Mayor of the City of Zagreb Tomislav Tomašević opened the two-day international event titled 2nd CEE-Loc Conference 2024: Local Government Studies in Central and Eastern Europe, jointly organized by the Institute of Economics and the Faculty of Law of the University of Zagreb. The aim of the conference, which took place in the premises of the Institute of Economics, is to bring together leading scientists from Central and Eastern Europe engaged in researching local and regional self-government and local and regional development in Central and Eastern Europe.
Mayor Tomašević referred to the challenges that the City of Zagreb has faced in the recent years, including earthquakes, devastating storms, the pandemic, and communal, social and financial problems. He highlighted the positive results of the City of Zagreb during his term, such as the reducing the long-term deficit and raising the City’s credit rating by five grades, and outlined plans for the future of Zagreb. He also recalled the time when he himself was a researcher dealing with local development issues and emphasized the importance of successful collaboration between the academic community and local government: “I hope that your research will address some of the challenges we face, which could be useful for us as the executive branch of the city government. I believe that we can apply the findings from your research, especially those derived from the comparison of European cities”.
In addition to Tomašević, the dean of the Faculty of Law of the University of Zagreb, Prof. Ivan Koprić, acting director of the Economic Institute Ivana Rašić, founder of CEE-Loc Prof. Paweł Swianiewicz, and the co-chair of the Organizing Committee from the Institute of Economics, Dubravka Jurlina Alibegović, while the introductory part of the meeting was moderated by the co-chairman of the Organizing Committee from the Faculty of Law, Assoc. Prof. Mihovil Škarica.
“The organization of this conference is one of the results of the long-term efforts of the Faculty of Law in Zagreb to base its research-scientific activity on the principles of international cooperation and openness, interdisciplinarity and inter-institutional partnership, as that is the only way to find scientifically-based and practically relevant solutions to urban, local and regional problems,” Dean Koprić said.
Research papers covering a wide range of topics related to local, city and regional self-government were presented at the conference, including the fields of economics, geography, public administration, political science, law and sociology. Special attention was given to research results concerning topics such as local elections, local finances, fiscal results of local government units, financial policies, provision of local services, activities of political parties at the local level, local political decision-making, decentralization, local development and consolidation and cooperation of local self-government units. management of local self-governing units, territorial reforms and the relationship between social networks and local authorities.
In his key note address, Professor Hubert Heinelt from Technische Universität Darmstadt presented the results of empirical research on local self-government in Central and Eastern Europe.
The conference brings together prominent European researchers in public administration and related scientific disciplines, whose subject of interest is local, city and regional self-government. This conference is a follow-up to the successful CEE-Loc Seminar 2023 – Local Government Studies in Central and Eastern Europe, held in Wroclaw, Poland. The next conference is planned for 2025, and will take place in Budapest.
