Changes in the Local Territorial Government Organization and Their Effect on Municipal Budgets (by the Example of Trans-Baikal Region)

Abstract

The current reform of local governments in Russia is a process of optimization, consolidation and changing the territorial government organization, which corresponds to global trends in searching for a relevant and effective local territorial governance scheme. The new wave of interest to this process in the RF has been caused by establishing a new type of municipality, namely, municipal district. The article studies the problem of changes in local territorial governance organization in Russia and in Trans-Baikal region, in particular, as well as the effect of these changes on municipal budgets. The analytical calculations are based on the data from The Federal State Statistic Service of RF; the time lag for analyzing the local territorial governance organization is the period of 2007–2020, and 2016–2020 — for analyzing the budget funding of the transformed municipalities in Trans-Baikal region. The results of the study show that the common trends of consolidation of municipalities in Russia became evident only in 2020. According to the analysis of income and expenditures per capita, the territorial transformation of municipality influences the budget relations on the municipal level. Basing on the results of the study, the author proves the necessity of conducting a complex analysis before taking a decision to change a local territorial governance organization in order to build up the financial base of the municipalities.