<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

<p>The article draws on research on the quality of governance and its impact on Slovenian municipalities’ competitiveness. It presents the research results guided by two hypotheses: “<italic>Municipalities with a higher quality of governance are more competitive”</italic> and “<italic>The assessments of the quality of governance in Slovenian municipalities vary more than the assessments of the quality of governance in EU regions</italic>”. Starting from the general idea of governance as an undirected network of vertical and horizontal relations supports the importance of the research on the quality of governance and public administration in the EU environment on the local, regional, and national levels. As the low quality of governance impacts divergence in cohesion, mainly less developed and catching-up EU countries should focus on the development of the quality of governance and competitiveness at the regional and local levels. According to the research results, the Slovenian municipalities form several groups according to the behavior measured by the correlation between the quality of governance and the level of competitiveness. Additionally, the international comparison indicates that the quality of governance measured in Slovenian municipalities varies at least as much as in the EU regions. The evidence supports the quest for further research on the quality of governance and competitiveness to understand the dynamics of the development at the local and regional levels and develop proposals for improvement and measures adapted to the needs and capacities of groups of municipalities with similar behavior.</p>
</abstract>

The article draws on research on the quality of governance and its impact on Slovenian municipalities’ competitiveness. It presents the research results guided by two hypotheses: “Municipalities with a higher quality of governance are more competitive” and “The assessments of the quality of governance in Slovenian municipalities vary more than the assessments of the quality of governance in EU regions”. Starting from the general idea of governance as an undirected network of vertical and horizontal relations supports the importance of the research on the quality of governance and public administration in the EU environment on the local, regional, and national levels. As the low quality of governance impacts divergence in cohesion, mainly less developed and catching-up EU countries should focus on the development of the quality of governance and competitiveness at the regional and local levels. According to the research results, the Slovenian municipalities form several groups according to the behavior measured by the correlation between the quality of governance and the level of competitiveness. Additionally, the international comparison indicates that the quality of governance measured in Slovenian municipalities varies at least as much as in the EU regions. The evidence supports the quest for further research on the quality of governance and competitiveness to understand the dynamics of the development at the local and regional levels and develop proposals for improvement and measures adapted to the needs and capacities of groups of municipalities with similar behavior.

Assessment of the Quality of Governance and Competitiveness at the Local Level: The Case of Slovenian Municipalities

NISPAcee Journal of Public Administration and Policy

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The article draws on research on the quality of governance and its impact on Slovenian municipalities’ competitiveness. It presents the research results guided...

Assessment of the Quality of Governance and Competitiveness at the Local Level: The Case of Slovenian Municipalities

Published Online: May 12, 2021

Page range: 9 - 35

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/nispa-2021-0001

Keywords
Quality of governance, competitiveness, impartiality, local community, municipality, cohesion

© 2021 Jože Benčina et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Assessment of the Quality of Governance and Competitiveness at the Local Level: The Case of Slovenian Municipalities

Published Online: May 12, 2021

Page range: 9 - 35

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/nispa-2021-0001

KeywordsQuality of governance, competitiveness, impartiality, local community, municipality, cohesion

© 2021 Jože Benčina et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Keywords
Quality of governance, competitiveness, impartiality, local community, municipality, cohesion