From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Logo of the
Mancomunidad
of Cantalapiedra y Las Villas,
Province of Salamanca
, Spain.
In present-day
Spain
a
mancomunidad
(English:
municipal association
[note 1]
)
is an association of
municipalities
voluntarily established by some municipalities with the aim of carrying out joint projects or providing common services.
[1]
[2]
A mancomunidad is one of the
local entities
[3]
defined for the purpose of
local government
, to which those municipalities may voluntarily delegate some of their functions and powers. There were 1,023 mancommunidades in 2011.
Purpose
[
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]
In general, mancomunidades are aimed at carrying out projects or providing common services.
[1]
A
mancomunidad
has
legal personality
, and can exist either for a particular period to achieve a concrete goal or can exist indefinitely.
[
citation needed
]
A mancomunidad is similar to a
comarca
, with the difference that
comarca
has somewhat different meanings in the various
autonomous communities of Spain
and
mancomunidad
is defined identically throughout the country. The municipalities in a single
mancomunidad
need not be
coterminous
(though they usually are). They are required to set a clear goal, create management bodies distinct from those of the individual municipalities, and provide the
mancomunidad
with its own budget.
There are a number of
natural
or
historical regions
that, despite the strong identity and common goals of their inhabitants, are divided by
provincial
or even
ancient kingdom
boundaries. Examples of such regions are
Tierra de Campos
,
Manchuela
and
Ilercavonia
. Such regions or comarcas have often not been able to achieve the necessary legal recognition for their administrative development within the existing provincial or autonomous frameworks. Therefore, their municipalities have resorted to organizing themselves into a mancomunidad.
[6]
Other groups of municipalities that do not face the problem of borders cutting across their natural region or comarca may form a mancomunidad for economic reasons, to improve local services or in order alleviate some form of historical administrative neglect owing to distance from and lack of communication with current administrative centers.
[7]
Other uses
[
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]
The term
mancomunidad
and its cognates are also used to translate the English word "
commonwealth
".
[
citation needed
]
Notes
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]
References
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]
Bibliography
[
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]
External links
[
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]