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Petko Angelov, Silvia Sasheva Zarkova
THE FINANCIAL TRANSPARENCY OF BULGARIA’S MUNICIPALITIES WITHIN THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC DIGITALIZATION
Summary:
Digitalization is among the main priorities of the EU set in the Europe 2030 strategy; Bulgaria and Bulgaria’s municipalities are direct participants in this process. The global COVID-19 pandemic at the beginning of 2020 positively reflects the process of digitalization including the public sector and local self-government as the effects of it are of varying intensity. The research ascertains that the process of adjustment of the financial and budget transparency of the municipalities to modern digital solutions has resulted in a significant difference in the implementation of the concept of European economic digitalization among the various administrative units in the country. This requires the improvement of the process of digitalization which is of utmost significance for the private sector; it also necessitates taking efficient measures for the formation of favorable business environment; citizens shall also be taken into account with a view of facilitating them in performing their administrative duties.
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Mariyana Pavlova Banova
FISCAL DECENTRALISATION IN THE REPUBLIC OF BULGARIA – FINANCIAL EFFECTS AND REGIONAL ASPECTS
Summary:
Fiscal decentralization, which aims to enhance local au¬to¬no¬my in terms of transferring rights, obligations and duties from a gover¬n¬men¬tal to a municipal level, needs to ensure the efficient exploitation of public resources and the provision of high-quality public services at the optimum cost. Changes in local govern¬ment which have been going on for two decades now raise the issue of the results which have been achieved in this respect so far. The objective of this paper is to study the degree of decentralization of the public sector in Bul-garia and to assess the financial independence, investment activity and effi-ciency of selected municipalities in Bulgaria.
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Mariyana Pavlova Banova
FISCAL DECENTRALIZATION IN EUROPE: EFFECTS ON LOCAL GOVERNMENTS’ FISCAL AUTONOMY
Summary:
The European Charter of Local Self-Government, which was ratified by almost all European member states, provides for the decentralization of power and the transfer of competences and financial resources to local communities as well as extends local authorities’ tax collection and budgetary spending responsibilities. In reality, however, the increased spending responsibilities and the limited self-financing powers of the municipalities in our country raise the question of the degree of their dependence on the cen¬tral government. This paper presents a survey which aims to measure and assess the degree of tax autonomy of local governments in Bulgaria compared to their counterparts from other EU member states by means of a set of indicators and thus to determine one of the effects of fiscal decentralization – lo¬cal self-government’s tax autonomy.
