Chamber of Local Authorities

Last updated

The Chamber of Local Authorities is one of the two Chambers of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe. The Chamber is the voice of local authorities (cities and municipalities) in the Council of Europe. It consists of 306 representatives [1] from the Council's 46 member states, who either hold a general local authority mandate from direct elections or are politically accountable to a directly elected assembly. The Chamber provides an opportunity for local officials to discuss common concerns, share their experiences and develop relevant policies.

Contents

According to the Charter of the Congress adopted on 15 January 2020 by the Committee of Ministers, the Chamber's membership is based on the principles of balanced geographical distribution, equitable representation of the various types of local authorities and their political groups, as well as of equitable representation of women and men. The Chamber drafts reports, recommendations, resolutions and opinions on the issues of its concern and presents them to the Standing Committee of the Congress for adoption.

History

Prior to the creation of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe in 1994, the Conference of Local and Regional Authorities was in place. The first existence and idea of a body addressing with the issue local government was proposed in 1957 but the standing conference was not created until 1961. This standing conference had existed since 1961. This institutionalisation in 1994 demonstrated the progress and importance of local governance and regional control in the development of Europe. The behavior and actions of the chamber (along with the Chamber of Regions) are based in the European Charter of Local Self-Government which was opened for signature and ratification in 1985.

Committees

In October 2010, the Congress laid out its priorities for 2011-2012 as part of the reform process which included a modification of its committee structure from four statutory committees to three. The four prior existing committees were the Institutional Committee, the Culture and Education Committee, the Committee on Social Cohesion and the Committee on Sustainable Development. The three newly created committees are the Monitoring Committee, the Governance Committee and the Current Affairs Committee. This change was approved in December 2010.

According to the Congress' official website:

Monitoring Committee

"The Committee on the Honouring of Obligations and Commitments by member states of the European Charter of Local Self-Government - Monitoring Committee - is responsible, in particular, for monitoring the application of the Charter as well as institutional developments in Europe’s regions, for preparing reports on the situation of local and regional democracy in Europe and for monitoring specific questions related to local and regional democracy in the member states."

Governance Committee

"The Governance Committee is responsible for affairs falling within the scope of the Congress' statutory mandate such as governance, public finance, cross-border and interregional co-operation and e-democracy as well as co-operation with intergovernmental bodies."

Current Affairs Committee

"The Current Affairs Committee is responsible for studying the role of local and regional authorities with regard to the major challenges of our society and preparing work on thematic issues such as social cohesion, education, culture and sustainable development from the point of view of the Council of Europe's core values."

The Bureau

The Chamber elects its President among its members for two years, and appoints the Bureau composed of the President and seven Vice-Presidents respecting as far as possible a fair geographic distribution among the member states. The actual composition of the Bureau can be seen on the official website of the Congress.

The Secretariat

The Chamber has a permanent Secretariat located at the Palace of Europe in Strasbourg, which is headed by its Executive Secretary, appointed by the Secretary General of the Council of Europe.

List of Members

The Chamber consists of 306 statutory members (representatives and substitutes) from: [2]

StateMembersStateMembersStateMembers
Flag of Albania.svg  Albania 2/2Flag of Andorra.svg  Andorra 1/1Flag of Armenia.svg  Armenia 2/2
Flag of Austria.svg  Austria 3/3Flag of Azerbaijan.svg  Azerbaijan 3/3Flag of Belgium (civil).svg  Belgium 3/4
Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg  Bosnia and Herzegovina 2/3Flag of Bulgaria.svg  Bulgaria 5/1Flag of Croatia.svg  Croatia 3/2
Flag of Cyprus.svg  Cyprus 2/1Flag of the Czech Republic.svg  Czech Republic 4/3Flag of Denmark.svg  Denmark 3/2
Flag of Estonia.svg  Estonia 2/1Flag of Finland.svg  Finland 3/2Flag of France.svg  France 9/9
Flag of Georgia.svg  Georgia 2/3Flag of Germany.svg  Germany 9/9Flag of Greece.svg  Greece 4/3
Flag of Hungary.svg  Hungary 4/3Flag of Iceland.svg  Iceland 3Flag of Ireland.svg  Ireland 4
Flag of Italy.svg  Italy 9/9Flag of Latvia.svg  Latvia 2/1Flag of Liechtenstein.svg  Liechtenstein 2
Flag of Lithuania.svg  Lithuania 2/2Flag of Luxembourg.svg  Luxembourg 3Flag of Malta.svg  Malta 2/1
Flag of Moldova.svg  Moldova 3/2Flag of Monaco.svg  Monaco 1/1Flag of Montenegro.svg  Montenegro 3
Flag of the Netherlands.svg  Netherlands 4/3Flag of North Macedonia.svg  North Macedonia 3Flag of Norway.svg  Norway 3/2
Flag of Poland.svg  Poland 6/6Flag of Portugal.svg  Portugal 4/3Flag of Romania.svg  Romania 5/5
Flag of Russia.svg  Russian Federation 9/9Flag of San Marino.svg  San Marino 2Flag of Serbia.svg  Serbia 4/3
Flag of Slovakia.svg  Slovakia 3/2Flag of Slovenia.svg  Slovenia 3Flag of Spain.svg  Spain 6/6
Flag of Sweden.svg  Sweden 3/3Flag of Switzerland (Pantone).svg  Switzerland 3/3Flag of Turkey.svg  Turkey 9/9
Flag of Ukraine.svg  Ukraine 6/6Flag of the United Kingdom.svg  United Kingdom 9/9
TOTAL306/306

Two representatives of local government in Flag of Kosovo.svg  Kosovo participate in the work of the Congress as observers. [3]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Council of Europe</span> International organization founded in 1949

The Council of Europe is an international organisation with the goal of upholding human rights, democracy and the rule of law in Europe. Founded in 1949, it brings together 46 member states with a population of approximately 675 million as of 2023; it operates with an annual budget of approximately 500 million euros.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages</span> Treaty to protect languages

The European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (ECRML) is a European treaty adopted in 1992 under the auspices of the Council of Europe to protect and promote historical regional and minority languages in Europe. However, the charter does not provide any criterion or definition for an idiom to be a minority or a regional language, and the classification stays in the hands of the national state.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">European Committee of the Regions</span> Institution of the European Union

The European Committee of the Regions (CoR) is the European Union's (EU) assembly of local and regional representatives that provides sub-national authorities with a direct voice within the EU's institutional framework.

A territorial collectivity, or territorial authority, in many francophone countries, is a legal entity governed by public law that exercises within its territory certain powers devolved to it by the State as part of a decentralization process. In France, it also refers to a chartered administrative division of France with recognized governing authority. It is the generic name for any territory with an elective form of local government and local regulatory authority. The nature of a French territorial collectivity is set forth in Article 72 of the Constitution of France (1958), which provides for local autonomy within limits prescribed by law.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe</span> Council of Europes decision-making body

The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe or Committee of Ministers is the Council of Europe's decision-making body. It comprises the Foreign Affairs Ministers of all the member states, or their permanent diplomatic representatives in Strasbourg. It is both a governmental body, where national approaches to problems facing European society can be discussed on an equal footing, as well as a collective forum, where Europe-wide responses to such challenges are formulated. In collaboration with the Parliamentary Assembly, it is the guardian of the Council's fundamental values; it monitors member states' compliance with their undertakings. The Holy See, Japan, Mexico, and the US are observer states in the Committee of Ministers.

In many parts of the world, local elections take place to select office-holders in local government, such as mayors and councillors. Elections to positions within a city or town are often known as "municipal elections". Their form and conduct vary widely across jurisdictions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Venice Commission</span> Advisory body of the Council of Europe

The Venice Commission, officially European Commission for Democracy through Law, is an advisory body of the Council of Europe, composed of independent experts in the field of constitutional law. It was created in 1990 after the fall of the Berlin Wall, at a time of urgent need for constitutional assistance in Central and Eastern Europe.

Multi-level governance is a term used to describe the way power is spread vertically between levels of government and horizontally across multiple quasi-government and non-governmental organizations and actors. This situation develops because countries have multiple levels of government including local, regional, state, national or federal, and many other organisations with interests in policy decisions and outcomes. International governance operates based on multi-level governance principles. Multi-level governance can be distinguished from multi-level government which is when different levels of government share or transfer responsibility amongst each other. Whereas multi-level governance analyses the relationship of different state levels and interaction with different types of actors.'

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Council of European Municipalities and Regions</span> Association of local and regional governments

The Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR) is the largest organisation of local and regional governments in Europe. Its members are 60 national associations of towns, municipalities and regions from 41 countries that are part of the Council of Europe. Together these associations represent about 130,000 local and regional authorities.

Christopher Newbury is a British Conservative politician. He was a member of the Congress of the Council of Europe from 1998 to 2010 and since 2009 has been a member of the new Wiltshire Council, created that year.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Congress of Local and Regional Authorities</span> Pan-European political assembly

The Congress of Local and Regional Authorities is the pan-European political assembly representing local and regional authorities from the forty-six member states of the Council of Europe. Its role is to promote local and regional democracy, improve local and regional governance and strengthen authorities' self-government, according to the principles laid down in the European Charter of Local Self-Government. It is made up of two chambers, the Chamber of Local Authorities and the Chamber of Regions and holds its plenary sessions twice a year at the Palace of Europe in Strasbourg, where its permanent Secretariat is located.

In England, spatial planning is undertaken at the national level, through the National Planning Policy Framework. The London region is the only one to have a statutory London Plan. Most planning functions are exercised by local authorities, with neighbourhood planning also taking place in some areas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">INGOs Conference of the Council of Europe</span>

The INGO Conference is the body representing civil society in the Council of Europe, a European organisation founded in 1949. The Council of Europe has 46 member states with some 800 million citizens and its seat is in Strasbourg, France. The current president is Gerhard Ermischer.

The Chamber of Regions is one of the two Chambers of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe, the other being the Chamber of Local Authorities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anders Knape</span> Swedish politician

Klas Anders Knape is a Swedish conservative politician. He served as the President of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities (CLRAE) of the Council of Europe between November 6, 2018 and March 23, 2021. He was president of the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (SALAR), from 2007 to 2015 and again from 2019 to 2022. He was also a councillor of the Karlstad Municipality.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Member states of the Council of Europe</span>

The Council of Europe was founded on 5 May 1949 by ten western and northern European states, with Greece joining three months later, and Iceland, Turkey and West Germany joining the next year. It now has 46 member states, with Montenegro being the latest to join.

The UCLG Committee on Social Inclusion, Participatory Democracy and Human Rights is one of the four Committees of the United Cities and Local Governments. As an autonomous network in the framework of UCLG, its stated goal is to bring together local authorities from across the world to exchange points of view and local initiatives on social inclusion, participatory democracy and human rights. Inheritor of the forums of local authorities (FAL) held in parallel to the first editions of the World Social Forum, the Committee has become a relevant stakeholder in global advocacy for human rights in the city and the Right to the City Throughout its history, the Committee been characterized by facilitating meetings and networking between progressive local authorities, with a special emphasis in the Latin American and European region. Headquartered in Barcelona, the Committee is composed by more than 100 local governments and various partner organizations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">European Alliance of Cities and Regions for Roma Inclusion</span>

The European Alliance of Cities and Regions for Roma Inclusion is an initiative from the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe. The Alliance currently gathers 130 Cities and Regional authorities from 29 countries.

Since Kosovo's declaration of independence from Serbia, international recognition of Kosovo has been mixed, and the international community continues to be divided on the issue. The Republic of Kosovo is member of some international intergovernmental and international non-governmental organisations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Armenia in the Council of Europe</span> International relations

Armenia has been a member of the Council of Europe, an international organization that focuses on strengthening democracy, human rights, and the rule of law across Europe, since 2001.

References

  1. ↑ "Congress Database - Council of Europe". www.congressdatabase.coe.int. Retrieved 2020-01-29.
  2. ↑ "Congress Database - Council of Europe". www.congressdatabase.coe.int. Retrieved 2020-01-29.
  3. ↑ "DELEGACIONI I ASOCIACIONIT TË KOMUNAVE PO PËRFAQËSON KOSOVËN NË PUNIMET e KONGRESIT TË KËSHILLIT TË EVROPËS – Asociacioni i Komunave të Kosovës".
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.