Faculty of Organisation Studies Novo mesto organizes 3rd annual Governance in (post)transition conference that will take place between 24 and 25 April 2014 in hotel Šport Otočec. Topic of 2014 conference is

“Effects of local government on system reforms”

Slovenian crisis management introduced a new set of public administration realities as well as desires. As such, the Minister, competent for local government announced the need to reduce the number of municipalities in Slovenia as well as their financing. Based on these requests, discussion on further development of sub-national governance is opened.

Because local government units are the subject of discussion in most post-transitional countries, we invite papers that will try to give insight into different aspects of local government development. Within this frame, we expect participants to address the issues of decentralization, regionalization, financial autonomy, amalgamation, participation of citizens, and use of ICT.

According to the European framework, local government shall be as competent as possible and capable of development on the sub-national level but many states created numerous local government systems without any real competences that would enable them to become a relevant actor of development. Financial dependency of local administration on state budget and centralized taxation system paralyses them to act on their own. Local development is often directed by the national and European level, due to all the limitations imposed by the state and the European Union. At the same time national as well as local levels often prevents citizens' participation by refusing or overhearing public debate on certain issues.