Local and county politics in Romania are often captured by interest groups that are good at manipulating elites at the center to avoid accountability to local voters. I still believe that the efficiency of counties through mergers will also include the catalysis of kleptocratic networks, leading to a shift from petty robbery to (much) bigger robbery.

Radu Andrei Parvulescu is a doctoral student in sociology at Cornell University and a research associate at the Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Social Work at the University of Dayton.

Last September, I supported the Romanian administrative-territorial status quo, i.e. the division into counties, against regionalization through county mergers. The idea was simple: it could be even worse than the current number of counties.

I’m glad the article sparked a discussion. Most critics say essentially the same thing: “the situation we live in is catastrophic, and you’ve come to the point that mud is better than manure? How does it help us?” The criticism is valid, and in this article I will propose two ideas for improving county politics and local self-government. As far as I know, these ideas have not been voiced in domestic debates about territorial and administrative reform. More specifically, I propose the abolition of county elections ( and implicitly local) and introduce a Swiss-style referendum for decisions by local and county councils.Let’s take them one at a time.

1) Cancellation of district and local elections. In any democracy, local and national elites coerce each other through electoral barter. The provincials, close to the grassroots, control and condition the popular vote, and the citizens challenge the dismal glory and distribution of central resources. This balance – theoretically advantageous – does not meet the requirements in Romania because all local elections take place simultaneously (as is usual in unitary states) and, in particular, because they always precede parliamentary elections by several months. Therefore, the county elites are strengthened to the maximum, threatening that they will not bring votes to the parliamentarians, and the negotiators of the central parties spend the election year offering – in advance – the moon and the stars, hoping that the provincials will fill their ballot boxes.

It is mainly about wrong or, at least, incomplete information. Local elites clearly assess how many votes they have, but only in their own backyard, while the capital elites do not see and cannot rely on the word of local barons. So the center tries to buy the loyalty of the provincials early (which leads to inflation of political allegiances) and spends money on polls, knowing they are usually wrong, but still thinking it’s better than nothing.

But if there were county and local elections every month, only in one county? If you skip months with presidential or (European) parliamentary elections, then within four years – the duration of the national legislative assembly – elections will be held in all districts of the country. First, this practice would convey to the public, monthly and at no additional cost, the weight of the national parties in the various constituencies; at least we would get rid of the most hideous observation houses. At the same time, constituency dynamics will be at the fore, as national political strategy could change after a surprise result from a key constituency. This is what happens in federations when elections are held in large states or provinces. Then the business between the county and central elites would be balanced, and the latter could negotiate with each county separately, focusing on small and possible barter, knowing that the local barons’ promises of high stakes (parliamentary elections) would mean too much if the parliamentary elections were held through year, for example.

The reform procedure is to amend Law 115 of 2015 (for the election of local government bodies). The main amendment will be an appendix with an electoral calendar such as “Alba in January 2024, Bacau in February 2024 and … will repeat once every four years, skipping months with national or European elections”. The difficulty is more administrative: the Central Electoral Bureau, which is formed every four years on the occasion of local elections, must become permanent in such a way that it oversees the monthly district elections. One of the challenges is recruiting magistrates for BEC positions without overburdening the already overburdened legal staff. One possibility would be to involve lawyers not only from among judges, but also prosecutors and high-ranking lawyers. Of course, the condition that they are not members of a political party will be maintained and the selection should be by lot, as BEC judges are also elected.

If this division were also applied to municipal elections (which would take place at the same time as the corresponding county elections), we would eliminate the nuisance of Romanian local politics, namely the large migration of local elected officials during an election year. Local political tracheuse would exist, but at least it would no longer be exacerbated by the simultaneous holding of elections, which encourages a herd mentality.

2) Introduction of a referendum for the decisions of the regional council. Currently, the citizens of the county can influence the decisions of the county council through voting, political barter, persuasive arguments, citizen initiatives or street demonstrations. If the county council is stubborn, citizens will only have to wait until the next election to voice their opposition. There is a legal option to dissolve the entire council through a referendum, but I have never heard of such an attempt. That is, once in power, county parties should not pay attention to citizens, but only to other parties and only in the absence of a majority in the council. Delegation of authority is the basis of representative democracy, but here it is somewhat abused.

Between elections, citizens could influence county politics by introducing a referendum on county council decisions. A national sport in Switzerland, it involves two modes of plebiscite. First, county voters can vote to reject a resolution that has already been voted on by the county board. At the same time, a decision not formulated by its members may be submitted to the council, which is adopted by the county voters directly, bypassing the county council. If it is accepted, the local government must implement it.

In order for the county referendum to invalidate the decision of the county council to work, a small mat is needed to introduce a plebiscite movement. In the Swiss district of Geneva, for example, 7,000 signatures (ie about 2.5% of the 263,000 registered voters) can propose the repeal of a local law, while 10,000 (~3.8%) voters can propose an entirely new law. Proposals must be submitted to a popular vote within six months from the date of introduction, and the cost of the county plebiscite share must be paid in full from county funds. It is the same with legal costs if the plebiscite decision is successfully challenged in court: if the district loses, its citizens pay for satisfaction from the district budget.

Obviously, this proposal will not become a council decision (plebiscite) unless it is supported by 50%+1 of those voting, and I would recommend a majority of 30% of the eligible voters of the district. To avoid the tragi-comedy of a valid but ignored referendum, any proposal that goes through this process must be treated as a county council decision, meaning it is binding, and the council cannot overturn that decision by a subsequent vote. The decision of the plebiscite can be canceled either by being declared invalid due to election violations, or by a court decision regarding the inconsistency of this submission with other applicable laws, or by a subsequent plebiscite vote. point.

Very important No there is a commission (composed of representatives of the district parties or so-called non-party experts) that decides whether the proposal will be put to the voters. It is obvious that the proposals for the referendum should be polished by the department of the county apparatus, which helps to develop the questions so that they are clear and to the point. But voters should also be responsible. If they want a daily referendum and are given decisions that are guaranteed to be challenged in court, all they have to do is pay; that’s how you learn

Politicians don’t need to hold many district (or local, as is the practice in Switzerland) referendums to capture voters’ fears. A journalist discovers a suspicious maneuver in the council, a public organization collects signatures, and suddenly every decision of the council has to be defended in newspapers and on television. In particular, a lot of fraud with property, with expenses from the county VAT calculation or with the composition of inspections can be submitted to the national vote. And if a party or organization wants to fundamentally change the organizational scheme of district or local officials, then it only needs to convince a few thousand people, and the initiative is put to a national vote – from there, vox populi. If 4% of voters are needed to challenge a decision through a plebiscite, and 5% to propose a new decision, any county party and many non-profit organizations can appeal to voters through a referendum.

Reform in this sense would be relatively simple, since Law 215 of 2001 (ANDlocal government administration) already provides for the possibility of direct participation of citizens in district and local councils. It is little known that paragraph 99 of Art. (3)-(6) of the Law 2015/2001 provides for the possibility of holding a district referendum, with the help of which the entire council can be dissolved, if this is proposed by at least 20% of the citizens who have the right to vote in the district, if the turnout is at least half of the voters of the district, and if among those who voted, at least 50%+1 supported dissolving the board. I bet most county councilors have no idea about this article. Correct: the procedure is difficult, with a high quorum; it is not clear what the benefit of dissolving the council is as soon as another election is held within 90 days, likely to be contested by the same parties with similar results; and county councils are often captured by local interest networks who know how to get people to vote, so such a referendum is unlikely to succeed. The only fragment worth remembering from the current law is paragraph (4): “Expenses for the organization of the referendum, provided for in paragraph (3), are carried out from the district budget.”

Reform in this sense will take place by amending Chapter VIII of the Law on Public Administration. First of all, add part (3) to Article 109, which provides for the possibility of canceling decisions of county (and local!) councils through a referendum, if it is supported by the signatures of at least 2.5% of the voters of the relevant administrative-territorial unit. Secondly, it is necessary to rewrite Article 111, indicating that the initiatives in Article 109 that meet the necessary conditions (respectively, 5% of voters) are subject to voting within a maximum of 6 months under the conditions established in Art. 99(4)-(6), with the amendment that only 30% of eligible voters must appear at the polling station for the vote to be valid. – Read the entire article and comment on Contributors.ro