministry of Interior through the governors' executive
organs to the district police station and the village headman
(sing., umdah; pl., umadah).
Before the revolution, state penetration of the rural areas was
limited by the power of local notables, but under Nasser, land
reform reduced their socioeconomic dominance, and the incorporation
of peasants into cooperatives transferred mass dependence from
landlords to government. The extension of officials into the
countryside permitted the regime to bring development and services
to the village. The local branches of the ruling party, the Arab
Socialist Union (ASU), fostered a certain peasant political
activism and coopted the local notables—in particular the village
headmen—and checked their independence from the regime.
State penetration did not retreat under Sadat and Mubarak. The
earlier effort to mobilize peasants and deliver services
disappeared as the local party and cooperative withered, but
administrative controls over the peasants remained intact. The
local power of the old families and the headmen revived but more at
the expense of peasants than of the state. The district police
station balanced the notables, and the system of local government
(the mayor and council) integrated them into the regime.
Sadat took several measures to decentralize power to the provinces
and towns. Governors acquired more authority under Law Number 43 of
1979, which reduced the administrative and budgetary controls of
the central government over the provinces. The elected councils
acquired, at least formally, the right to approve or disapprove the
local budget. In an effort to reduce local demands on the central
treasury, local government was given wider powers to raise local
taxes. But local representative councils became vehicles of
pressure for government spending, and the soaring deficits of local
government bodies had to be covered by the central government.
Local government was encouraged to enter into joint ventures with
private investors, and these ventures stimulated an alliance
between government officials and the local rich that paralleled the
infitah alliance at the national level. Under Mubarak
decentralization and local autonomy became more of a reality, and
local policies often reflected special local conditions. Thus,
officials in Upper Egypt often bowed to the powerful Islamic
movement there, while those in the port cities struck alliances
with importers.
France
According
to its constitution, France
has 3 levels
of local government :
However, intercommunalities are now a level of government between
municipalities and departments.
Paris
(both a
commune and a département) and Corsica
are local
government sui generis.
Germany
As a
federal country, Germany
is divided into a number of states (Länder
in German), which used to have wide powers, but whose main
remaining power today (2004) is their ability to veto federal laws
through their Bundesrat
representation. The system of local
government is described in the article on
States of Germany.
India
In India the local government is the third level of government
apart from the State and Central governments. There are two types
of Local Government in operation: Panchayats in rural areas and
Municipalities in urban areas. The Panchayats are a linked-system
of local bodies with village panchayats (average population about
5,000),panchayat samities at the intermediate level (average
population about 100,000), and district panchayats (average
population about 1,000,000).
Number of Panchayats and Municipalities in India, 2004
Panchayats Nos. Municipalities Nos.Gram (Village) 236,350 Municipal
Corporations 109Samities (Intermediate) 6,795 Municipal Councils
1,432Zilla (District) 531 Nagar(Town)Panchayats 2,182Total 243,676
Total 3,723Source: India, Twelfth Finance Commission Report,
2005
The rural panchayats created in around 1959 were based on the
soviet model (Yugoslav variety ) of tiering with hierarchical
control to undertake mainly agency tasks of the states through
earmarked funding, with limited civic tasks financed from assigned
land revenue and local surcharge thereon. This resulted in
overlapping functional jurisdiction and a mismatch of functions and
taxes among the three tiers. The urban municipalities, created
during the colonial days of mid-19th century, survived the
‘socialist’ experiment and retained their separate character as
their English counterparts. In 1991, through two identical
constitutional amendments, one for the Panchaysts and the other for
the Municipalities, a number of changes were introduced to
strengthen local governments in India ensure regularity of their
ekection every five years and limiting their period of supersession
or dissolution to six months, three sets of local local govetnments
for the Panchaysta and the Municipalities, reservation of seats and
chairpersons for women and scheduled castes and tribes, creation of
independent state slection commission (SEC), state finance
commission (SFC) linked with the central finance commission, and
planning committees at the districts (DPCs) and metopolitan areas
(MPCs). In addition, these amendments have indicated guidelines for
the states to empower the local governments through increased
devolution of functions and taxes to them- these are not been
followed-up by the states. However, the CFCs have been allocating
discretionary grants for local governments passed through the
states.One lacuna in the existing arrangement is that the
Panchatars do not have a statutorily delegated list of functions on
which its revenues could be spent; this has created problems of
financing their own activities rom their oen revenues or through
general grants fron the CFC-SFC arrangements. Panchayats act mostly
as agencies for implementing thr erstwhile soviet plan schemes and
projects on cost reimbursement (around 96% of their activities)
that do not have any maintenance component for transferred
completed works.The major national parties are committed to improve
the efectiveness of the Panchayats through further central action
to remedy the situation.
Isle of Man
Local
government on the Isle of
Man
is based around the concept of ancient
parishes. There are three types of local authorities: a
borough corporation, town commissions, and parish
commissions.
Ireland
Local government in Ireland is mainly based on a structure of 29
county councils and five city councils. By far the main source of
funding is national government. Other sources include rates on
commercial and industrial property, housing rents, service charges
and borrowing. The city and county councils suffer from a
combination of a lack of power to raise their own taxes and a
gradual and persistent erosion of their powers over time.
Therefore, local policy decisions are sometimes heavily influenced
by the
TD who represent the local
constituency in
Dáil Éireann
(the main chamber of parliament), and may be dictated by national
politics rather than local needs.
Israel
The
Israeli Ministry of
Interior recognizes four types of local government in Israel
:
- Cities: 71 single-level
urban municipalities, usually with populations exceeding 20,000
residents.
- Local councils: 141
single-level urban or rural municipalities, usually with
populations between 2,000 and 20,000.
- Regional Councils: 54
bi-level municipalities which govern multiple rural communities
located in relative geographic vicinity. The number of residents in
the individual communities usually does not exceed 2000. There are
no clear limits to the population and land area size of Israeli
regional councils.
- Industrial
councils: Two single-level municipalities which govern large
and complex industrial areas outside cities. The local industrial
councils are Tefen in Upper Galilee
(north of Karmiel
) and Ramat
Hovav
in the Negev
(south of
Beer
Sheva
).
Italy
The
Italian Constitution
defines three levels of local government:
- Regions: At present 5 of them
(Valle d'Aosta, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Trentino-Alto Adige,
Sardinia and Sicily) have a special status and are given more power
than the others. The constitutional reform of 2001 gave more power
to regions.
- Provinces: They mostly care
to roads, forests, and education. They had more power in the
past.
- Communes: The Mayor and staff, caring for
the needs of a single town or of a village and neighbouring minor
towns or villages.
Major cities also have an extra tier of local government named
Circoscrizione di Decentramento Comunale or, in some
cities (e.g. Rome)
Municipio.
Japan
Since the
Meiji restoration, Japan
has had a
local government system based on prefectures. The national government
oversees much of the country. Municipal governments consist from
historical villages. Now merger and restoration of those municipal
governments are undergoing for cost effective administration. In
between are the 47
prefecture
which are made up by area and population. They have two main
responsibilities. One is mediation between national and municipal
governments. The other is area wide administration.
Kenya
Malaysia
Local
government is the lowest level in the system of government in
Malaysia
—after federal and state. It has the power to
collect taxes (in the form of assesment tax), to create laws and
rules (in the form of by-laws) and to grant licenses and permits
for any trade in its area of jurisdiction, in addition to providing
basic amenities, collecting and managing waste and garbage as well
as planning and developing the area under its jurisdiction.
Mali
In recent years, Mali has undertaken an ambitious decentralization
program, which involves the capital district of Bamako, seven
regions subdivided into 46 cercles, and 682 rural community
districts (communes). The state retains an advisory role in
administrative and fiscal matters, and it provides technical
support, coordination, and legal recourse to these levels.
Opportunities for direct political participation, and increased
local responsibility for development have been improved.
In August-September 1998, elections were held for urban council
members, who subsequently elected their mayors. In May/June 1999,
citizens of the communes elected their communal council members for
the first time. Female voter turnout was about 70% of the total,
and observers considered the process open and transparent. With
mayors, councils, and boards in place at the local level, newly
elected officials, civil society organizations, decentralized
technical services, private sector interests, other communes, and
donor groups began partnering to further development.
Eventually, the cercles will be reinstituted (formerly grouping
arrondissements) with a legal and financial basis of their own.
Their councils will be chosen by and from members of the communal
councils. The regions, at the highest decentralized level, will
have a similar legal and financial autonomy, and will comprise a
number of cercles within their geographical boundaries. Mali needs
to build capacity at these levels, especially to mobilize and
manage financial resources.
Mexico
Mexico
is a Federal
Republic made up by 31 states and a
federal district.
Each state is divided in
municipios, while the federal
district is divided in sixteen
delegaciones.
Twenty-nine states of Mexico were created as
administrative divisions by the constitution of 1917, which grants
them those powers not expressly vested in the federal government;
Mexico's two remaining territories, Baja California Sur
and Quintana
Roo
, achieved statehood on 9 October 1974, raising the
total to 31. Each state has a constitution, a governor
elected for six years, and a unicameral legislature, with
representatives elected by district vote in proportion to
population. An ordinary session of the legislature is held
annually, and extraordinary sessions may be called by the governor
or the permanent committee. Bills may be introduced by legislators,
by the governor, by the state supreme court, and by municipalities
(a unit comparable to a US county).
In addition to the 31 states, there is
also one federal district comprising Mexico City
, whose governor serves as a member of the
cabinet. Many state services are supported by federal
subsidies.
The principal unit of state government is the municipality.
Mexico's 2,378 municipalities are governed by municipal presidents
and municipal councils. State governors generally select the
nominees for the municipal elections. Municipal budgets are
approved by the respective state governors. Until 1997, the
president appointed the mayor of Mexico City. Political reforms
allowed the first open elections in 1997. PRD candidate
Cuauhtémoc Cardenas
Solórzano was elected mayor. When he resigned to run for the
presidency in 1999, Rosario Robles Berlanga became the first woman
mayor of Mexico City. In 2000, PRD's
Andrés Manuel López
Obrador became the second democratically elected mayor of
Mexico City. López Obrador's popularity as mayor has made him a
prime candidate for the 2006 presidential election.
The Netherlands
The
Netherlands
has three
tiers of government. There are two levels of local
government in The Netherlands, the provinces and the
municipalities. The water boards are also part of the local
government.
The Netherlands is divided into twelve
provinces. They form the tier
of administration between the central government and the
municipalities. Each province is governed by a provincial council
(
Provinciale Staten). Its members
are elected every four years. The day-to-day management of the
province is in the hands of the provincial executive (
Gedeputeerde Staten). Members of the
executive are chosen by the provincial council from among its own
members and like the members of the provincial council serve for a
period of four years. Members elected to the executive have to give
up their membership of the provincial council. The size of the
executive varies from one province to another. In
Flevoland, the smallest of the Dutch provinces, it
has four members, while most other provinces have six or seven.
Meetings of the provincial executive are chaired by the
Queen's Commissioner. The Queen's
Commissioner (Commissaris van de Koningin) is not elected by the
residents of the province, but appointed by the Crown (the Queen
and government ministers). The appointment is for six years and may
be extended by a second term. The Queen's Commissioner can be
dismissed only by the Crown. Queen's Commissioners play an
important part in the appointment of municipal mayors. When a
vacancy arises, the Queen's Commissioner first asks the municipal
council for its views as to a successor, then writes to the
Minister of the Interior recommending a candidate.
Municipalities form the lowest tier of government in the
Netherlands, after the central government and the provinces. There
are 458 of them (1 January 2006). The municipal council (
Gemeenteraad) is the highest authority in the
municipality. Its members are elected every four years. The role of
the municipal council is comparable to that of the board of an
organisation or institution. Its main job is to decide the
municipality's broad policies and to oversee their implementation.
The day-to-day administration of the municipality is in the hands
of the municipal executive (
college van burgemeester
en wethouders, abbreviated to B&W), made up of the mayor
(
Burgemeester) and the aldermen. The
executive implements national legislation on matters such as social
assistance, unemployment benefits and environmental management. It
also bears primary responsibility for the financial affairs of the
municipality and for its personnel policies. Aldermen (
Wethouders) are appointed by the council.
Councillors can be chosen to act as aldermen. In that case, they
lose their seats on the council and their places are taken by other
representatives of the same political parties. Non-councillors can
also be appointed. Unlike councillors and aldermen, mayors are not
elected (not even indirectly), but are appointed by the Crown.
Mayors chair both the municipal council and the executive. They
have a number of statutory powers and responsibilities of their
own. They are responsible for maintaining public order and safety
within the municipality and frequently manage the municipality's
public relations. As Crown appointees, mayors also have some
responsibility for overseeing the work of the municipality, its
policies and relations with other government bodies. Although they
are obliged to carry out the decisions of the municipal council and
executive, they may recommend that the Minister of the Interior
quash any decision that they believe to be contrary to the law or
against the public interest. Mayors are invariably appointed for a
period of six years and are normally re-appointed automatically for
another term, provided the municipal council agrees. They can be
dismissed only by the Crown and not by the municipal council.
Water board are among
the oldest government authorities in the Netherlands. They
literally form the foundation of the whole Dutch system of local
government; from time immemorial they have shouldered the
responsibility for water management for the residents of their
area. In polders this mainly involves regulating the water level.
It has always been in the common interest to keep water out and
polder residents have always had to work together. That is what led
to the creation of water boards. The structure of the water boards
varies, but they all have a general administrative body, an
executive board and a chairperson. The general administrative body
consists of people representing the various categories of
stakeholders: landholders, leaseholders, owners of buildings,
companies and, since recently, all the residents as well.
Importance and financial contribution decide how many
representatives each category may delegate. Certain stakeholders
(e.g. environmental organisations) may be given the power to
appoint members. The general administrative body elects the
executive board from among its members. The government appoints the
chairperson (
Dijkgraaf) for a period of
six years. The general administrative body is elected for a period
of four years. In the past the administrative body was elected as
individuals but from 2009 they will be elected as party
representatives. Unlike municipal council elections, voters do not
usually have to go to a polling station but can vote by mail.
New Zealand
New Zealand
has a local government system comprises two
complementary sets of local authorities—regional councils and territorial
authorities. There are currently 86 local authorities
consisting of:
- 12 regional councils which cover most of New Zealand’s land
area
- 74 territorial authorities (comprising 59 district councils and
15 city councils,
).
Five of the territorial authorities are
unitary authorities, also have the powers
of a regional council. They are the Nelson City Council, the
Gisborne, Marlborough and Tasman District Councils, and the Chatham
Islands Council.
Regional council areas are based on water catchment areas, whereas
territorial authorities are based on community of interest and road
access. Within a regional council area there are usually many city
or district councils, although city and district councils can be in
multiple regional council areas.
Norway
Norway
's regional
administration is organised in 19 counties (fylke), with 18 of them
subdivided into 431 municipalities (kommune) per January 1,
2006. The municipal sector is a provider of vital services
to the Norwegian public, accounting for about 20% of Norwegian GNP
and 24% of total employment. Norway had 435 municipalities of
varying size in 2003, each administered by an elected municipal
council. They are grouped into 19 counties (fylker), each governed
by an elected county council. Each county is headed by a governor
appointed by the king in council. Oslo is the only urban center
that alone constitutes a county; the remaining 18 counties consist
of both urban and rural areas. County and municipal councils are
popularly elected every four years. The municipalities have wide
powers over the local economy, with the state exercising strict
supervision. They have the right to tax and to use their resources
to support education, libraries, social security, and public works
such as streetcar lines, gas and electricity works, roads, and town
planning, but they are usually aided in these activities by state
funds.
Palestinian National Authority
Local government in the
Palestinian National
Authority-controlled areas are divided into three main groups:
Municipal councils, village council and local development
committees.
- Municipality : Depends
on size of locality. Localities that serve as the centers of
governorate
and populations over 15,000 have 15-member councils. Localities
with populations over 15,000 residents have 13-member councils and
localities with populations between 4,000 and 15,000 have 9-member
councils.
- Village
Council : Localities with populations between 800 and 1,500
have 3-member councils while those between 1,500 and -4,000
residents have 7-member councils.
Paraguay
Paraguay
is divided into 17 departments, which are
subdivided into districts, which, in turn, comprise municipalities
(the minimum requirement for a municipality is 3,000 persons) and
rural districts (partidos). A governor, elected by popular
vote, runs each department. Municipal government is exercised
through a municipal board, chosen by direct election, and an
executive department. In the principal cities and capitals, the
executive department is headed by a mayor appointed by the minister
of the interior; in other localities, the mayor is appointed by the
presidents of the municipal boards. Police chiefs are appointed by
the central government.
Philippines
For a description of the arrangements in force, see the section on
Regions and Provinces in the article on the
Philippines.
Spain
Spain is divided into 17
Autonomous
Communities, which in turn are divided into 50
provinces. There are also two
autonomous cities: those of Ceuta and
Melilla. Finally, each province comprises a number of
municipalities.
Each administrative entity is given powers, structure, and
boundaries by a law that was passed by the
President of the Government (or
Prime Minister).
Law 7/1985, passed by the former Spanish President
Felipe González Márquez
(socialist), lays down the procedure of the Local Government. Every
city in Spain used this Law until 2003. This year, the former
Spanish President
José María Aznar López
(conservative), passed a Law (57/2003) to modernize organic rules
of those cities which had more than 250,000 inhabitants, and other
important cities (like capital cities of Provinces with at least
175,000 inhabitants). Also, it exists two other important Laws for
specifically Madrid (Law 22/2006) and Barcelona (Law 1/2006). The
main governing body in every city is called The Plenary (el Pleno).
The number of members that compose The Plenary varies depending on
city's population (for example, since 2007 Valencia has 33 members
and Pamplona has 27). The name given to the members of the Plenary
is Councelor (Concejal). Those Councelors are elected between
city's habitants every four years by direct vote. After being
elected, Councelors meet in a special Plenary session to determine
who will be elected, between them, as City's Mayor. In the next
days after the election, the Mayor chooses some Councelors to set
up the executive governing body (Junta de Gobierno). After that,
and for the next four years, City's Mayor and the Junta de Gobierno
will govern over the city according to their competences (urbanism,
some taxes, local police, licenses for specific activities,
cleaning services, etc.). Meanwhile, Councelors in the Plenary but
not part of the Junta de Gobierno (the opposition) will oversee
Mayor's rule.
Sweden
Sweden
is divided
into counties which in turn are divided into
municipalities.
United Kingdom
The
system of local government is different in each of the four
countries of the United
Kingdom
. In total, there are 434 local authorities
in the UK.
354 of these are in England
, 26 in Northern Ireland
, 32 in Scotland
and 22 are in Wales
.
England
The most
complex system is in England, the result of numerous reforms and reorganisation
over the centuries.
England is
subdivided on
different levels:
The top level of local government within England are the nine
regions. Each region has a
government office and assorted other institutions. Only the London
region has a directly elected administration. Only one other
regional referendum has been held to date to seek consent for the
introduction direct elections elsewhere—in the northeast of
England—and this was soundly rejected by the electorate.
The layers of government below the regions are mixed.
Historic
counties still exist with
adapted boundaries, although in the 1990s some of the
districts within the counties became
separate
unitary authorities and a
few counties have been disbanded completely. There are also
metropolitan districts in some
areas which are similar to unitary authorities. In Greater London
there are 32
London boroughs which
are a similar concept.
Counties are further divided into
districts (also known as boroughs in some
areas).
Districts are added into
wards for
electoral purposes.
Districts may also contain
parishes and town
council areas with a small administration of their own.
Other area classifications are also in use, such as health service
and
Lord-Lieutenant areas.
See also:
Northern Ireland
Northern
Ireland is divided into 26 districts. Local
government in Northern Ireland does not carry out the same range of
functions as those in the rest of the United Kingdom. The Northern
Irish
Department of
the Environment has announced plans to decrease the number of
councils to 11.
Wales
Wales has a
uniform system of 22 unitary authorities, referred to as counties
or county boroughs. There are also communities, equivalent
to parishes.
Scotland
Local
government in Scotland is arranged on the lines of unitary authorities, with the nation
divided into 32 council
areas.
United States
Local government in the
United States refers to the governments at the city, town, village, borough, or civil township level in the United
States of America
. In the more general sense, local government
also refers to
county government as
well.
It must be noted that under the federal system of the United
States,
State government, though it might
generally appear to be classed as a type of "local government" by
foreign observers from
unitary states,
is generally differentiated from local governments as the several
States possess
sovereignty within the
Federal union, while local governments are not sovereign in any
way, shape, or form, even within their respective states; on the
contrary, they are governmental corporations chartered by (and
whose charters may be revoked by) the legislature of the State
whose boundaries they are within. For example, the U.S.
State of California
is hardly a "local government": it has 30+ million
people within its borders, a geographical area slightly smaller
than that of Iraq
and
slightly larger than that of Paraguay, and an economy which if considered separately from
that of the United States, would be ranked the 8th largest in the
world by GDP.
Uruguay
Uruguay
's administrative subdivisions consisted of nineteen
territories called departments and governed by intendencias, which
were subordinate to the central government and responsible for
local administration. They enforced national laws and
administered the nation's social and educational policies and
institutions within their territories. These territories had
limited taxing powers, but they could borrow funds and acquire
property. They also had the power to establish unpaid five-member
local boards or town councils in municipalities other than the
departmental capital if the population was large enough to warrant
such a body.
Executive authority was vested in a governor (intendente), who
administered the department, and in a thirty-one-member
departmental board (junta departmental), which carried out
legislative functions. These functions included approval of the
departmental budget and judicial actions, such as impeachment
proceedings against departmental officials, including the governor.
At the municipal level, a mayor (intendente municipal) assumed
executive and administrative duties, carrying out resolutions made
by the local board (whose members were appointed on the basis of
proportional representation of the political parties). The governor
was required to comply with and enforce the constitution and the
laws and to promulgate the decrees enacted by the departmental
board. The governor was authorized to prepare the budget, submit it
for approval to the departmental board, appoint the board's
employees, and, if necessary, discipline or suspend them. The
governor represented the department in its relations with the
national government and other departmental governments and in the
negotiation of contracts with public or private agencies.
Like the governor, the members of the departmental board and the
mayor were elected for five-year terms in direct, popular
elections. A governor could be reelected only once, and candidates
for the post had to meet the same requirements as those for a
senator, in addition to being a native of the department or a
resident therein for at least three years before assuming office.
Departmental board members had to be at least twenty-three years of
age, native born (or a legal citizen for at least three years), and
a native of the department (or a resident for at least three
years).
The board sat in the capital city of each department and exercised
jurisdiction throughout the entire territory of the department. It
could issue decrees and resolutions that it deemed necessary either
on the suggestion of the governor or on its own initiative. It
could approve budgets, fix the amount of taxes, request the
intervention of the Accounts Tribunal for advice concerning
departmental finances or administration, and remove from office—at
the request of the governor—members of nonelective local
departmental boards. The board also supervised local public
services; public health; and primary, secondary, preparatory,
industrial, and artistic education. Although Montevideo was the
smallest department in terms of area (divided into twenty-three
geographic zones that generally coincided with the electoral
zones), its departmental board had sixty-five members in 1990; all
other departments had thirty-one-member boards and a five-member
executive council appointed by the departmental board, with
proportional representation from the principal political
parties.
Data as of December 1990
See also
References
- Fact Sheet: Government in Canada
-
http://noticias.juridicas.com/base_datos/Admin/l7-1985.html
-
http://noticias.juridicas.com/base_datos/Admin/l57-2003.html
-
http://noticias.juridicas.com/base_datos/Admin/l22-2006.html
-
http://noticias.juridicas.com/base_datos/Admin/l1-2006.html
External links
New Zealand
, Martinique
, Guadeloupe
and French
Guiana
).
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