Planned Territorial Reform in Romania

Public debate on a territorial-administrative reform in Romania started in June 2011. The reform attempt aims at redrawing the borderlines of the current administartive units (called 'judet') in order to reduce bureaucracy and make regional governance more efficient and self-reliant. In the lack of a common position between the governemnt parties and those of the opposition, the reform was first put off for autumn 2011, then further postponed unti after the local and parliamentary elections that are to take place in November 2012.

To learn more about the main points of the debate and the diffrent solutions proposed, please consult our brief summary.

AER meets Presidents of the Hungarian regions

Regions of yesterday, Regions of tomorrow - What has changed over the last 25 years? What is at stake today? These are the main questions addressed in the updated version of the AER Regionalism Report published on 14th June 2010 at the AER 25th Anniversary Conference kindly hosted by the region of Brussels-Capital. 

The report includes commentaries and analysis on the state of play of Regions in Europe as well as further information on the status of Regions in the individual countries of the Council of Europe member states. 

Should you have any comments on the report, please send them to:

Agnès Ciccarone, Senior Policy Coordinator

a.ciccarone@aer.eu  Re.: Regionalism Report

In 2006 the AER drafted a Regionalism Report and respective Country Reports. The Regionalism Report is the first stage in an ambitious project to understand how regionalism works in practice across Europe. It is based on the AER Declaration on Regionalism in Europe published in 1997 which sets outs core principles for regions: definition of the region, institutional organisation, competences, financing, involvment of regions, relations with other levels of government and international organisations as well as transfrontier cooperation.

The working group ‘Regionalism across Europe' was set up to examine the issue of regionalism within Europe, an issue made topical by recent changes in political processes and the review of structural arrangements in many countries. The purpose of the work was to arrive at an interpretation of the definition or definitions of regions so that individually or collectively through the AER they are able to influence European policy. The results should also be helpful to accession countries and other European countries facing change.