Local authority

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A regional authority is a body whose jurisdiction and membership are determined territorially. Their territorial sovereignty is limited to a spatially delimited part of the national territory . This differentiates itself from those bodies whose membership is determined by personal characteristics.

State organization

Regional authorities at the highest level, regardless of their size, are the respective states , which, depending on the organizational form, can consist of further smaller regional authorities. In federal states or a federation of states , the states form the second level of the regional authorities. Both in unitary states and in federal states today there are mostly units of regional or local self-government , which in turn can comprise a single, but also several levels. Autonomous areas with a special status or dependent areas with self-administration are further special forms of regional authorities.

In Germany, as member states, the countries as well as local authorities municipalities , counties and districts in France Régions , départements and municipalities as regular Collectivités territorial , to further areas with special status in the UK , the three since the devolution autonomous parts of the country Scotland , Northern Ireland and Wales as well as counties and districts at the local level , some of which in England and in the rest of the country are amalgamated to form a single level of unitary authorities , in the USA states , counties and municipalities that can assume different forms of self-government depending on the state . In Switzerland there are cantons and municipalities . In Austria it is the municipalities , the federal states and the republic itself, while the districts are purely administrative structures.

The position, function and tasks of the regional authority in the respective political system determine the degree of centralization of the respective system. In Germany, for example, the federal, state, municipal associations and municipalities work together within the framework of the vertical separation of powers , while in France the state, region, department and municipality form the framework of the central state .

Legal systems

The specific situation in different legal systems is presented in the corresponding individual articles:

See also

Web links

Wiktionary: Territorial entity  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Ulrike Rausch: local authority. In: Dieter Nohlen, Rainer-Olaf Schultze (Hrsg.): Lexicon of political science . CH Beck, 2010, ISBN 978-3-406-59233-1 , p. 292.
  2. ↑ a b Manfred G. Schmidt : Dictionary of Politics (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 404). 3rd, revised and expanded edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 2010, ISBN 978-3-520-40403-9 , p. 281.