Along the path to metropolitan cooperation via metropolitan unit establishment: Case of Brno Metropolitan Area, Czech Republic

Former socialist countries still suffer from the absence of planning at a higher administrative level. To develop a metropolitan governance model, strengthen the partner-ship between the hinterland and core cities, and eliminate obstacles stemming from the local government fragmentation, the paper aims to introduce the steps for the institu-tionalization of metropolitan cooperation in the Czech Republic, being demonstrated by the example of the Brno Metropolitan Area (BMA), a leader in the development of in-termunicipal cooperation. The procedure is based on transferable experience from foreign countries and robust surveys among mayors in BMA (carried out in 2020, 175 municipali-ties, 96% response rate) and tens of experts on metropolitan issues. Selected results show that a mutual willingness to create an institution (metropolitan unit) responsible for har-monic metropolitan development, delegate some municipal competencies to a higher level and to contribute to a metropolitan fund was found. The participation of municipalities in the institution is proposed indirectly through voluntary association of municipalities, which would be intermediate between local and metropolitan levels. However, for imple-mentation at the national level, a valid and effective legislative regulation is needed.

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