Local Government Systems in Selected Post-Communist EU-Member Countries

After the fall of communist regimes in Europe, the post-communist countries tried to reform their local government systems in the manner that would be closer to democratic principles accepted in the European Union. Although these countries were following the same goal and to join the EU, and were supported by the same international organizations and institutions, their paths of implementing the requested measures, as well as the achieved results, differ significantly. In the article, the authors try to present how the same or similar ideas produced different outcomes in different post-communist EU-member countries, namely the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Slovakia and Slovenia. Based on an analysis of legal documents and secondary data, the countries are compared in their process of establishing modernised systems of local administrations.