The Role of Local Authorities in Local Development in Europe

Anna Mempel-Sniezyk

One of the activities undertaken currently by the European Union is an aspiration for widely understood development achieved by a decrease in worlds poverty and reaching of Millennium Development Goals. The goals specified within the United Nations Millennium Project include development and strengthening of worldwide partnership in the range of development. The European Union perceives the possibility of this goal reaching by the support of widely understood cooperation on local and regional level, between highly developed and the most poorly developed countries, between the North and South. The social-economic development is currently perceived locally all over the world, and it is difficult to imagine separated spatial units without an engagement of self-governance authorities. Development and strengthening of the worldwide partnership is to be achieved by support of an activity of local authorities, non-governmental institutions and local communities, and by the propagation of cooperation idea. For this purpose, the European Commission has undertaken a range of projects aimed at strengthening of self-governance authorities and other local entities contribution in particular countries development, including the most poorly developed ones.