Scholarly record

PROBLEMS CONNECTED WITH THE ISSUE OF THE LEGAL STATUS OF METROPOLITAN UNIONS IN POLAND ARISING OUT OF THE STRUCTURE OF TERRITORIAL DIVISION OF THE STATE

W. Zajac

Abstract

In modern world, large metropolises are beginning to play an increasingly important role. It also applies to many Polish cities. In Poland carrying out metropolisation process, understood as creating special solutions for metropolitan areas in the form of large urban agglomerations, that are facilities of various networks (transport, scientific, economic) and development centres, is not satisfactory. Initiatives to ensure management of metropolitan areas have been undertaken for a long time, but still without achieving sufficient results. Moreover, solutions regarding legal status of an entity performing metropolitan tasks and its location in the structure of local self-government and territorial division of the state are still being sought. Taking the above into account, the scientific purpose of the research is analysis of the provisions of Polish legal system aimed at obtaining an answer to the question of legal status of metropolises in Poland in the context of essential territorial division of the state on municipalities, counties and self-government voivodships - adopted for local self-government needs. The scientific method that has been applied is based on dogmatic scientific research and the typical for dogmatic of law - the logical-language analysis of legal text. That scientific method has been supplemented by the use of systemic interpretation and functional interpretation. There have been also analysed the opinions of representatives of judicial doctrine. The results of the study lead, firstly, to a conclusion that metropolitan union, both in terms of management principles and its system, constitutes a separate entity from existing in the structure of territorial division, subject to its own legal personality, bodies and tasks. Secondly, the concept of metropolis management, and thus the functioning of metropolitan unions in Poland, should be evaluated as bad thought and incomplete. Primarily, due to the fact that in the light of the provisions of the Act of 9 March 2017 on metropolitan union in the Silesian voivodship only one metropolitan union operates in the area of the Silesian metropolis, while the remaining metropolitan areas have been deprived of functioning and management on the basis of a separate legal entity in the local self-government structure. As a consequence, all these areas, with the exception of only Silesian metropolis, do not function on the basis of systemic solutions separate for this type of areas. The third conclusion is that, the metropolitan union as a legal entity is not situated in the current structure of territorial division of the state into municipalities, counties and self-government voivodships, which was made by the Act of 24 July 1998 on the introduction of essential three-stage territorial division of the state. Fourthly, it seems reasonable to think about and re-evaluate the structure of local government units in order to introduce a separate unit operating in metropolitan areas into this structure. Performing of tasks specific to the metropolises is currently not within the scope of tasks of any existing local self-government unit forming territorial division of the state, as well as possible statutory forms of cooperation between these units. Although the tasks of each metropolis could be created differently depending on its specificity, their legal status should be regulated as far as possible uniformly for the entire area of the country. Meanwhile, such a regulation is currently only valid for the area of Silesian voivodship.

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DOI resolver: doi.org/10.5593/sgemsocial2018/1.2/S02.096

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