Local democracy development in Croatia – From experimental self-management to weak local democracy

During the socialist period, fragmented territorial organization was consolidated in several waves of reforms, which started in 1955. At the end of that period, local units in Croatia were large monotypic communes, with about 42,000 inhabitants in average. The position of local government during socialism was rather strong, but local government was not a democratic institution. What differentiated former Yugoslavia from other socialist countries was self-management experiment, formally instigated as early as in 1950. One of the components of this experiment was territorial self-management. Besides other forms of direct democracy and citizen participation, it was characterised by specific tricameral assemblies as the representative bodies of communes. They consisted of workers’ chamber, territorial communities’ chamber, and social-political chamber. A significant part of local decisions was made by a dense network of self-managing interest councils, which consisted of the representatives of users and employers, and of politically delegated members. After Croatia gained independence, previous communes and their local institutions were partly retained. Self-managing interest councils were abolished. The first multiparty elections in May 1990 were held not only at the republic level, but also at the local level. Only the 1993 reform introduced substantial institutional changes and tricameral assemblies were replaced by unicameral local representative bodies. Territorial organisation became fragmented since the number of units was quintupled. Local scope was narrowed, and local finances reduced – the whole system was organized in a centralistic vein. Local bodies functioned in a parliamentary-like manner. The first attempt to decentralise the country happened in 2001, especially in education, social care, healthcare, and fire-fighting service. Because of the fragmented structure and low capacities, only counties and 33 towns were able to take over these services. Currently, local government consists of 576 units (128 towns, 428 municipalities and 20 counties). A vast majority of local units have fewer than 5,000 inhabitants (446, or 80%). In 2009, direct election of mayors was introduced, when the system started to function in a more presidential-like manner. However, there has not been any other significant change in the local government system, even after joining the European Union in July 2013. In our paper we will analyse, in neo-institutional manner, the development of local democracy institutions in Croatia during the transition period. We will also try to evaluate effects of such a development. Our analysis will cover four main developmental lines: a) direct democracy (referenda, recall procedure, citizens’ initiative), b) local representation and the development of local electoral system (including several innovations such as independent lists, national minorities’ representation, etc.), c) attempts of finding a balance between representative and executive bodies, including the effects of introduction of direct election of mayors, and d) efforts to foster new democratic standards by introduction of new participation channels (youth councils, public consultation procedures, participative budgeting, etc.).