It is public knowledge that Romania needs a better administrative reorganization, efficient institutions for better management according to the level at which they work, local, regional or central. Numerous emerging or anticipated crises can provide the impetus to justify and initiate the necessary policies on the ground. Postponing sine die under pretexts like upcoming elections or similar does not help.

The process should be started as soon as possible through scientific justification, public discussion and consistent application of relevant strategies. When you have so many communes that cannot support themselves financially, poor infrastructure that blocks communication, territorial inequality of development, it is fundamental to find and apply solutions. A clear specification of the principles by which you work and the methods of anticipatory verification for any of the lines of action in the field are important.

In the material we offer, we try to answer the question “how to pre-check the NUTS 2 level”?, regardless of what you call them and how many there are. The question in no way means that the other sequences of the process are the voluntary and justified reduction of the number of communes, the development of institutional mechanisms at the local-regional-central level, etc. – will be secondary. After these introductory explanations, we move on to defining the main principles of the mentioned verification.

principles

The question we start with, depending on the dominant practices in Romania, is related to the relationship between identity and functional criteria in the design of NUTS 2 regions (development regions, in the case of Romania). Is it good that these regions repeat the contours of historical regions, regions of current development, or is it better to have a different spatial contour? The principles accredited in international practice in this field support the ideas of: a) multi-criteria design, b) partial ordering of principles depending on the importance of their application and c) anticipatory and, subsequently, periodic assessment of the proposed way regions function. According to the first criterion, it is possible to specify the idea that it is desirable that regions of the second rank (NUTS 2) are designed according to several criteria, the most relevant of which are the perception of the identity associated with a certain space and its functionality (Hansen et al. 1997, Dragoman 2023). A series of criteria for the proper functioning of regions (Zamfir 2013) includes both the functioning of labor markets and markets of social interaction, the capital of relations of different social groups, the demographic composition of the population, favorable for participation in the economy. population, demographic size as a condition of demographic competitiveness, etc. According to the second criterion, it is desirable that priority is given to the criteria of socio-economic functionality) (Sandu 2013) The third criterion (c) requires that the first two criteria that must be checked when applying themboth before and after the adoption of regionalization (Sandu 2022).

We illustrate the application of the principles through an example, starting with the data in Figure 1 on internal migration flows between countries recorded in the last population census in 2021.

Historical or developmental regions?

This graph favors developing regions more than historical regions (Figure 2). For example, the County of Hunedoara has the strongest migration flow of permanent population to the settlements of the County of Timișoara. Strictly speaking, the corresponding district is part of the historical region of Transylvania. In the design of the development of the regions, it was carried out in Green map of regional development, in 1996 the corresponding district became part of the Western Development Region. This is an illustration of the fact that in the design of the Western region, priority was given to functional integrity, rather than the identity associated with the historical region. In addition, it should be noted that if the concept of Transylvania is taken in a broad sense (Trebici, 1996), Hunedoara county can be considered as a part of Transylvania, as a collection of intra-Carpathian regions.

Figure 1. Main inter-district internal migration flows between previous and current place of residence, 2021

Another type of situation, information about which appears on the graph of internal migration flows in Figure 1, is related to the districts of the South-Eastern Development Region. It is the most heterogeneous development region with two counties of Moldova (Vranca and Galati), two counties of Muntenia (Buzeu and Braila) and two counties of Dobrudja (Tulca and Constanta).

What is the best design option? Design NUTS 2 regions based on historical regions or go for the configuration of regions of current development? If you choose the functionality priority criterion, then you accept the configuration of the development regions as partially different from the historical one. Otherwise, it is difficult to answer how a development region can be considered functional, in which to get to the regional capital, one has to move from Galati to Iași. Regarding the computerization of public services, I would not rush to say that it solves everything, quickly. In addition, Galatsiul, Breila and Tulcea are part of the Danube Estuary region, which is not a historical region, but as a geo-economic region it is well defined. In addition, it should be noted that Braila is the second pole of labor force attraction in Galaţi County after Bucharest. The idea of ​​breaking the circulation of labor force from Galati by placing the district in another development region contradicts the principle of priority, which must be given to functionality criteria when designing development regions.-

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