1. Inter-municipal cooperation in Iceland Results from the survey
4th General COST-LocRef MC and WG Meeting
Local Public Sector Reforms:
An International Comparison
(LocRef IS 1207) in Dubrovnik (Croatia), 05/06 May 2015
WGIII: Results from the
IMC surveys.
Date: May 5th
Dr. Grétar Þór Eyþórsson
Professor in Methodology and
Political Science.
University of Akureyri, Iceland

2. Territorial structure
* Based on an estimation from a survey in 2003.
Estimation 2014: 7-10 IMC‘s pr. municipality

3. Amalgamation history
Comprehensive reform attempts and
Referendums in 185 in 1993 and in 66 in 2005
Only 1 new municipality
But the number went down the voluntary way
From 196 (1993) to 105 (2002) and 74 today
But the problem is not solved yet
Still a considerable part of the municipalities is to small
To provide modern services for the people
To provide services according to law
To cope with regional development – losing people south...

4. Number of municipalities
Referendum
1993 (185)
Referendum
2005 (66)
Grétar Þór Eyþórsson 2014

5. Municipal size historically

6. IMC in Iceland Inter-municipal entities (Byggðasamlög).
Here the municipalities (most often in districts) join in an entity with a board with representatives from usually all. Social services, primary school expertise services, primary schools, fire brigades, bus transports, museums and regional tourism centres are the most frequent forms of this.
Inter-municipal contracts.
Here a contract about service provision is made between municipalities. Usually this is about one big municipality providing services to one or more, smaller neighbouring municipalities.
Inter-Municipal Public Company.
This is not frequent in Iceland but exists in the cases of power companies and water supply.

7. IMC in Iceland
Regional economic development agencies (Atvinnuþróunarfélög).
One such is run in every district. That means eight agencies all around the country. They work for common economic development for the district/region. This is usually done in cooperation between the municipalities and sometimes private companies are involved. The state grants money to these agencies.
Associations of local authorities (Landshlutasamtök sveitarfélaga)
Are run in the eight districts. They are voluntary and get no grants from the state. They work, just as the economic development agencies for the mutual interests of the municipalities.

8. Increasing interest in IMC instead of amalgamations…
Figure 6. Icelandic local politicians on the statement: “We should go for inter-municipal cooperation rather than amalgamations.“ Results from surveys 2006 and 2011 (Balance Yes – No in %).

9. IMC survey in Iceland A sample of 50 entities Web-survey
Criteria: The biggest and most comprehensive + with information on the web
A complete mapping of IMC´s doesn‘t exist
...but I have been granted money to do it completely!
In the sample:
Handicap services, culture, garbage, fire brigade, regional federations of municipalities, regional economic development centres
Web-survey
Sent out 2. February and closed 3. March
37/49 ( 75,5%) responded (one had been discontinued)

10. Areas of cooperation realized within the entity

11. How many employees work for the Association?

12. How many meetings a year on the board of the Association?

13. Reasons behind establishing the Association?
59,5% The capacity problem is well known in Iceland, since many of the municipalities are so small.

14. Reasons behind establishing the Association
Reasons behind establishing the Association? (Reasons others than mentioned above)

15. Who was the initiator of the Association?

16. Evaluation of the activeness of members of the Association?

17. Agree with statements about the IMC’s

18. IMC’s Effectiveness, equality and trust

19. Effectiveness, equality and trust in IMC´s

20. Effectiveness, equality and trust in IMC´s

21. How often do you contact following people within the daily work of the Association?

22. How are citizens informed about the activities of the Association?
Webpages is the common Icelandic way to inform!

23. Interest of the individual groups in the activities of the Association and their municipalities?
No wonder the interest is higher in own municipality but the interest in IMC seems to be fairly good.

24. Who usually are representatives of municipalities at the general assembly of your Association?

25. What are the effects of the Association’s activities?
Solving the capacity problem and obtaining efficiency.

26. Changes in the activities of the IMC?
Expansion to other areas is common. Developing incrementally into amalgamations?