Membership in the Assembly of European Regions

According to AER Statutes, regions are defined as "European local authorities immediately below the level of central government, with a political power of representation, as embodied by an elected regional Assembly". 

Regional competences vary from one country to another and 6 types of situations can currently be distinguished:

• Constitutional regions having the prerogatives of a State (Germany, Austria, Belgium, Switzerland)
• Regions with large political and administrative autonomy (Spain, Italy, certain regions or autonomous islands in Denmark, the United Kingdom, Portugal)
• Regions in decentralised States (France, Holland, Poland, the Czech Republic)
• Regions with a district, département or county like nature (Croatia, Denmark, Finland, Hungary, Greece, Lithuania, Norway, Romania, Sweden, Turkey, Ukraine)
• Regional authorities made up of county delegations (Ireland)
• Small States whose size corresponds to that of a region

• If you represent a democratic region from one of the Council of Europe member States, you can apply for full membership!
• Groups of democratic regions, territorial entities in the process of regionalisation and non-European Regions can ask for an observer status, unless all regions already are AER members.
• Thematic interregional organisations of European Regions can become observers in the Assembly of European Regions, each full member is entitled to one vote.

• Undertake any necessary step at the national level to enter an internationally binding agreement
• Make an official request for membership ! Fill out the membership form, which details our work areas you are most interested in and send it back to the Secretariat
• Once you have been accepted by the AER Bureau or Presidium, you are free to participate as a full member in all of our activities
• According to our Statutes, your application will be ratified by our General Assembly, which usually takes place in November.

For further information, do not hesitate to contact Sandrine Vinçon, in charge of member relations.