The reform to restructure municipalities and services in Finland: A

Transcription

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pentti meklin, marianne pekola-sjöblom (eds.)
The reform to restructure
municipalities and services in
finland: A research perspective
Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 23
Pentti Meklin and
Marianne Pekola-Sjöblom (eds.)
The reform to restructure
municipalities and services
in Finland: A research perspective
A summary of the findings of the Evaluation
Research Programme ARTTU 2008–2012
ASSOCIATION OF FINNISH
LOCAL AND REGIONAL AUTHORITIES
HELSINKI 2013
EDITORS
Pentti Meklin, Professor Emeritus, University of Tampere, Scientific Director of the Evaluation Research
Programme ARTTU
Marianne Pekola-Sjöblom, Head of Research, Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities,
Project Manager for the Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU
WORKING GROUP
Organisations and researchers responsible for the ARTTU research modules:
Democracy and leadership (Åbo Akademi University and the Association of Finnish
Local and Regional Authorities):
Siv Sandberg, Sari Pikkala and Marianne Pekola-Sjöblom
Structural functionality of urban regions (Aalto University):
Raine Mäntysalo, Jonne Hytönen, Vesa Kanninen, Ilona Akkila and Petteri Niemi
Personnel (University of Tampere): Tuula Heiskanen, Esa Jokinen and Risto Nakari
Economy (University of Tampere): Jarmo Vakkuri, Pentti Meklin, Olavi Kallio and Jari Tammi
Social welfare and health services (University of Eastern Finland):
Vuokko Niiranen, Juha Kinnunen, Alisa Puustinen and Joakim Zitting
Education services (University of Jyväskylä): Jouni Välijärvi, Jouko Mehtäläinen and Hannu Jokinen
Impacts on linguistic equality (University of Helsinki and Åbo Akademi University):
Stefan Sjöblom and Siv Sandberg
Impacts on gender equality (Åbo Akademi University): Sari Pikkala
1. edition
ISBN 978-952-293-050-7 (vol.)
ISBN 978-952-293-051-4 (pdf )
ISSN 1237-8569
Translation from Finnish: Parasta Artun mitalla II
© The Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities
Helsinki 2013
Printed by:
Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities
Toinen linja 14
P.O.Box 200
FI-00101 Helsinki
Tel. +358 9 7711
Telefax +358 9 771 2291
www.localfinland.fi
3
Foreword
Early 2008 saw the official launch of the Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU,
but the process that led to the start of the programme had begun already long before
that. In spring 2005, the Finnish Government began to prepare a reform to restructure
municipalities and services, also known as the PARAS project. At the end of the same
year, Finnish Local Government 2004, a ten-year research programme collecting systematically information on different types of municipalities over a longer period of time,
was drawing to an end. As the Finnish Local Government 2004 research programme
ended and preparation of a framework act to guide the PARAS reform started, an
idea began to form at the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities that
a more extensive and systematic evaluation research similar to that of Finnish Local
Government 2004 programme would be needed.
An extract of the first document presenting ideas for a project to evaluate the
PARAS project, drawn up in June 2006, reads:
The reform to restructure municipalities and services, known as the PARAS project,
is the most extensive and far-reaching project to reform local government administration undertaken in Finland since the administrative trial launched in 1989. As we
are writing this paper, the full outcome of the project is not yet known; even so, it is
evident that the reform will influence the provision of local services and collaboration
between municipalities as well as local government structures. The importance and
extent of the PARAS project make a strong case for launching a research programme
to evaluate the progress and impacts of the project.
Today, eight years after the first document presenting ideas for the project was written, the reform to restructure municipalities and services, or the PARAS project, has
formally ended, and so has the ARTTU research programme evaluating the reform.
Nevertheless, municipalities will continue with restructuring and modernisation. The
Government led by Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen was appointed in 2011. The Government Programme issued on 22 June of that year states that “the Government will
carry out reforms in municipalities across the country. The aim is to create a thriving
municipal structure built on economically robust municipalities” (Chapter 10).
This summary report on the final stage of the Evaluation Research Programme
ARTTU aims to answer the research questions put to the programme and to the
studies carried out under the programme: 1) What decisions and measures have local
authorities taken during the PARAS project, or what developments have taken place
in the municipalities? 2) What impacts do local government measures and events have
The
reform to restructure municipalities and services in
Finland: A
research perspective
4
from the viewpoints of different research modules? 3) What factors have affected the
differing progression of the PARAS reform in different municipalities? and 4) How
has State steering affected the implementation of the PARAS reform in municipalities?
The PARAS project has taught many lessons that are important for continuous
renewal. The key findings and lessons learnt are summarised in the final chapter of
this report.
This summary report has been jointly written by the research modules and the
researchers of the programme. The text has been revised and edited by the report editors.
This report was originally published in Finnish with the title "Parasta Artun mitalla II".
We would like to extend our warm thanks for their cooperation to all those who
have participated in the ARTTU research programme: the municipalities participating in the research, the ministries funding the programme, the Keva institution for
public sector earnings-related pensions, the Association of Finnish Local and Regional
Authorities and our research colleagues. We hope that the insights gained through
the ARTTU Evaluation Research Programme and the numerous studies conducted
within the programme will encourage knowledge-based restructuring of municipalities and services.
December 2012
In Helsinki and Kuru
Pentti Meklin and Marianne Pekola-Sjöblom
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Contents
Foreword_______________________________________________________ 3
Chapter 1. Introduction
_____________________________________ 7
Chapter 2. What decisions and measures have local authorities taken
during the PARAS project, or what developments have taken place
in the municipalities? ___________________________________________
2.1 A large number of municipal mergers have been implemented – some
of the merger plans have fallen through__________________________
2.2 Local government co-management areas for social welfare and
health services and for upper secondary level vocational education _____
2.3 Intensive renewal of local government management systems and
operating models ___________________________________________
2.4 Structural reforms have concentrated more on social welfare and
health services and less on education services______________________
2.4.1 Reform of social welfare and health service provision and
management systems________________________________________
2.4.2 Education services are determined by demographic changes,
financial situation and value judgements of municipalities____________
2.5 Urban regions slowly starting cooperation ________________________
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Chapter 3. What impacts do local government reform policies have? ______
3.1 Impacts on municipal residents’ opinions_________________________
3.2 Impacts on voting behaviour and election results___________________
3.3 Impacts on economy ________________________________________
3.4 Impacts on local government personnel__________________________
3.5 Impacts on linguistic equality _________________________________
3.6 Impacts on gender equality___________________________________
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Chapter 4. What factors have affected the differing progression of
the PARAS reform in different municipalities? _______________________
1. State support for municipal mergers – merger grants________________
2. The economic situation of municipalities and the expected benefits_____
3. Past experiences of intermunicipal cooperation____________________
4. Trust in the decision-makers of neighbouring municipalities__________
5. Municipalities’ differing interests ______________________________
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6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. Decline in municipalities’ own influence – the voice of peripheral
areas isn’t heard____________________________________________
Opinions of municipal residents, local government officers, the local
media, and business and industry_______________________________
The municipality’s general direction of development – how to
proceed after the choice______________________________________
Managers’ attitudes and management determine the implementation
of the reform______________________________________________
Development context and operating culture ______________________
Reform fatigue_____________________________________________
Chapter 5. How has State steering affected the implementation of
the PARAS reform in municipalities? _______________________________
1. The launch of new local government reform in 2011________________
2. Merger grants have encouraged municipal mergers_________________
3. Decisions on central government transfers and taxation _____________
4. Flaw in the PARAS reform?___________________________________
5. Steering not coordinated between the ministries ___________________
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60
Chapter 6. In conclusion: Twenty lessons learnt that are important for
continuous renewal ____________________________________________ 62
Appendix 1. Presentation of the ARTTU programme researchers and of
the working group responsible for this report________________________ 67
Appendix 2. The following reports produced within the ARTTU research
programme were used as sources in this report________________________ 70
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Chapter 1. Introduction
The framework act governing the PARAS reform, the Act on Restructuring Local
Government and Services (169/2007), was ratified on 9 February 2007 and entered
into force on 23 February 2007. Section 1 of the Act states that the purpose is to
”…create prerequisites for the restructuring of local government and services. The
aim of the reform is to use local democracy as a basis for strengthening municipal
and service structures, for improving the manner in which services are produced
and organised, for overhauling local government financing and the system of central
government transfers to local government and for reviewing the manner in which
tasks are divided between central and local government so that the organisation and
production of services which are the responsibility of local authorities would be on a
strong structural and financial basis. The aim is to improve productivity, slow down
the rise in local government spending and create a sound basis for steering the services
organised by local authorities.”
The Act stipulates that the PARAS reform should be implemented by means of
strengthening local government and service structures and ensuring better productivity
of local government activities. According to section 4 of the Act, this can be achieved by
a) merging municipalities and by incorporating parts of some municipalities
into other municipalities;
b) forming larger catchment areas for services for which the population base
provided by individual municipalities is insufficient, and by increasing cooperation between municipalities;
c) making the organisation and production of municipal services more efficient
and by strengthening the operating prerequisites in the Helsinki Metropolitan
Area and in other city regions with problematic urban structures.
Section 5 of the Act lays down the requirements for forming a municipality and a local
government co-management area:
“A municipality must constitute a commuting area or some other larger catchment
area that has the necessary prerequisites in terms of economic and personnel resources
for assuming responsibility for organising and financing services.”
Section 5 of the Act lays down two rules that are based on the number of inhabitThe
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ants in a municipality: one concerning primary health care and the other vocational
education and training.
“A municipality or a local government co-management area responsible for primary
health care or closely associated social services must have a population of about 20,000
at least.”
“A municipality or a local government co-management area authorized to provide
basic education, as laid down in the Vocational Education and Training Act, must
have a population of about 50,000 at least.”
The framework act formally expired at the end of 2012. The timetable for the reform
to restructure municipalities and services is set out in Figure 1.
Reform is planned and
legislation enacted
V/2005 - II/2007
Reform is
planned
Government
decisions
XI/2005-II/2007
Framework act is
drafted and approved
by Parliament
Plans for implementation and urban
regions are drawn up
II/2007 - VIII/2007
and implementation is prepared
IX/2007 - XII/2008
Reform is implemented
I/2009 - XII/2012
(1.1.2013)
Reform is implemented
Reform implementation
is planned
Acts regulating the reform are
enacted and adopted by Parliament
Management and evaluation of the reform
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(1) Municipalities submit their reports and implementation plans to Government by 31 Aug 2007.
(2) Urban regions submit their plans to Government by 31 Aug 2007.
(3) Government evaluates reform progress in summer 2008 based on supplementary information provided by
municipalities.
(4) In 2009, the Government submitted a report to Parliament on the reform to restructure municipalities and
services.
(5) A questionnaire is sent to municipalities to find out what decisions they have taken to meet the obligations of
the Act on Restructuring Local Government and Services (169/2007).
Figure 1. The timetable for the reform to restructure municipalities and services (PARAS project) (Source: The Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities)
Already at the time of launching the PARAS project it was clear that research would
be needed to follow up and evaluate the reform and its progress. In 2007, an extensive
five-year research programme titled Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU, initiated and coordinated by the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities,
was launched to evaluate the PARAS project. The actual research and funding term
covered the period from 2008 to 2012. The Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities prepared and launched the research programme jointly with seven
ministries (Ministry of Transport and Communications, Ministry of Agriculture and
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Forestry, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, Ministry of
Employment and the Economy, Ministry of Finance and Ministry of the Environment);
the Keva institution for public sector earnings-related pensions; seven universities
(Aalto University, the Universities of Helsinki, Eastern Finland, Jyväskylä, Lapland
and Tampere, and Åbo Akademi University) and the 40 municipalities that had been
accepted to the programme (Figure 2). The research programme was jointly funded
by the parties mentioned above. The Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities has coordinated the programme as well as participated in the financing and
in the actual research.
The purpose of the programme was to convey information on the research, but
also to maintain and strengthen dialogue between researchers and practical actors,
especially between political decision-makers and professional management in municipalities and in society in general. A further objective was to bring practical benefits to
local authorities, particularly to those participating in the research programme.
The municipalities participating in the research were selected and divided into four
groups based on the means of implementing the reform laid down in the framework act:
1)
2)
3)
4)
Municipalities party to municipal merger
Municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation (local government
co-management areas for social welfare and health services)
Other municipalities
City region municipalities
Pursuant to section 4 of the framework act, the means of implementing the PARAS
reform include municipal mergers, establishment of local government co-management
areas and cooperation between urban regions. The group ‘other municipalities’ was
used as a control group and included the municipalities which at the start of the project had not made a decision to implement the above means. The grouping was not
exclusive, in other words, some municipalities were members of several of the groups
right from the beginning. As the reform progressed, the grouping underwent changes
as many of the municipalities had joined a local government co-management area.
For the purposes of statistical analysis of the data, city region municipalities have been
categorised into other groups.
The ARTTU research programme analysed the stages of the PARAS project before
and after a merger or an establishment of a local government co-management area.
Most of the mergers involving municipalities participating in the ARTTU research
took place in early 2009, and a substantial number of the current co-management
areas for social welfare and health care were established in the same year. By the time
the ARTTU research programme ended, only a few years had passed since the municipalities had implemented reform measures. Therefore, it is not possible to make
any far-reaching conclusions about the broader impacts of the reform.
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Sodankylä
Pello
Kuusamo
Haukipudas
Pudasjärvi
Oulu
Kajaani
Halsua
Vöyri
Mustasaari
Vaasa
Vimpeli
Juuka
Lapua Äänekoski Siilinjärvi
Seinäjoki
Kuopio
Uurainen
Mänttä-Vilppula
Pori
Lempäälä
Harjavalta
Lieto
Turku
Kemiönsaari
Varkaus
Kitee
Hirvensalmi
Hämeenlinna
Karkkila
Salo
Jyväskylä
TUTKIMUSKUNNAT:
1.
Halsua
2.
Hamina
3.
Harjavalta
4.
Haukipudas
5.
Hirvensalmi
6.
Hollola
7.
Hämeenlinna
8.
Juuka
9.
Jyväskylä
10.
Kajaani
11.
Karkkila
12.
Kemiönsaari
13.
Kirkkonummi
14.
Kitee
15.
Kotka
16.
Kuopio
17.
Kuusamo
18.
Lappeenranta
19.
Lapua
20.
Lempäälä
21.
Lieto
22.
Mustasaari
23.
Mänttä-Vilppula
24.
Oulu
25.
Pello
26.
Pori
27.
Pudasjärvi
28.
Raasepori
29.
Salo
30.
Seinäjoki
31.
Siilinjärvi
32.
Sipoo
33.
Sodankylä
34.
Turku
35.
Uurainen
36.
Vaasa
37.
Varkaus
38.
Vimpeli
39.
Vöyri-Maksamaa
40.
Äänekoski
Hollola
Lappeenranta
Hamina
Sipoo
Kotka
Raasepori
Kirkkonummi
© kuntarajat: Tilastokeskus.
Figure 2. Municipalities participating in the ARTTU research 2008–2012 (N = 40)
A joint steering group was set up to guide the research organisations in the practical
implementation of the research programme. Each research organisation was responsible
for its own research module.
The research modules funded by the ARTTU programme:

Social welfare and health services: University of Eastern Finland, Department
of Health Policy and Management

Education services: The University of Jyväskylä, Finnish Institute for Educational Research

Democracy and leadership: Åbo Akademi University, Department of Political Science, and the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities,
Research and Development Unit

Economy: The University of Tampere School of Management and City of
Helsinki Urban Facts (2008–2009)

Personnel: University of Tampere, Work Research Centre

Structural functionality of urban regions: Aalto University, Department of
Real Estate, Planning and Geoinformatics
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The sub-projects conducted with separate funding:

The reform’s impacts on linguistic equality: University of Helsinki, Swedish
School of Social Science and Åbo Akademi University

The reform’s impacts on gender equality: Åbo Akademi University

Evaluation of reform implementation: University of Lapland (2007–2009)
The ARTTU research programme has produced more than 30 research reports over
the research period. All of them are available in Finnish as web publications, and about
half of them have been published in the Acta publication series of the Association of
Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. At the beginning of the research programme,
the research modules conducted a preliminary survey. They wrote interim reports during the course of the programme and a final report as the programme ended.
Both the PARAS reform and the ARTTU research programme evaluating it have
a broad scope. A matter often raised over the course of the research programme was
a need to compile the project’s most important findings into one report. The original
purpose was to explore the impacts of the PARAS project on the development of local
government and service structure. It was soon discovered, though, that the evaluation
could not be strictly limited to changes resulting from the PARAS reform, since other
developments, too, influence local government and service restructuring. For this
reason the research questions of the programme were summarised into the following
four questions:
1) What decisions and measures have local authorities taken during the PARAS project, or what developments have taken place in the municipalities?
2) What impacts do local government measures and events have from the view
points of different research modules?
3) What factors have affected the differing progression of the PARAS reform in
different municipalities?
4) How has State steering affected the implementation of the PARAS reform in
municipalities?
This summary report “The reform to restructure municipalities and services in Finland: A research perspective” written jointly by the programme’s research modules
and researchers seeks to answer these questions. The text has been revised and edited
by the report editors.
***
Municipalities will carry on with reforms even after the end of the PARAS project.
The Government Programme of 22 June 2011 issued by Jyrki Katainen’s Government
appointed in 2011 states that “the Government will carry out reforms in municipalities across the country. The aim is to create a thriving municipal structure built on
economically robust municipalities” (Chapter 10). This emphasised the State’s role in
the implementation of the reform.
The PARAS project has taught many lessons, and the researchers hope that the
insights gained through the ARTTU research programme will encourage knowledgebased restructuring of municipalities and services.
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Chapter 2. What decisions and measures
have local authorities taken during the
PARAS project, or what developments
have taken place in the municipalities?
Finnish municipalities have revamped their operations in many ways: the means of
restructuring laid down in the PARAS framework act include municipal mergers and
cooperation in the field of social welfare and health services, in vocational education and
training and in developing urban regions. Also, municipalities may reform their own
operations without a need to form mergers or collaborate with other municipalities.
The formation of municipal mergers and local government co-management areas
is a multi-stage process, which is illustrated in Figure 3:
The objectives and means of PARAS reform
The objective is
” a thriving … municipal structure”…
”cost-effective, high-quality services”
Means of implementing
the reform – Stage I (4 §)
- Municipal mergers
- Increased cooperation –
- local government
co-management areas
Offer
development
potential
Means of implementing the
reform – Stage II
Management system –
leadership
Municipal operations:
1. Service provision
2. Community development
Figure 3. Stages of the reform to restructure municipalities and services
The first stage of restructuring involves formation of municipal mergers and local
government co-management areas, and making collaborative efforts in urban regions.
It must be kept in mind, though, that the PARAS means for local government reform
merely offer development potential, in other words, opportunities for improving municipal operations. The benefits of mergers, local government co-management areas
and collaboration ultimately depend on how the newly established municipalities and
co-management areas are able to harness this potential.
The second stage of restructuring can be divided into two main phases: First,
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municipalities typically revamp their systems of management, which includes organisational restructuring and introduction of new practices, such as life-course models,
process organisations or purchaser-provider models. A reform to the system of management is, however, merely a tool that can be used to implement the second phase, i.e.
reforms at the level of service provision and community development, in other words,
at the level in which local residents encounter the municipal organisation.
The early stages of the PARAS reform saw the formation of a number of municipal
mergers and local government co-management areas. Some of the municipalities were
party both to a merger and to a co-management area.
2.1 A large number of municipal mergers have been
implemented – some of the merger plans have
fallen through
A total of 167 municipal mergers have taken place in Finland after the wars. The
mergers are not equally divided over this period, but the majority of them occurred
during two distinctive waves of mergers: the number of mergers in 1967–1977 and
in 2005–2013 was 63 and 78 respectively.
At the beginning of 2005, ten municipal mergers took place, and at the beginning
of 2006, there was one merger, but the decisions on these mergers had been made before the launch of the PARAS project. The total number of municipal mergers formed
during the PARAS reform period in 2007-2013 was 67. As a result, Finland now has
111 fewer municipalities than in 2006.
The majority of the mergers that took place in 2007-2013 were mergers between
two municipalities [the municipality of Längelmäki (2009) included]. One in three
mergers (22) were multi-municipal mergers, i.e. mergers of more than two municipalities. The municipalities which concluded a separate merger agreement have been
counted as multi-municipal mergers. They are Jyväskylä-Korpilahti and JyväskyläJyväskylä rural municipality (2009), and Lohja-Karjalohja and Lohja-Nummi-Pusula
(2013). When examined by the number of municipalities involved in a merger, the
largest multi-municipal mergers were that of Salo with 10 municipalities and those of
Kouvola and Hämeenlinna with six municipalities in 2009.
Table 1. Municipal mergers formed in Finland in 2005–2013
Year of merger
Mergers of two
municipalities, No. 200520062007200820092010201120122013
81
131
163606
Multi-municipal mergers, No.
2010
161004
Total No. of municipal mergers
101
141
32460
10
Total No. of municipalities 432431416415348342336336320
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Grant to speed up mergers
During the PARAS project, mergers have been encouraged by merger grants. The
amount of merger grant for the period 2008-2013 is determined according to the
population size and to the number of municipalities party to the merger: the larger the
population of the new municipality, the larger the combined population of municipalities other than the largest municipality and the greater the number of municipalities
party to the merger, the larger the merger grant. The merger grant, paid in accordance with the Act on Municipal Boundary Divisions which entered into force at the
beginning of 2007, was highest in 2008–2009 after which it was gradually reduced
in 2010–2011 and 2012–2013. The investment and development grants for merging
municipalities were abolished in the 2007 legislation. In accordance with the Act,
any losses of central government transfers are compensated to municipalities in full
for five years.
Municipal mergers that take place following the reform in local government
structures introduced by Prime Minister Katainen’s Government in summer 2011 are
also supported with merger grants. More detailed guidelines on the different forms of
support will be included in the 2013 act on local government structures. A draft of
the act was sent for consultation in November 2012.
The proportion of the largest municipality of the new municipality’s
population
The majority of the mergers taking place in 2007-2013 center on a heavily populated
central urban municipality. In twenty of the total of 67 mergers, the population of the
central urban municipality constitutes more than 90 per cent of the new municipality’s population.
In contrast, in the multi-municipal mergers involving Siikalatva, Kouvola, Kauhava, Kimitoön, Salo and Loviisa, less than half of the new municipality’s population
lived in the largest of the merging municipalities; similarly in the multi-municipal
merger involving the municipality of Raseborg, slightly over half of the new municipality’s population lived in the largest municipality party to the merger.
In some of the merged municipalities, the differences in size between the municipalities are so small that there is no undisputed central urban municipality. Dragsfjärd
and Kemiö, the two largest of the three municipalities party to the Kimitoön merger
were about the same size. The population of Rantsila, the largest municipality party
to the Siikalatva merger of four municipalities, was less than one-third of the new
municipality’s population. The populations of both Pukkila and Kestilä were about
one-fourth of the new municipality’s population. Likewise, in the merger of Mänttä
and Vilppula the two municipalities were relatively equal in size: Mänttä accounted
for fifty-four per cent of the new municipality’s population.
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Table 2. The 67 municipalities that merged in 2007–2013 divided by the population of the
largest of the municipalities (percentage of the population of the merging municipalities).
A nationwide survey.
Proportion of the largest
municipality of Less than
50.0-60.0-70.0-80.0-90.0the total population:
50% 59.9%69.9%79.9%89.9%100%
No. of merged
municipalities
(N = 67)
63920
920
The smaller municipalities involved in mergers often make up a notably small proportion of the new municipality’s population. The populations of Kodisjoki (Rauma
2007), Särkisalo (Salo 2009), Velkua (Naantali 2009), Iniö (Länsi-Turunmaa 2009)
and Suomenniemi (Mikkeli 2013) accounted for less than two per cent of the new
municipality’s population at the time of the merger. The populations of Ullava (Kokkola 2009), Jaala (Kouvola 2009), Tuulos (Hämeenlinna 2009) and Yli-Ii (Oulu 2013)
accounted for two to three per cent of the new municipality’s population.
Chained mergers
A substantial proportion of the municipalities that merged during the PARAS project
have been party to several mergers. After the year 2000, a total of 17 municipalities have
formed successive, or chained, mergers. They include: Akaa (formely Toijala) (2007,
2009), Joensuu (2005, 2009), Jämsä (2001, 2007, 2009), Kangasala (2005, 2011),
Kuopio (2005, 2011, 2013), Lappeenranta (2009, 2010), Lohja (2009, 2013), Loimaa
(2005, 2009), Mikkeli (2001, 2007, 2013), Oulu (2009, 2013), Pieksämäki (2004,
2007), Pöytyä (2005, 2009), Sastamala (formerly Vammala) (2009, 2013), Savonlinna
(2009, 2013), Seinäjoki (2005, 2009), Vörå (2007, 2011) and Ylöjärvi (2007, 2009).
Decisions on mergers
A total of 18 referendums on municipal mergers were undertaken during council terms
2005–2008 and 2009–2012. In ten cases the majority of those who voted were in
favour of a merger, and a merger was formed. In five of the municipalities, the majority
opposed a merger, but the council made a decision in favour of one. The votes against
a merger won in a referendum undertaken in Siuntio in 2011, yet the council decided
in favour of a merger with Lohja. Following a decision of the Supreme Administrative
Court, the decision to merge was not enforced.
The other mergers were decided by the local councils without a referendum.
Table 3. Municipal referendums on municipal mergers in Finland in 2005–2012 (No.)
Year20052006200720082009201020112012
No. of municipal
referendums (N = 18)0290133 -
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Mergers implemented during a council term and at the turn of council
terms
The launch of the PARAS project in 2005 raised concerns that there would be cuts
to merger grants for smaller municipalities. Subsequently, many small or relatively
small municipalities rushed the decision to merge, and the beginning of 2007 saw the
implementation of 14 mergers.
Typically, though, mergers take place at the turn of council terms. If a redetermination of municipal boundaries enters into force at the start of a new electoral period
on 1 January, local elections will be held based on the new municipal boundary divisions in October of the previous year according to normal practice. Only slightly over
one-third of the municipal mergers completed during the PARAS project took place
in the middle of a council term. In only two cases were new elections held during a
council term: in Rovaniemi, new elections were held in 2005 as the town and the rural
municipality merged, and in Loviisa new elections were held in 2009.
In 2007–2008, the councils of the merged municipalities (15) merged to form a
“super council”, which then continued until the end of the council term. The 2008
elections based on the new municipal boundaries were not held until the usual time
in October.
Following an amendment to the Act on Municipal Boundary Divisions in 2010,
municipalities that merge in the middle of a council term are given the possibility to
merge their councils only in part. In 2010-2011, four of the merged municipalities
merged their councils in part, and five in full. As mentioned above, new elections were
held in Loviisa in 2009.
In conclusion, the number of mergers is substantial. During the PARAS reform
period, the number of municipalities decreased by 111, which is about one-fourth of
the municipalities that existed before the reform. As a result of the mergers, the average
size of municipalities has increased in recent years. In 2000, there were an average of
11,500 inhabitants in municipalities; by 2012, their number had already increased to
16,000. Correspondingly, the median population of municipalities has increased by
about one thousand and was 6,000 inhabitants in 2012.
Not all explorations of merger opportunities have led to mergers. Of the 144
cases where a merger was explored in 2004–2011, the number of those that came to
nothing (77) slightly exceeded those that led to a merger (67). Over the past few years,
the risk of failure in exploring merger options seems to have increased: in 2009-2011,
21 merger explorations failed whereas 13 led to a merger. Generally speaking, we can
conclude that in 2004–2011 less than half (47%) of the explorations led to a merger.
In 2009–2011, the corresponding figure was 38%, or slightly over one-third of the
merger explorations. Structural changes in the municipalities participating in the ARTTU
research programme
At the end of 2007, a group of municipalities was selected to the ARTTU programme. These municipalities would constitute the 40 municipalities participating
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in the programme when the planned mergers were to take effect in 2009. Nine of
the selected municipalities underwent a merger in 2009. They were Hämeenlinna,
Jyväskylä, Kimitoön, Lappeenranta, Mänttä-Vilppula, Oulu, Raseborg and Seinäjoki.
The largest mergers took place in the regions of Salo and Hämeenlinna. A merger of
two municipalities took place in only three regions, those of Lappeenranta, MänttäVilppula and Oulu.
This means that at the early stage of the ARTTU programme in 2007–2008,
the number of municipalities participating in the programme was 65. This group was
surveyed in a study on municipal residents conducted in 2008. At the start of 2007,
a merger was carried out in three of the municipalities: Kajaani-Vuolijoki, VöråMaksamaa and Äänekoski-Suolahti-Sumiainen. Of them, Kajaani was exceptional
in the sense that it participated in a self-government trial in the region of Kainuu
(2006–2012) and thus came only partly under the scope of application of the PARAS
framework act (see Section 2 of the framework act).
2000-2002: 73 municipalities
Merger 2003: Hamina + Vehkalahti
Mergers 2005: Kuopio + Vehmersalmi,
Seinäjoki + Peräseinäjoki, Varkaus + Kangaslampi
Mergers 2007: Kajaani + Vuolijoki,
Vörå + Maksamaa,
Äänekoski + Suolahti + Sumiainen
2009: 40 municipalities
Mergers 2009 (9): Hämeenlinna (+5), Jyväskylä (+2),
Kiiminki (3), Lappeenranta (+1), Mänttä-Vilppula (2),
Oulu (+1), Raseborg (3), Salo (+9), Seinäjoki (+2)
2010 – 2012 mergers:
2010: Lappeenranta + Ylämaa, Pori + Noormarkku
2011: Kuopio + Karttula, Vörå-Maksamaa + Oravainen
2013:
• Oulu + Haukipudas + Kiiminki +Oulunsalo+ Yli-Ii
• Kitee – Kesälahti
• Kuopio – Nilsiä
• Vaasa - Vähäkyrö
Figure 4. Mergers involving municipalities participating in the ARTTU programme in 2000–2013
In 2000–2006, prior to the actual reform to restructure municipalities and services,
the municipalities participating in the ARTTU programme were party to four mergers: Hamina-Vehkalahti in 2003 and Kuopio-Vehmersalmi, Seinäjoki-Peräseinäjoki
and Varkaus-Kangaslampi in 2005. This means that in the early 2000s, the current 40
municipalities participating in the ARTTU programme still made up 73 municipalities.
Local government restructuring will continue even after the PARAS framework act
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has expired, and in early 2013, four of the municipalities participating in the ARTTU
programme are undergoing a merger. As of 1 January 2013, the municipalities of
Oulu and Haukipudas merged with Kiiminki, Oulunsalo and Yli-Ii to become a new
municipality of Oulu. The following three mergers will also come into force: KiteeKesälahti, Kuopio-Nilsiä and Vaasa-Vähäkyrö. Five of the municipalities participating
in the ARTTU programme are party to chained mergers (see Table 4).
Table 4. Mergers in the municipalities participating in the ARTTU programme in 2000-2013.
The municipalities in order of the time of merger:
Municipality (2012)
Year(s) of merger
Merged municipalities
Hamina
2003
Hamina – Vehkalahti
Kuopio
2005, Kuopio – Vehmersalmi;
2011, Kuopio – Karttula;
2013
Kuopio – Nilsiä
Seinäjoki
2005,
Seinäjoki – Peräseinäjoki;
2009
Seinäjoki – Nurmo – Ylistaro
Varkaus
2006
Varkaus – Kangaslampi
Vörå*
2007, Vörå – Maksamaa;
2011
Vörå-Maksamaa – Oravainen
Kajaani
2007
Kajaani – Vuolijoki
Äänekoski
2007
Äänekoski – Sumiainen – Suolahti
Hämeenlinna
2009
Hämeenlinna – Hauho – Kalvola –
Lammi – Renko – Tuulos
Jyväskylä
2009
Jyväskylä – Jyväskylä rural municipality –
Korpilahti
Kimitoön*
2009
Kemiö – Dragsfjärd – Västanfjärd
Lappeenranta
2009, Lappeenranta – Joutseno;
2010
Lappeenranta – Ylämaa
Mänttä-Vilppula*
2009
Mänttä – Vilppula
Oulu
2009,
Oulu - Ylikiiminki;
2013
Oulu – Haukipudas – Kiiminki – Oulunsalo –
Yli-Ii
Raseborg*
2009
Karjaa – Pohja – Tammisaari
Salo
2009
Salo – Halikko – Kiikala – Kisko – Kuusjoki –
Muurla – Perniö – Pertteli – Suomusjärvi –
Särkisalo
Pori
2010
Pori – Noormarkku
Haukipudas
2013
see Oulu
Kitee
2013
Kitee – Kesälahti
Vaasa
2013
Vaasa – Vähäkyrö
Of the municipalities participating in the ARTTU programme, four have chosen a
new name for the municipality after the merger. The 2009 merger between Kemiö,
Dragsfjärd and Västanfjärd created a new municipality with the name Kimitoön; a
merger completed in the same year between Karjaa, Pohja and Tammisaari resulted
in the town of Raseborg, and the merger of Mänttä and Vilppula in 2009 created the
town of Mänttä-Vilppula. A merger between Vörå and Maksamaa in 2007 created
the municipality of Vörå-Maksamaa; however, when the municipality of Oravainen
merged with it in 2011, the name Vörå was adopted.
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2.2 Local government co-management areas for
social welfare and health services and for upper
secondary level vocational education
According to section 4(2) of the PARAS framework act, service structures are to be
strengthened by forming larger catchment areas for services for which the population
base provided by individual municipalities is insufficient and by increasing cooperation
between municipalities. Section 5 of the framework act stipulates that a municipality
must be large enough to be capable of managing its service provision. To strengthen
their mutual co-operation, local authorities can establish a co-management area. A
municipality or a co-management area responsible for primary health care and closely
associated social services must have a population of about 20,000 at least. Correspondingly, a municipality or a co-management area authorized to provide vocational basic
education, as laid down in the Vocational Education and Training Act (630/1998), must
have a population of about 50,000 at least. Under the framework act, local authorities
may agree that the functions of the co-management area are performed by one local
authority (host local authority) on behalf of one or more local authorities or that the
functions are performed by a joint municipal authority.
Local government co-management areas for social welfare
and health services
After the entry into force of the PARAS framework act, municipalities actively started
to establish co-management areas for health care and the closely associated social
welfare services. The collaborating municipalities differed widely by location, size,
population and economic structures. Co-management areas have been established on
the one hand by municipalities with small populations and on the other hand by small
municipalities together with municipalities with large populations. In urban regions,
co-management areas have also been established around central urban municipalities.
In such cases, the central urban municipality usually acts as the host municipality. Alternatively, municipalities that surround a central urban municipality have established
a co-management area for social welfare and health care without the central urban
municipality being party to it.
Initially, there were plans for about 60 local government co-management areas
across the country, with 270 municipalities as members (following the 2007 municipal
boundaries). At one point there were plans for as many as 66 co-management areas
with 260 municipalities as members (following the 2009 municipal boundaries). These
figures were recorded in the report on the PARAS reform submitted in November 2009.
In November 2012, there were a total of 54 co-management areas with 210
member municipalities. Of the current co-management areas, 35 or close to two
thirds started operating in 2009 the latest. Of these co-management areas, seven were
based on cooperation started before 2007, five started operating between 2007 and
2008, and 23 in 2009. In addition to these, we can also count as co-management
areas the nine joint municipal authorities for primary health care established before
the PARAS reform, to which social welfare tasks have not yet been transferred or a
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decision on a transfer has not yet been made. They are not automatically counted as
co-management areas as laid down by the PARAS framework act. Figure 5 presents
54 + 9 local government co-management areas.
Provided by municipality
Provided by joint municipal
authority
Provided by host municipality
Map:2011-2012
Statistics
Karttapohja: Tilastokeskus
Finland
2011–2012
9.10.2012
9 Oct 2012
Figure 5. Local government co-management areas for social welfare and health services on
1 January 2012. Source: The Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities.
Of the local government co-management areas that were in operation in late 2012, 33
were managed by a host municipality, and 21 were joint municipal authorities. The
population base of the local government co-management areas varies between 12,500
and 150,000 and the number of member municipalities between two and eight. The
latest figure (2013) for the number of co-management areas is 55 with 199 member
municipalities.
In the course of the PARAS project, co-management areas have been disbanded
as well as established. Of the present co-management areas four are likely to be disbanded and other four start operating in early 2013. Often one of the reasons for
ending cooperation is that one of the member municipalities enters into merger negotiations. Another reason is that the cooperation has not yielded satisfactory results
and municipalities have subsequently transferred social welfare and health services
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back to their own organisations or started negotiations on a co-management area with
new partners. The often short-term nature of the collaboration in the field of social
welfare and health care may be explained by unpredictable results brought about by
organisational restructuring or by the too high expectations for the reform’s economic
and operational effects. Changes that have taken place in central government steering after the launch of the reform also partly explain why some co-management areas
have been disbanded.
Local government co-management areas for social welfare and health
services in municipalities participating in the ARTTU programme
Like other municipalities across Finland, the municipalities participating in the ARTTU
research formed both mergers and co-management areas for social welfare and health
services during the PARAS reform period. In 2008, a total of 14 municipalities provided health services or both social welfare and health services via a co-management
area, whereas 26 municipalities provided these services within their own organisation.
In 2012, the number of municipalities providing social welfare and health services in
collaboration with other municipalities had increased to 18, and the number of municipalities providing the services via their own organisation had decreased to 22. Two
of these municipalities, the towns of Kuopio and Seinäjoki, are also collaborating with
other municipalities in social welfare and health service provision. Finally, it should
be noted that the co-management areas established by municipalities participating
in the ARTTU research have member municipalities that did not participate in the
research programme.
Table 5. Methods of providing social welfare and health services in the municipalities participating in the ARTTU research in 2008 and 2012. (No. of municipalities based on the 2009
municipal boundary divisions, N = 40)
Social welfare and health services Municipality’s own organisation
Collaboration
20082614
20122218
Three local government co-management areas of which municipalities participating
in the ARTTU programme are members – Helli (Kitee), Karviainen (Karkkila) and
Siiliset (Siilinjärvi) – were disbanded at the start of 2013. After a series of events, the
town of Mänttä-Vilppula has decided to withdraw from the co-management agreement and transfer social welfare and health service provision to its own organisation.
Local government co-management areas for vocational education and
training
There are two factors that have driven collaboration in vocational education: first, the
requirement of the PARAS framework act that a municipality or a local government
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co-management area authorized to provide vocational basic education must have a
population of about 50,000 at least; and second, the 2006 project launched by the
Ministry of Education and Culture together with education providers to ensure a sufficient structural and economic basis for vocational education and training.
At the start of the PARAS project in 2007, 15 out of the 23 municipalities and 15
out of the 53 joint municipal authorities providing vocational education and training
did not meet the population requirement laid down by the framework act. By 2010
there were only few municipalities not meeting this requirement, so it seems that the
goal to create a network of vocational education providers has been achieved as planned.
Table 6. Providers of vocational basic education in 2009 and 2012 (No.)
Providers of vocational basic education (No.)
2009
2012
- municipalities
18
11
- joint municipal authorities
46
38
- private 89
87
- the State
1
1
Total154
137
2.3 Intensive renewal of local government
management systems and operating models
A local government management system refers to the organisation and management
of municipal service provision and local community development. In a wide sense, a
management system includes operations that are needed to ensure that local authorities can perform their core tasks: service provision, regional and local development
and promotion of democracy. The words ‘operating model’ or ‘operating method’ are
sometimes used in this context.
The concrete elements that make up a management system are the organisational
structure and organisational units; division of power and responsibilities between elected
officials and local government officers; the roles of the different actors; and management processes. They create the framework for managing the core tasks.
Formation of municipal mergers and local government co-management areas alike
force municipalities to renew their systems of management at least to some degree.
Despite a shortage of detailed information, we can assume that most municipalities
have in some ways revamped their management systems.
A survey carried out in 2011 shows that about two-thirds of the municipalities
participating in the ARTTU research made some changes to their management systems
during the research period. The reforms had been undertaken following a merger (11
municipalities), an establishment of a co-management area (10 municipalities), operative development (10 municipalities) or for some other reason (two municipalities).
The reforms of management systems share some common features. Local authority corporations have assumed a more pivotal role in managing municipal operations.
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Municipal operations have been structured by describing the internal corporation, the
external legal corporation and entities providing municipal services but not belonging
to the local authority corporation. So what structural changes have taken place? On
the one hand, local authority corporations have decentralised their operation by way
of setting up companies for business purposes and by way of corporatisation. On the
other hand, they have also centralised their operation by merging service units within
the local authority corporation.
The purpose has been to fine-tune the management system. Some of the municipalities have adopted a life-course model, and some use process management
applications. The introduction of the purchaser-provider model has brought about
a significant number of changes to the internal operation of municipalities. In some
form or other, this model has been applied by nearly half of the municipalities. In
larger municipalities, the managing of purchases has created a need for a new profession inside the municipal organisation: purchase managers. In smaller municipalities,
service unit managers have been obliged to take responsibility for the purchases, which
has profoundly changed their job profile. Internal operation has changed in character
and become more fragmented: cost awareness, the necessity to acquire calculation
information, competence in pricing, knowledge of legislation and management of
control mechanisms have a pivotal role in management.
Further, municipalities have established new budget units to provide administrative support services for corporate management. Some of the municipalities centralised
services by purchasing all the services from an external unit owned by the municipality
and established for this purpose only. Besides support services, other centralised services
include information management, payroll, and facility and catering services. This has
meant increased collaboration between municipalities.
Compared to corporate restructuring, the reform of the political and administrative systems of management has been more moderate. Some of the changes to the
organisation of service provision are reflected in the organisation of committees, for
example a transition to an organisation following the life-course model (where the
traditional division into political sectors is abolished), introduction of the purchaserprovider model (which highlights the role of elected officials) and the establishment of
local government co-management areas. The role of the steering group becomes more
important in terms of the overall management of the municipality. However, only
some of the larger municipalities have made any substantial changes to their political
and administrative organisation. In many municipalities a merger or the decision to
join a co-management area has not brought about any notable changes to committee
structure or to the division of work between politics and administration. Especially in
merged municipalities the period 2008-2012 can be described as a transition period
over which the organisation of the new municipality was moderately build on the
basis of the merger agreement. The administrative regulations coming into force at the
start of 2013 emphasise the importance of allocating adequate resources for political
administration.
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2.4 Structural reforms have concentrated more on
social welfare and health services and less on
education services
The systems of managing municipal fields of activity have been revamped as part
of the reform of the entire local government management system. It is important,
however, that the reforms are targeted at those operations and service units in which
local residents encounter the municipal organisation and which provide services for
residents. The level of service organisation is crucial for the productivity of operations:
Are services effective? Do they serve the purpose for which they are intended? Is service
provision cost-efficient?
2.4.1 Reform of social welfare and health service provision
and management systems
After executing a merger or joining a co-management area, most municipalities have
been forced to overhaul their methods of service provision and management systems.
Table 7 summarises the changes that the municipalities participating in the ARTTU
research made to their service provision between 2008 and 2012.
The municipalities can be divided into three main groups based on their situation
at the end of 2012. The first group consists of 22 municipalities which provide social
welfare and health services within their own organisation, and includes municipalities
that merged right before or during the PARAS reform period. Three of these municipalities are also members of a local government co-management area for social welfare
and health services.
The second group consists of 16 municipalities which at the start of 2008 were
still providing their social welfare and health services within their own organisation or
which were providing social welfare services within their own organisation and health
services via a joint municipal authority, but which started collaboration with one or
more municipalities during the PARAS reform period. The highest degree of variability
as to the kinds of reforms implemented emerges within this group.
The third group consists of two municipalities with different approaches to service
provision. The municipality of Hollola has been a member of a co-management area
for social welfare and health services for the entire duration of the research period. In
contrast, the town of Kajaani was a member of the Regional Council of Kainuu, which
terminated its operations at the end of 2012 and will be replaced by a joint municipal
authority for Kainuu social welfare and health care.
There is a striking number of alternative ways of reforming the systems of managing social welfare and health services. With the establishment of co-management
areas, most of the basic social security committees or social welfare and health committees have been disbanded. Depending on the system of organising services, political
decision-making has either been transferred to a committee in the host municipality or
to the council or a committee of the joint municipal authority. This has both made the
decision-making structures more complex and distanced municipal decision-making
from that of co-management areas.
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Social welfare and health care integration has made visible progress and improved
the cohesion of these services, but some of the new solutions in the field may also lead
to a separation of the social welfare and health services from other municipal services.
Some municipalities have switched over to a service organisation that follows the
life-course model, and these reforms have also brought about changes to the system
of decision-making.
Despite its complexity, the PARAS reform has improved the structural integration
of municipalities’ own social welfare and health services and service provision. Almost
all of the municipalities participating in the research have integrated social welfare
and health services into similar organisational structures. The towns of Hämeenlinna
and Kuopio and the municipality of Kuusamo are exceptions: they introduced new
models for organising services during the PARAS project, integrating social welfare and
health services into other municipal areas of responsibility. This harmonises the local
government service domain as a whole, but disrupts the integration of social welfare
and health services within the domain.
No substantial changes as yet at the operative level
The Social welfare and health services research module under the ARTTU programme
examined operative level social welfare and health services for older people, services
for children and families, and medical services within primary care. This is the local
government level closest to citizens.
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ACTA
Joint authorityKajaani
Joint authority
Kajaani
A new charter and collaboration
agreement entered
into force on 1 Jan 2013
(excl. municipality of Vaala).
Social and health service Hamina, Haukipudas, Juuka,
Social and health service
Hamina, Haukipudas, Hämeenlinna, Mergers: Kimitoön
production by the municipality Kimitoön, Kirkkonummi, production by the municipality Juuka, Kimitoön, Kirkkonummi,
(2009), Raseborg (2009),
itself
Kotka,Kuopio, Kuusamo, Lapua, itself
Kotka, Kuopio, Kuusamo, Lapua,
Äänekoski (2007).
Lempäälä, Oulu, Pello, Raseborg, Lempäälä, Oulu, Pello, Raseborg,
Sipoo, Sodankylä, Turku, Vaasa, Salo, Sipoo, Seinäjoki, Sodankylä,
Forthcoming mergers 2013:
Varkaus and Äänekoski.
Turku, Vaasa, Varkaus and Äänekoski.Oulu-Haukipudas-Kiiminki
(19 municipalities)
(total of 22 municipalities)
Oulunsalo-Yli-II;
Kuopio and Seinäjoki also collaborateVaasa-Vähäkyrö;
in social and health service provision.Kuopio-Nilsiä.
Social service production by Hämeenlinna, Salo, Seinäjoki
the municipality itself, health
service production by a joint (3 municipalities)
authority for health care
Social and health services Karkkila, Lappeenranta, Musta- Social and health services
Halsua, Harjavalta, Hirvensalmi,
Co-management areas to be
by the municipality itself
saari, Pori, Pudasjärvi, Siilinjärvi, in collaboration
Jyväskylä, Karkkila, Kitee, Lappeen- disbanded as of 2013:
Uurainen.
between municipalities
ranta, Lieto, Mustasaari, Mänttä-
Helli (Kitee), Karviainen (Karkkila)
(7 municipalities)
Vilppula, Pori, Pudasjärvi, Siilinjärvi, and Siiliset (Siilinjärvi).
Uurainen, Vimpeli and Vörå.
Social service production by Halsua, Harjavalta, Hirven-
(total of 16 municipalities)
Mänttä and Vilppula merged in
Jyväskylä, Lappeenranta, Mänttä-
2009, later also members of a
the municipality itself; health salmi*, Jyväskylä, Kitee, Lieto,
Vilppula, Pori and Vörå have been
co-management area (the area
service production by a joint
Mänttä-Vilppula, Vimpeli, Vörå
parties to a merger as well. was disbanded as of 1 Jan 2013.
authority for health care
(9 municipalities)
The merger Kitee-Kesälahti enters
(*outsourced services town
into force on 1 Jan 2013.
of Mikkeli)
Co-management area forHollola
Co-management area forHollola
social welfare and health care
social welfare and health care
2008:Municipalities
2012:Municipalities
Special characteristics
Table 7. Development of social welfare and health service structures during the PARAS project in 2008–2012. (Source: Niiranen, Puustinen, Zitting and
Kinnunen 2012)
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An examination of the location of primary care services in the municipalities participating in the ARTTU programme showed that the decisions related to the local
government and service structure reform did not have much impact on the location
or the number of health centres. Merged municipalities and those collaborating in the
field of social welfare and health care had made changes mainly to the range of services
available in individual health centres.
Services for families with children are undergoing radical changes in terms of
structures, practices and service needs. These changes, too, are related to central government steering, the increasing service needs and, indirectly, to the reform to restructure
municipalities and services. A shift towards larger units of service production may,
however, strengthen specialist skills, which in turn creates a wider competence base
also for child welfare services.
The statistics on the services for older people indicate a development towards lessassisted sheltered housing and towards home care, which is in line with the national
recommendations. In the municipalities participating in the ARTTU programme,
there is an even slightly stronger trend towards sheltered housing with 24-hour assistance than the country’s average. The shift towards less-assisted care is also visible
in the net operating costs.
The PARAS project stimulated wide-ranging discussion on and concern about
the fact that social welfare and health services are being concentrated on large urban
centres. This research suggests that at the start of the PARAS project the municipalities enacted only moderate reforms of the social welfare and health services network.
More fundamental reforms were, and are being, carried out towards the end of the
term of the PARAS framework act and starting from 2013. However, these reforms
are motivated by factors other than the framework act only, mainly by national and
international financial difficulties which manifest differently in different municipalities.
In the first merger years, the merger agreement, protection against termination
of employment and pre-merger investments may make it difficult to downsize or
concentrate the service network in any substantial way. During the PARAS project,
more specifically in 2008-2012, it has been evident that over several years the services
will be concentrating in the central built-up area of new municipalities.
Following the mergers and the establishment of co-management areas, the range
of social welfare and health services has become somewhat wider in small municipalities, and larger units have enabled a harmonisation of the criteria for service eligibility.
This may have promoted the equality of citizens. However, some of the municipalities
that have undergone a merger are downsizing their service network, and concentrating
and cutting some of the services. The concentration of services has had effects that
were visible at the end of 2012 as a reduced range of services in some branch health
centres and as centralisation of some of the social welfare offices in the largest municipal
centres following a merger.
In short, the findings show that the decisions made during the PARAS project that
were partly influenced by the project have had both the expected positive, but also some
negative impacts on the municipal social welfare and health services. In the course of
the project, municipalities had to pay more attention to issues related to social welfare
and health service organisation and especially to how these issues should be addressed
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in the future. The emphasis in the PARAS period was clearly on the reorganisation of
structures, which was the original goal of the framework act.
2.4.2 Education services are determined by demographic
changes, financial situation and value judgements of
municipalities
The key objective of the municipal strategies related to education services has been to
maintain an extensive network of schools at reasonable costs, which has been evident
also at the level of operations. School networks have been reduced moderately, and
there have also been efforts to keep costs in check through administrative reorganisation. Because of their demographic and economic differences, some municipalities
are still under pressure to cut their school network while others face pressure to build
new schools.
The findings show that merged municipalities have reformed and downsized their
school network evenly and in the same way and following the same principles as the
two other groups (cooperation and ‘other municipalities’). Schools will be closed down
if student numbers and student number forecasts drop below a certain level. There
is, indeed, a strong link between local demographic changes and the falling number
of schools. It is noteworthy that the differences in school network changes within the
municipal groups are greater than the differences between the groups.
From a municipal economy perspective, the goal is to retain high-quality education
services, but at affordable costs, whereas service accessibility and quality are priorities
for residents. It is a serious challenge to deliver high-quality, cost-effective services. How
rapidly changes take place in the school network and the quality of education services
not only depends on the financial situation now and in the near future, but also on the
relation of services to each other and to other functions to which municipalities wish
or are able to allocate resources. Ultimately, it is a question of what value judgements
municipalities make and whether they are willing to work together.
School numbers were reduced; accessibility of education services was
not affected
The reduced number of comprehensive schools and upper secondary schools has not
significantly undermined the accessibility of education services. This is partly due to
the fact that student cohorts have become smaller and the network of schools providing basic education has undergone considerable restructuring. The shift from separate
primary and secondary schools towards comprehensive schools reduces the number
of educational units. When examined from a ten-year perspective, merged municipalities do not significantly differ from the other municipalities participating in the
ARTTU research programme. Over the last five years, the relative number of schools
has decreased more in merged municipalities than in the other two groups (municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation and other municipalities). The abolishment
of municipal boundaries has led to a more direct re-evaluation of the school network,
and especially to a reduction of the number of primary schools. Over the past five
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years, however, the accessibility of education services in the merged municipalities has
deteriorated only slightly more than in the other groups.
The availability of education services, that is the number of schools, is primarily
determined by the changes in population structure and numbers in municipalities and
the associated financial development. In other words, the number of schools decreases
at the same rate as the population. The accessibility of education services is strongly
related to the statistical grouping of municipalities and to the size of the municipality.
The home-school distances are longer in small semi-rural municipalities than in large
urban municipalities. Over the past five years, the accessibility of education services,
that is the home-school distances for children and young people, has declined only
slightly more in merged municipalities than in the other groups.
No changes in cost-efficiency of educational services — standard of
services has somewhat improved
The operating costs of basic and upper secondary education have been equal in merged
municipalities, municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation and in the group ‘other
municipalities’. The range of variation within the groups is, however, markedly broad.
The differences in operating costs are primarily linked with the statistical grouping of
municipalities. Over the entire period covered by the survey, costs have been highest
in semi-rural and lowest in urban municipalities. So far, merged municipalities have
not proved to be any more efficient than other municipalities as far as the provision
of services is concerned.
Municipal residents estimate that the quality of education services has somewhat
deteriorated in merged municipalities, while it has slightly improved in the two other
groups (municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation and other municipalities), but
these differences are subtle. The average size of teaching groups has become smaller and
the number of teaching lessons per pupil and student has increased proportionately
in all three PARAS categories.
2.5 Urban regions slowly starting cooperation
The framework act targets especially urban regions with a growing population and
economy. Growing urban regions have problems such as dispersed urban structure and
insufficient cooperation in service provision and in organisation of transport.
Section 7 of the PARAS framework act stipulates that the cities in the Helsinki
Metropolitan Area and the specifically mentioned urban regions should draw up a plan
on how to better reconcile land use, housing and transport and on how to make better
use of services in the region across municipal boundaries. Such a plan was drawn up by
altogether 19 regions. In addition to the cities in the metropolitan area and the 16 other
regions required by law to do so, a plan was also drawn up by the regions of Kouvola
and Länsi-Uusimaa. Besides those under obligation by law, city region municipalities
could involve in the process other municipalities interested in cooperation. A total of
154 municipalities drew up a collaboration plan, of which 54 volunteered to do so.
During the PARAS reform period, city region municipalities made structural
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models to serve as instruments guiding regional land use. These models constitute
a common land use strategy for municipalities. While a structural model does not
legally guide land use planning or building, it conveys the municipalities’ shared vision on the long-term guidelines for land use planning in the urban region concerned.
The structural models can be used as a basis for forthcoming local master plans and
regional plans. Addressing difficult issues while developing a structural model may
facilitate future land use planning processes and help to reach agreement. Structural
models are considered good instruments for strategic planning because they offer a
way to sidestep the heavy bureaucracy associated with the land use planning process.
A number of structural models have been made, and some regions, such as that
of Tampere, are already planning the next structural model with the aim for a stricter
management of urban structure. Still, a structural model has its weaknesses — it is
not legally binding and can be overlooked in municipal decision-making. The steering
effect of structural models is highest when they are used as a foundation for drawing
up general plans — either a regional land use plan or a general plan — without delay.
An agreement on land use, housing and transport further improves the effectiveness
of structural models. Of course, it is possible to go back on an agreement provided
that there will be no sanctions.
The State is also signing letters of intent with the biggest city region municipalities,
particularly on land use, housing and transport. Such letters of intent make the use
of structural models and plans in urban regions more feasible, because they indicate
an agreement to implement structural models and plan projects, and the State’s own
investments are used as incentives for operational cooperation between the region’s
municipalities. The State signed letters of intent concerning land use, housing and
transport with the regions of Helsinki and Turku in summer 2012 and with the
Tampere region in spring 2011. A second letter of intent is already being prepared
with the Tampere region to be signed in early 2013. The city of Oulu is preparing a
letter of intent with a broader content, and it is expected to be signed in early 2013.
The other regions are not planning to use letters of intent; instead, smaller regions
use growth agreements. Such agreements are concluded with the regions of Lahti,
Kuopio, Jyväskylä, Pori, Seinäjoki, Vaasa, Joensuu and Lappeenranta and apparently
with Kouvola, too. In accordance with the Government Programme, the agreements
guide growth, land use, housing, transport and social cohesion — the municipalities
of the region and the State can thus select the development priorities that are best
suited for the region.
The urban regions have also actively organised joint services, engaged in economic cooperation and planned investments for the entire region. Such cooperative
arrangements have become part of the formal organisational structure of some urban
regions. To give an example, the municipalities in the Tampere city region founded a
joint municipal authority for the region, though this took place before the launch of
the PARAS project.
Increased cooperation and mergers between city region municipalities were the
goal of the project, but the progress has been slow. The ARTTU research indicates a
lack of trust between city region municipalities: they have historically competed over
residents, enterprises and jobs and become involved in political chicanery. The disputes
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between businesses mostly concern large retail units, and the regions participating
in the ARTTU research provide several examples of such disputes. Municipalities
competed to varying degrees to attract home builders. The competition over residents
and enterprises underlines the role of land use policy and building permit policy as
competitive assets. Traditionally, the land use policy in central urban municipalities
differs from that of the municipalities surrounding them.
The main conclusion is that the municipality-based approach to strategy work in
urban regions remains unchanged, even though collaboration in economic development, structural plans and other corresponding tools of cooperation may have opened
up new perspectives to regionality. Most urban regions do not, however, have clearly
regional strategic planning in place. While all urban regions have some traditions of
planning cooperation at the level of local government officers, this cooperation has
mainly constituted coordination and information exchange; closer cooperation has been
prevented by a lack of political commitment. Now that the programme is closing, the
municipalities participating in the ARTTU case study are in different situations with
regard to planning. The new municipality created via a large merger in the Jyväskylä
region has naturally put land use issues at the top the planning agenda now that the
local master plan is being drafted based on a previously formulated regional structural
model. Similarly, the new municipality of Oulu has strongly focused on drafting a local
master plan for the area, although there is extensive regional material, too, for example
a common local master plan. The town of Vaasa is starting work on a structural model
for the region. Last spring, the region of Turku completed a structural model, which
was used as a basis for a letter of intent concerning land use, housing and transport.
The Kuopio region also completed a functional structural model for the urban region
in summer 2012.
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Chapter 3. What impacts do local
government reform policies?
The impacts arising from municipal reform should be reflected in various ways on municipal residents who elect their representatives, finance municipal operations and use
services provided by the municipality. The aims of the reform give assurances that the
reform secures balanced services. Does this occur? In addition to services, the reforms
to be implemented should, or at least can, impact on the economic situation of the
municipality. Savings should be achieved. The reform to restructure municipalities and
services can be expected also to impact on the position of personnel as organisational
structures and the tasks of personnel change. Does it have impacts, and if so, what kinds?
Furthermore, structural reform can also impact on gender equality and the opportunities to use one’s own language in dealing with local government. What observations
did the ARTTU research programme highlight with regard to these viewpoints? While
many impacts only arise in the long term, some impacts can be seen more quickly; for
example, in the next elections. This holds, for example, with regard to how municipal
mergers impact on gender equality with regard to positions of trust.
3.1 Impacts on municipal residents’ opinions
The Act on Restructuring Local Government and Services (the PARAS framework
act) stipulates that both the operational preconditions for municipal residents’ selfgovernment and municipal residents’ possibilities to participate and exert influence
are taken into account when restructuring in accordance with the act is implemented.
The ARTTU research programme explores municipal residents from two viewpoints. On the one hand, a municipal resident acts in multifaceted interaction with the
municipal organisation, not only as a voter and a taxpayer but also as a service-user and
a client. On the other hand, the municipal resident is part of the local environment,
i.e. the operating environment in which the municipal resident typically lives his or her
everyday life: goes to work, uses public and private services, and engages in hobbies.
The municipal resident’s viewpoint was surveyed in the ARTTU research municipalities through extensive questionnaires targeted at municipal residents that
were conducted in 2008 and 2011. The questionnaires explored municipal residents’
opinions at the early stages of the PARAS reform in autumn 2008, before numerous
municipal mergers and local government co-management areas had been established;
and in autumn 2011, after many reforms had been implemented. About 13,000 people responded to the questionnaire in 2008 and more than 11,000 people in 2011.
The issues determined on the basis of the questionnaires included how municipal
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residents assess their own municipality’s management of services and the accessibility
of services, the functioning of municipal decision-making, municipal mergers, their
own possibilities to participate and exert influence, and the sense of belonging with
regard to one’s own municipality and other regional bodies. The questionnaires enable
the comparison of opinions over time and provide information on how any reforms
implemented in municipalities have affected municipal residents’ opinions.
Only minor changes in municipal residents’ satisfaction with services and
their assessments of accessibility
According to the results obtained in autumn 2011, municipal residents considered
municipal services across the board to be important and well managed, and felt that
the accessibility of municipal services is at least fair. In general, the situation remained
very stable since the autumn of 2008: the proportion of those satisfied with social welfare, health, education and technical services declined slightly while the proportion of
those satisfied with cultural activities increased. It must be noted, however, that results
presented at the general level in places mask wide variations in opinion both between
different services as well as in municipalities differing by type and size.
Scrutiny of the research municipalities, in line with the PARAS means for local
government reform, reveals that satisfaction with services in 2011 was the greatest in
municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation and the lowest in merged municipalities. Scrutiny of the change over the period 2008–2011 shows that satisfaction had
decreased in merged municipalities but increased in the group ‘other municipalities’
and had also increased slightly in municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation.
Intramunicipal differences in satisfaction with services can be seen in merged municipalities where the amalgamation had taken place in 2009 or later. Those living in the
centre of the municipality are generally more satisfied than municipal residents living
in the peripheral areas of the municipality that had formerly been independent (and
typically small) municipalities.
Examination by municipal size, in turn, reveals that satisfaction with services is the
highest among municipal residents in municipalities with 10,001–20,000 inhabitants
and in those with less than 5,000 inhabitants. Satisfaction is the lowest in municipalities with 5,001–10,000 inhabitants, where satisfaction with services declined more
than in municipalities of other size categories. Satisfaction also declined slightly in the
largest cities. In contrast, satisfaction among municipal residents in municipalities with
10,001–100,000 inhabitants has been increasing slightly since 2008.
Scrutiny according to statistical grouping of municipalities indicates that municipal
residents living in semi-urban municipalities are slightly more satisfied with municipal
services than those living in urban and rural municipalities. Satisfaction has fallen in
rural municipalities, risen a bit in urban municipalities and remained unchanged in
semi-urban municipalities.
Municipal residents’ assessments of the accessibility of services go strongly hand
in hand with the assessments of satisfaction, as do the variations according to the
categories for the PARAS means for local government reform, municipal size, and the
statistical grouping of municipalities. Thus, the accessibility of services is experienced
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as a little better in municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation, and in semi-urban
municipalities in the size category of 10,001–20,000 inhabitants. The differences in
assessments between municipal groups, however, are smaller for accessibility than for
satisfaction.
At municipal level, the factors affecting overall service satisfaction are in particular
the unemployment rate, the dependency ratio and the total amount of loan. Satisfaction with services is the greater the lower the unemployment rate and the dependency
ratio, and the smaller the municipality’s total amount of loan per capita are. In other
words, the more stable the municipality’s situation is, the more satisfied municipal
residents are with services.
Aside from the level of care and accessibility experienced by municipal residents,
satisfaction seems to be affected also by municipal residents’ requirement standard. The
standard is usually higher in larger municipalities, while people in smaller municipalities may also be satisfied with a lower standard of services.
Extreme differences between municipalities have increased a bit since autumn
2008, but in a positive direction. In some municipalities, residents’ satisfaction with
services changed a lot during the years 2008–2011, and the changes were both negative
and positive. Although the development that has occurred in municipalities is in part
negative, at least when examined for the period 2008–2011, the reform to restructure
municipalities and services does not seem to have significantly affected residents’ attitude towards municipal services in municipalities where the structure and services
have undergone reform.
Confidence in decision-making weakened in large, urban merged
municipalities
According to the confidence index measuring municipal residents’ attitude towards
decision-making in their municipality, municipal residents had more of a critical attitude than a confident attitude at both measurement times. Municipal residents in
municipalities with under 5,000 inhabitants and with 10,001–20,000 inhabitants had
the most confidence in decision-making in their municipality, while those in municipalities with over 50,000 inhabitants were the most critical. Confidence rose the most
clearly among municipal residents in municipalities with 10,001–20,000 inhabitants,
while the confidence of municipal residents in municipalities with 50,001–100,000
inhabitants, and in municipalities with 5,001–10,000 inhabitants, decreased slightly.
Scrutinised by ARTTU categories, municipal decision-making was viewed the least
critically in municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation and the most critically in
merged municipalities. Criticality decreased both in the group ‘other municipalities’
and in municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation, while distrust increased in
merged municipalities during the years 2008–2011.
Municipality-specific scrutiny reveals that the extreme variations in confidence
index between municipalities are great, as are the changes from the year 2008 to the
year 2011. Although in the vast majority of municipalities, municipal residents continue to have a distrustful attitude towards municipal decision-making, in the majority
of the ARTTU municipalities the change measured by the confidence index tended,
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however, to be positive rather than negative. Merged municipalities accounted for
almost all of the negative change observed for municipalities. On the other hand, the
municipalities that received a positive confidence index, and a confidence index that
improved over time, included especially the municipalities bordering on urban regions.
The attitude towards municipal mergers became more negative during
the PARAS reform
Municipal residents’ belief in the overall necessity of municipal mergers clearly weakened from the year 2008 to the year 2011. Whereas in 2008 municipal mergers clearly
divided opinions, in 2011, the share with a negative attitude towards municipal mergers rose to 50 per cent of the respondents. Only just over a quarter were in favour of
combining municipalities into larger units by merging municipalities.
A merger involving one’s own municipality raises significantly more opposition
than acceptance. The proportion in favour of a merger involving their own municipality fell from one out of three in 2008 to one out of five in 2011; at the same time,
the proportion opposing the merger rose to 60 per cent. Negativity with regard to
municipal mergers increased most strongly in municipalities where a municipal merger
took place at the start of 2009. High proportions of opposition to a merger involving
their municipality were also detected, among others, in municipalities bordering on
urban regions.
Opposition to the merger of one municipality with another was the highest in the
smallest municipalities with less than 5,000 inhabitants (71%) and the lowest in the
largest municipalities with more than 100,000 inhabitants (53%). A negative attitude
towards municipal mergers increased significantly in all size categories of municipalities, but most clearly in the smallest municipalities with less than 5,000 inhabitants.
Municipal residents’ belief in the possibility to exert direct influence
weakened
Alongside the traditional participation in elections, there are increasingly more, other
complementary channels for exerting influence between elections. All in all, eight out
of ten municipal residents had used at least one means of participation or exerting
influence. Their use, however, decreased from that in 2008. This use was the greatest
in the smallest municipalities with less than 5,000 inhabitants – in this group, the
use of means of exerting influence increased from that in 2008. The use of means of
exerting influence was the lowest in the largest municipalities with more than 100,000
inhabitants. In these municipalities, their use decreased.
Less than half of the municipal residents had more of a positive than a critical attitude towards the effectiveness of means of participation. Belief in their effectiveness
declined from that in 2008. Belief in one’s own possibilities to exert influence was the
greatest in the smallest municipalities with less than 5,000 inhabitants and the least in
the largest municipalities with more than 100,000 inhabitants. Belief in the effectiveness
of means of participation strengthened significantly in municipalities with less than
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ants, as well in the group of municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation and other
municipalities. On the other hand, belief in the effectiveness of means of participation
weakened in merged municipalities, in urban and semi-urban municipalities with
5,001–10,000 inhabitants, and in municipalities with more than 20,000 inhabitants.
Identification with one’s own municipality weakened in merged
municipalities
Municipal residents’ identification with their own municipality in general remained
relatively stable over the period 2008–2011. Among the categories of the PARAS means
for local government reform, in the year 2011 greater identification was observed for
the municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation than for other municipalities,
and the least identification in the merged municipalities. In merged municipalities,
identification weakened during the period examined, whereas in the other groups it
became stronger.
Scrutiny by municipal size categories reveals that identification with the municipality in 2011 was the greatest in municipalities with less than 5,000 inhabitants,
but also higher than others in municipalities with 10,001–20,000 inhabitants and
over 100,000 inhabitants. Identification strengthened clearly the most in the smallest
municipalities with fewer than 5,000 inhabitants, while the greatest decline occurred
in municipalities with 50,001–100,000 inhabitants.
Readiness among municipal residents to raise the local income tax, but
increased effectiveness also desired
More than half of the municipal residents (51%) were of the opinion that it is better
to raise the local income tax than to cut back municipal services. The proportion who
held this opinion remained unchanged from that in 2008, but it increased from that
in the years 2000 and 2004. On the other hand, however, the majority of municipal
residents are also of the opinion that municipal services can be made more effective,
leading to a consequent lowering of the local income tax.
Municipal residents still consider it important to maintain municipal service
production. The features of municipal services they appreciate are proximity, flexibility, versatility and quality. Residents seem to continue to want to affect services and
consider it important to have freedom of choice between different service providers,
for example by means of service vouchers and the use of services produced by neighbouring municipalities.
3.2 Impacts on voting behaviour and election results
Promotion of democracy is an argument used both for and against local government
reforms. In public discussion, municipal mergers are often opposed with the argument
that the municipalities surrounding central urban municipalities lose their influence
because their representation on the new council is not strong enough. Those in favour
of mergers emphasise the need to downsize municipal cooperation networks, because
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the decision-making is seen to rest with joint municipal authorities and other collaborative bodies instead of municipalities.
The 2008 and 2012 local elections were held in the PARAS reform period. Several
municipal mergers were implemented at the start of 2009, which means that representatives for the councils of the merged municipalities were elected in the 2008 elections.
The results of the 2012 autumn elections reflect the impact of municipal mergers on
democracy. The key issues of interest include how municipal mergers have affected voter
turnout, the nomination of candidates, turnover of municipal councillors, changes in
support for political parties and in power relations, as well as the realisation of regional
representation, in the municipal elections of 2008 and 2012. The effects of municipal
mergers are examined on the one hand by comparing merged municipalities to other
municipalities and on the other hand by comparing the central urban municipalities
and the peripheral areas of merged municipalities with each other.
A municipal merger increases competition for council seats
More than half of the municipalities merging at the turn of municipal council terms,
i.e. at the beginning of 2009 and 2013, took advantage of the opportunity afforded by
the Act on municipal boundary divisions to elect more councillors for the transition
period than their population would require. After the terms following the 2008 and
2012 elections, the total number of council seats in merged municipalities shrank to
almost half of the previous figure. Although the number of candidates in municipalities undergoing mergers has decreased compared to the situation before the merger,
the drop was well below the reduction in council seats. The decline in the number of
candidates was clearly greater in the peripheral areas of merged municipalities than in
the central urban municipalities.
Voter turnout trends went in different directions in the merged
municipalities
Voter turnout in the municipal elections of October 2008 increased by 2.7 percentage points when compared against that for the elections four years before. Following
changes in voter turnout over a longer period reveals that after the radical drop that
occurred in the 1990s, a gradual increase began in the 2004 municipal elections, when
the restructuring of municipalities and services (the PARAS reform) was still only on
the drawing board.
Inspection by municipal groups shows that an increase in the 2008 elections was
recorded in both merged municipalities and other municipalities; in merged municipalities, however, the increase was one percentage point more than in the others. In
municipalities that merged at the beginning of 2009, there was no difference between
the centres and peripheral areas; instead, voter turnout in both rose equally. The increase was slightly stronger in merged municipalities where the merger took place in
2006–2007, and the turnout of voters in the peripheral areas of these mergers rose
slightly more than that for the largest municipality of the merger.
The direction of the trend changed in the elections of 2012. Voter turnout dropped
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on the national level by 2.9 percentage points from the previous elections. The decline
took place across the board, in all types of municipalities. In contrast to four years
earlier, the decrease was now more pronounced in merged municipalities than in other
municipalities. The decline in voter turnout in the new merged municipalities was
roughly the same in central urban municipalities and in peripheral areas. In 2012,
voter turnout in the peripheral areas of municipalities that had merged earlier, in
2007–2009, decreased by just over one percentage point more than that in the central
urban municipalities. In the case of merged municipalities, this is not a question of
a collapse in turnout, but rather a gradation when compared against municipalities
that continued as before.
Inspection of the level of voter turnout instead of the change reveals that turnout
is still somewhat higher in peripheral areas than in central urban municipalities. However, this is largely a question of the traditional differences in voter turnout associated
with municipal size – people in small municipalities vote more actively than people
in the large urban centres.
Changes in support for political parties greater in the peripheral
areas of merged municipalities
The shifts in party support were quite considerable in both the 2008 and the 2012
elections. In some municipalities the changes in support for political parties were very
slight, while in others the shifts were substantial. Greater than average municipalityspecific changes had their own local characteristics in both 2008 and 2012, nor do
they have any one common denominator. In individual cases, there are indications
that major changes in party support are associated with merger-related conflicts within
the municipality.
The overall change in the distribution of votes for political parties in the 2008
elections remained a little lower in merged municipalities than the corresponding figure
for the whole country. The changes in the peripheral areas of merged municipalities,
however, were greater than in the central urban municipalities. Unlike in the 2008
elections, in the 2012 elections the changes in support for political parties were slightly
greater in merged municipalities than in other municipalities. The direction of the
difference between central urban municipalities and peripheral areas, however, stayed
the same as before: the shifts in support were more substantial in peripheral areas.
For their size, most small parties to mergers fared well in the elections
The realisation of regional representation has been investigated on the basis of register
materials in merged municipalities where the merger took place at the turn of the
municipal council term, i.e. at the beginning of 2009 or 2013.
Municipal mergers are often accompanied by the apprehension that as far as
decision-making is concerned, small areas party to the merger will be overshadowed
by the central urban municipality. All of the 99 municipalities involved in municipal
mergers that took place at the beginning of 2009 gained representation on the new
municipal council even though the smallest peripheral areas were municipalities with
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only a few hundred inhabitants. Nor did any municipality involved in a merger that
would come into force in 2013 remain without representation in the 2012 elections.
In the case of most of the central urban municipalities, proportionally fewer
councillors were elected from the central urban municipalities in both election years
than the share of voters living there would have required. Correspondingly, a large
majority of the smaller parties to municipal mergers are overrepresented in the new
municipal councils – the share of councillors living in them is greater than the area’s
share of eligible voters out of the entire electorate in the municipality. The municipalities in peripheral areas that have remained underrepresented are, with a few exceptions,
underrepresented for reasons of electoral mathematics: the share of council seats for
candidates from these municipalities is smaller than the proportion of votes received
by these candidates.
The potential of candidates from peripheral areas to succeed is increased, in part,
by the higher than average voter turnout: in smaller municipalities – which are usually
those in the peripheral areas – voter turnout is generally greater than in the larger centres.
Voting across former municipal boundaries variable in merged
municipalities
Materials for the municipal elections of 2008 and 2012 show that support for candidates in merging municipalities does not always follow the old municipal boundaries.
When municipal mergers taking place at the turn of council terms are examined
along the lines of the municipal boundaries still in place at the time of the elections,
it is seen that, in both the 2008 and 2012 elections, the share of residents in merging
municipalities who voted for candidates from their own municipality was 60 per cent
at its lowest and well over 90 per cent at its highest.
In both election years, the share of residents voting for candidates from their own
municipality was generally higher in the central urban municipalities than in the areas
of the smaller parties to the merger. Voters from smaller municipalities thus, relatively
speaking, cast their vote for a candidate from the central urban municipality more often
than voters from the central urban municipality cast their vote for a candidate from
a peripheral municipality. In this regard, however, the differences between peripheral
municipalities are great.
The voting behaviour in merged municipalities appears to be linked to the number
of merging municipalities: voting across municipal boundaries is more common in
case of multi-municipal mergers than in mergers of two municipalities.
Regional bodies and quotas compensate for lack of representatives in
peripheral areas
Even if peripheral areas were represented on the new municipality’s council, the fact
remains that the smaller the municipality is, the lesser is its influence. Many merged
municipalities make the voice of peripheral areas better heard by either establishing
regional bodies or by setting a quota on the number of local executive and/or committee members for the representatives of peripheral areas.
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In 2007–2013, less than half of the merged municipalities had recorded a regional body in the merger agreement – a regional committee, a management board, a
commission, an advisory committee or the like. The duties and division of powers of
regional bodies vary from one merged municipality to the next.
About two-thirds of the merging municipalities have safeguarded in their merger
agreements the representation of peripheral areas in the municipality’s elective bodies,
but there is variation in the wording and in how binding it is. Some agreements refer
vaguely to regional representation while others lay down specific numbers for regional
quotas in local executives and/or committees. In some of the merged municipalities,
considerably larger quotas have been set for the representation of smaller municipalities in municipal elected bodies than their size would require.
Experience is an asset in the competition for council seats in merged
municipalities
A municipal merger increases competition for the reduced number of council seats.
Generally speaking, experienced councillors have an advantage over new candidates in
elections, but when the number of council seats decreases, the new municipal council
does not have enough seats for all sitting councillors, not even in theory. That is way
many current councillors voluntarily do not seek re-election.
In both the 2008 and the 2012 elections, about three out of ten councillors did
not seek re-election. Merged municipalities, especially their peripheral areas, had a
significantly higher turnover: only slightly more than half of councillors stood for
election to the new municipal council. In contrast, fewer councillors stepped down in
the centres of merged municipalities than in all municipalities on average.
In the 2008 elections, 27 per cent of the candidates standing for election were
left without a council seat. In 2012, the corresponding figure was 30 per cent. In both
years, the share of councillors failing to win re-election in merged municipalities, and
particularly in the peripheral areas of merged municipalities, was clearly higher than
in other municipalities. In 2008, nearly 60 per cent of councillors from peripheral
areas in merged municipalities who stood for re-election failed to win a council seat. In
2012, the corresponding proportion for the peripheral areas of municipalities merging
on 1 January 2013 was even higher, around 70 per cent.
In both 2008 and 2012, more than 40 per cent of the councillors elected were
new. The share of new councillors was clearly less in merged municipalities. Especially
in the peripheral areas of merged municipalities, it is difficult to win a seat on the
municipal council without being a councillor: only about one in four of those elected
were new councillors.
Municipal decision-making has been little affected
Like most political institutions, local government decision-making is well-established
and stable in nature. Danish researchers Rikke Berg and Ulrik Kjær describe municipal
politics as circulation of political capital. Local government decision-makers have ‘seed
capital’ which refers to voter trust gained in the elections, former experience and per-
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sonal characteristics. In everyday local politics, decision-makers invest this seed capital
into political acts and alliances with other actors. The returns on these investments
increase the seed capital of politicians.
In principle, a municipal merger or some other major structural change could
disrupt the circulation of political capital in municipalities. A survey of close to 1,500
local government officers and elected officials conducted in autumn 2010 showed,
however, that changes in external structures mobilise conservative forces. In the 2008
elections, the number of experienced councillors elected to councils was greater in
the merged than in the other municipalities. The organisations of merged municipalities are balancing between the old and the new. The rules governing the reform
to restructure municipalities and services have been formulated so that the decisionmakers can stay within their comfort zone in making decisions on the future of the
municipality. Unlike the rules governing the local government reform in Denmark,
the Finnish rules do not disrupt the ways that local government policies operate. If
local decision-makers and residents find the idea of a merger unappealing, the reform
provides municipalities with the option of forging collaboration with other municipalities. In some of the municipalities pursuing deepening cooperation, opposition of
mergers seems to be something that increases the political capital of elected officials
in management positions.
To simplify matters a little, the results of the autumn 2010 survey on decisionmakers can be summarised as follows:

The opinions of local government elected officials have changed surprisingly
little since 1995 (corresponding surveys of 1995, 1999 and 2003 used as
comparative material).
The reform to restructure municipalities and services and the options it offers
to municipalities has had a surprisingly small impact on the opinions and
action of local government elected officials. The differences detected in their
opinions can mostly be explained by reasons other than the municipality’s
decision to merge or start cooperation with other municipalities. However,
the survey does indicate that the political systems of large and small municipalities are very different. As a municipality increases in size, especially the
traditional system of volunteer-based elected offices is placed under pressure.
Time spent on positions of trust increased
In the 2000s, there has been a considerable increase in the time spent by elected representatives on their tasks. The need to devote more time on council work is probably
due both to external pressures to change (the PARAS reform) and to a shift in power
balance between politics and administration. In 2010, councillors and committee
members spent on average over two hours more per week on their tasks than in 2003.
The demands on the time of local executive members increased by as much as four
hours per week, from nine to thirteen hours. In the municipalities with more than
20,000 inhabitants, a membership of the local executive corresponds timewise to a
part-time job, taking up 14 to 17 hours per week.
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A slow shift in power balance between politics and administration
Elected officials estimate that their opportunities for influencing the municipality’s affairs have been increasing since 1995. While local government officers continue to assess
their influence more positively than elected officials, the estimations have remained
almost unchanged over the entire research period. Generally speaking, the power relations between elected officials and local government officers have thus equalised over
the past 15 years, while the role of local executive as the centre of political leadership
has become stronger.
Controversial opinions on municipal cooperation
The findings of the survey on decision-makers show that cooperation between municipalities is fraught with controversy. The majority of respondents (56%) favour
increased cooperation instead of mergers. While local government co-management
areas have been generally criticised for their organisational complexity, those who make
decisions concerning the area find the decision-making on social and health politics
less complex compared with the decision-makers in other municipalities. At a general
level the survey results do not confirm the view that a municipality’s membership in a
co-management area would weaken the influence of political decision-makers. Looking
at it another way, only 11 per cent of elected officials feel that they can influence the
work of joint municipal authorities and only 19 per cent of them estimate that they
can contribute to regional affairs. For this reason intermunicipal cooperation is one
of the challenges of local government decision-making.
3.3 Impacts on economy
The pivotal justification for the PARAS reform has been that the need for services, and
the spending entailed, will rise more quickly than revenue, and this trend will lead to
imbalance of the municipal economy. Resolution of the situation calls for “savings”. In
reality, reform in local government structures does not strive to achieve savings in the
textbook sense of the word, as the intention is not for municipalities to collect money
on their accounts. When speaking of “savings”, the issue is about other measures.
Economic balance by curbing the rise in spending
In the long term, municipal revenue and spending must be in balance. When spending by municipalities tends to rise faster than revenue, “savings” first and foremost is a
question of curbing the rise in spending and adjusting spending to disposable revenue.
The rise in spending can be checked or even reduced by cutting the services underlying
spending or by improving the results of activities, i.e. productivity (economy, costeffectiveness) and effectiveness. The central idea of the PARAS reform was not to cut
services and spending, but to improve results (productivity) “by widening the shoulders”; that is, by forming municipal mergers and local government co-management
areas. Application of the PARAS means for local government reform, larger municipal
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size and local government co-management areas thus should lead to securing a balanced
local government economy by curbing spending and/or increasing revenue. A balanced
local government economy in the end is reflected in the municipality’s financial status.
The economy module of the ARTTU research programme has focused especially
on determining the trend of economic balance, curbing the rise in spending, and on
the development of municipal revenue in merged municipalities and ARTTU municipalities that are member of local government co-management areas. In an effort
to get an idea of these, the economic trend for the period of the PARAS reform, i.e.
2007–2011, was compared to that for the period preceding the PARAS reform, i.e.
2000–2006, in order to determine whether there were differences. Effort was also
made to determine whether the merged municipalities, the municipalities pursuing
cooperation and the group ‘other municipalities’ differed as to the economic impacts
of the PARAS reform.
Municipal mergers have reduced the number of municipalities in deficit
One observation is that the number of research municipalities in deficit decreased
clearly in the 2000s. In 2000 a total of 77 municipalities made up the background of
the 40 municipalities studied in the ARTTU research programme, out of which 39
were municipalities in deficit. The municipal mergers implemented in 2003–2009
reduced the number of municipalities in deficit by 21, as municipalities in deficit
were merged with municipalities showing a surplus. In addition to the merging of
municipalities, some municipalities in deficit also became municipalities showing a
surplus subsequent to positive annual results. In 2011, a total of 12 of the original
municipalities of the ARTTU research programme were in deficit.
The study also showed that the surplus accumulated in merged municipalities
in 2006 was greater than that in other municipal groups, i.e. municipalities pursuing cooperation and the group ‘other municipalities’. But the surpluses accumulated
in the merged municipalities during the PARAS reform period were smaller than in
previous years. In the municipalities pursuing cooperation and in the group ‘other
municipalities’, the growth in surpluses during the PARAS reform period was greater
than before the PARAS reform.
No evidence yet of curbing the rise in spending
Has the PARAS reform helped municipalities to curb the rise in spending? The rise
in spending in the ARTTU municipalities during the PARAS reform period, i.e. in
2007–2011, was greater than that for the years preceding the PARAS reform, i.e.
2000–2006. This applies in particular to merged municipalities. This is explained at
least in part by the fact that a municipal merger and the associated changes in operating
procedures, and their consolidation, led to fusion costs in the initial years. Such costs
included the harmonisation of salaries, the harmonisation of service standards, rises in
managers’ salaries, consolidation of information systems, as well as the termination of
local government co-management agreements and the conclusion of new ones. Some
of these increases were realised prior to the year of the merger, when negotiations
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about the merger were started. Some of the fusion costs are permanent while others
will fall away over time.
Local government investments during the PARAS reform period increased more
than during the period preceding the PARAS reform. The largest increase in investment spending occurred in merged municipalities where investments peaked in 2008.
Some of the municipalities participating in mergers made last-minute investments
before the year of the merger. These have brought additional costs to the newly formed
municipalities.
The recession slowed down the growth in revenue
Has the PARAS reform promoted the growth of municipal revenue? A municipality may obtain additional revenue from increased economic activity, i.e. through an
increase in taxable income or in the share of corporation tax, or by raising its tax rate
and service fees. In municipalities, revenue has increased during the PARAS reform
period more slowly than spending. In merged municipalities, tax funding (tax revenue
+ central government transfers to local government) during the PARAS reform period,
calculated per capita (euros per inhabitant), has been slightly less than in municipalities pursuing cooperation and in the group ‘other municipalities’. The difference is
explained by smaller central government transfers to local government received by
merged municipalities.
With respect to tax revenue, the municipal income tax is crucial. A significant
part of the increase in municipal tax derives from growth in taxable income (78%).
The effect of increases in tax rates has been much smaller, just over a fifth (22%). The
differences between municipal groups with respect to growth in taxable income, and
the effects of an increase in the tax rate, remained rather slight.
During the 2000s, central government transfers to local government increased
more than tax revenue. In other words, the focal point of tax funding has gradually
shifted in the direction of central government transfers. The change was greater before
the PARAS reform period than during it. This has been influenced by the reduction in
municipalities’ share of corporation tax that occurred before the PARAS reform period
and more generally by the compensation, paid through central government transfers
to local government, for the increases in tax deductions received by taxpayers, which
meant losses in tax revenue to municipalities.
The amount of loan has increased ever more rapidly
Because of the developments that have occurred, where the growth in spending during the PARAS reform period has outstripped the increase in revenue, municipalities
have had to resort to loan funding. At the end of 2006, the total amount of loan per
capita in the research municipalities was 1,461 euros, while at the end of 2011 it was
2,061 euros (an increase of 600 euros per inhabitant). The increase in the total amount
of loan during the PARAS reform period (2007–2011) was clearly faster than before
the reform. During the PARAS reform period, the amount of loan increased more in
merged municipalities than in the other municipal groups (municipalities pursuing
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cooperation, the group ‘other municipalities’) – or 730 euros per capita.
In summary, it can be said that the number of municipalities in deficit has fallen
as a result of municipal mergers, but also as a result of municipalities’ own measures.
On the other hand, there are no signs that spending has been checked, which is understandable because fusion costs are incurred in the formation of mergers and local
government co-management areas. Some of these costs will gradually disappear. Nor
can any strengthening of the growth in revenue be detected; instead, municipal revenue
has increased more slowly than spending. In consequence, the amount of loan has
increased in municipalities during the PARAS reform period.
In the context of these observations there is reason to emphasise that most of the
municipal mergers and local government co-management areas studied were formed
at the beginning of 2009, so the economic impacts are for only three years. There are
grounds for assuming that the real economic impacts will be seen over a longer period
of time, and that the economic impacts are influenced by many factors other than the
municipal merger or local government co-management area itself. An example of this
is the change in economic structure that took place in the Town of Salo in 2010–2012.
Municipalities’ baseline situations differed
Scrutiny of the economic impacts should also take into account the differences in the
municipalities’ baseline situation. It seems that many of the municipalities party to
municipal mergers actively developed their operations even before the PARAS reform.
They may therefore have less development potential than the other groups. In the
long term, the achievement of benefits is a question not only of the effects of external
factors but, in the end, it is also a question of how the management of merged municipalities and local government co-management areas is able to take development
potential into use.
3.4 Impacts on local government personnel
Personnel are the core resource of municipalities in the provision of welfare services.
The reform to restructure municipalities and services affects local government personnel in many ways as their duties and work environment may undergo considerable
changes as a result of mergers and creation of local government co-management areas.
Municipalities have other ongoing projects as well. There are productivity projects,
for example, which aim at increasing efficiency and limiting the growing number of
personnel. Other projects promote mandatory staff levels to ensure the quality of
services. From the personnel perspective, an important characteristic common to the
local government reform, municipal mergers and local government co-management
areas is the five-year protection against termination of employment. At the same time
a considerable number of local government personnel are retiring.
The personnel module of the ARTTU research programme examined work organisations to see how the personnel experienced their work and the way it is developing.
The main emphasis was on how the personnel experience the quality of work life. In
addition, changes in the number of personnel and personnel policy dimensions of the
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local government reform were examined. To this end, information was sought from
the statistics and from municipal strategy documentation and reports on operations.
Reports on personnel show that in most of the municipalities the total number
of personnel increased slightly. However, no systematic differences could be detected
between the different types of municipalities, so in this sense the PARAS project has
not substantially affected personnel numbers. Of course, some of the personnel have
been transferred to the employment of local government co-management areas or
companies, but as general rule, there have been relatively few personnel transfers. At
local government level, demographic changes have a greater impact on personnel than
the PARAS reform has.
Reports on municipal personnel show that the old-age retirement rate is accelerating in municipalities at the same time that the average age of personnel has risen.
However, the number of pension decisions issued on the basis of incapacity for work
has started to decline.
No substantial changes in the quality of work life
The quality of work life was measured in 2009 and 2011 through five sub-dimensions:
sense of reward from work, opportunities for exerting influence, social functionality
of work organisation, work of superiors and transparent means of managing conflicts.
Longitudinal studies suggest that the quality of work life is a quite permanent
feature that changes slowly. Neither did this study detect any great variation in the
level of quality, or systematic differences between municipalities differing by type and
size. The protection against termination of employment guaranteed by the PARAS
framework act has probably evened out the quality of work life and accumulated
know-how by way of creating permanence, if only temporarily, in local government
organisations. It can, however, be anticipated that when this protection ends (and if
it is not continued), personnel may locally experience a temporary deterioration of
their work life quality. Looking at it another way, the protection against termination
of employment has also led municipalities to more consciously utilise natural wastage.
The overall improvement of work life quality and most of its sub-dimensions reflect improved and more strategic human resource management in municipalities. The
exact impact of the PARAS project cannot be directly inferred, but the average work
life quality in the municipalities that had undergone restructuring, i.e. were party to a
merger or a member of a local government co-management area, improved slightly in
2009-2011 whereas the other municipalities saw slight deterioration. Improvements
were experienced especially in the work of superiors and in the organisation’s social
functionality.
The quality of work life varies between fields of activity
As mentioned earlier, longitudinal studies suggest that the hierarchy of the different
dimensions of work life quality have remained relatively unchanged. What is more, the
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differences between service functions are clear and quite permanent. Personnel working
with children expressed most satisfaction with the quality of their work life, whereas
personnel in general administration and health centres expressed the least satisfaction
with their work life quality. In 2011, the disparities between functions decreased
somewhat and the ratings of especially health services and services for older people
improved. Nevertheless, the basic hierarchy of the functions remained unchanged.
While the average changes may seem small, they may hide very strong experiences
of a changing nature of work. On the one hand, the extensive publicity and media
coverage that has been given to the services for older people has most likely provided
fresh impetus to improve the circumstances. On the other hand, in some cases municipal mergers and collaboration between municipalities have created friction in work
organisations and ambiguity in the role of superiors. These aspects do not, however,
stand out in the overall assessment of work life quality.
Even though it is difficult to assess the impact of the PARAS reform on personnel
on the basis of individual indicators, we can say that a strategic approach to personnel
has become more prominent in municipal human resource management. This new
approach is evident not only in the work of superiors but also in personnel reports
and municipal and human resource strategies. Despite of the financial goals set for the
reform, a simultaneous improvement of productivity and work life quality in municipalities continues to be a challenge. Rather, municipalities have typically invested in
the training of superiors and promoted work life quality with projects and measures
not related to the PARAS reform.
3.5 Impacts on linguistic equality
Municipalities form the basic units for linguistic division. Thus the implementation of linguistic rights has traditionally been strongly bound with the principle of
organisationally and functionally uniform municipalities. The PARAS reform has
not changed this basic arrangement. Moreover, it cannot be shown that the reform
would have had any direct effects on the implementation of linguistic equality. Thus,
from the linguistic point of view, the effects of the reform are indirect. Since reform
of municipal structures always leads to operational changes, the PARAS reform, too,
has in part had considerable effects on linguistic minorities.
From the demographic point of view, bilingual areas differ from the situation of
the whole country especially with regard to economic structure, migration and the
dependency ratio. The same factors have given rise to great differences between bilingual
municipalities. The main problem is that according to forecasts, these differences will
increase in the future. While most of the factors are unfavourable, especially for the
smallest municipalities, the economic structure and the dependency ratio are more
central factors than the size of the municipality as such. In terms of levelling differences, measures promoting the attractiveness of municipalities from the viewpoint of
labour and enterprise are central in bilingual areas, especially in many municipalities
with a Swedish-speaking majority.
The trend in municipal economy in bilingual areas has in the main followed
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that for the whole country. However, compared to all municipalities, their economic
situation has been somewhat weaker. Polarisation has occurred in bilingual areas as
well; this was not yet visible at the start of the PARAS reform period. In other words,
economically strong municipalities have become stronger and the weak ones have
become weaker. Owing to the heterogeneity of municipalities, the achievement of
immediate direct economic impacts by means of structural reforms is particularly
challenging in bilingual areas.
Definition of responsibility and capitalising on the tradition of
cooperation in organising services
Changes in municipal services have been examined from the linguistic point of view
especially with regard to the modes of organisation, municipal service profiles and the
service network. The main attention has been focused on a few key service entities:
services for older people; children’s day care; and basic education.
Options for organising services have increased over time, and intermunicipal differences have grown also in the organisational sense. This applies in particular to local
government co-management areas but also to individual municipalities. The options
have increased along with, among others, purchaser–provider models and life-course
models. However, this is a long-term trend that is not associated only with the PARAS
reform. The main issue is therefore the extent to which the reform has accelerated
operational change processes in municipalities. In this regard as well, there are striking
differences between bilingual areas. With respect to the application of means complementing the traditional municipal and co-management area based production of
services (e.g. life-course models, outsourced services, service vouchers, services across
municipal boundaries), the tradition of cooperation has greater importance than the
PARAS reform. It should be possible to capitalise on the complementary modes of
organising services more effectively also for ensuring linguistic services.
Interviews of social and health service managers from bilingual municipalities of
the ARTTU research programme, conducted in 2011, revealed that the main focus of
restructuring work has been the development of management systems, forms of cooperation and customer-oriented processes. The linguistic dimension is not experienced
as the most challenging issue in this restructuring work. The most common language
problems concern personnel recruitment, ensuring linguistic services in service outsourcing, and in the various links of the chain of services for older people. The most
important factor with regard to ensuring linguistic rights in organising services is the
explicit definition of responsibilities both at the political level and at the management
and personnel level. The issue of language should be taken into account in greater
detail also at the agreement level, e.g. in merger agreements and outsourced service
agreements. The question of responsibility is pivotal irrespective of the language group,
i.e. also in developing services for immigrant groups.
There are considerable task-specific differences with regard to changes in service
profiles. As to services for older people, a stronger than average emphasis on institutional care has been typical in bilingual areas. The shift towards outpatient care has
been faster in municipalities of local government co-management areas than in other
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municipal groups. The differentiation of service profiles has also led to an increase
in cost differences between municipalities. Unlike the service profile, there is a clear
link between costs and demographic factors. From the point of view of cost, the situation is challenging in many municipalities with a Swedish-speaking majority. The
changes in children’s day care during the study period have been moderate in bilingual
municipalities. The number of children in day care has increased the most in merged
municipalities and local government co-management areas. The same applies to service costs, although the cost level is the highest in other municipalities. Development
pressures are the highest in growth centres regardless of language groups.
The school network is still more small school oriented in bilingual areas than
on average. The largest relative decrease in the number of schools took place in
merged municipalities (20%) and in small municipalities with a migration loss. For
the Finnish-language school network, there is a statistically significant link between
the changes in the numbers of students and the number of schools that were closed
down. No corresponding connection is observed for the Swedish-language school
network. Other factors have therefore affected the changes in the Swedish-language
school network. The school network has been intensified more than the changes in
student numbers would require. In consequence, the increase in school costs has been
more moderate in bilingual merged municipalities than in the other municipal groups.
Municipalities with a migration gain have the greatest cost pressures also with regard
to basic education. The results of questionnaires conducted among municipalities by
the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities in 2008 and 2011 show
that municipal residents’ assessments of the accessibility of school services are clearly
more critical in merged municipalities. This applies particularly to municipalities with
a Swedish-speaking majority.
All in all, the changes in services that have occurred in bilingual municipalities
give reason to stress the importance of cooperation. The changes shown by several
indicators have been faster in local government co-management areas than in the other
municipal groups. In this regard, too, there are considerable regional differences, in
which the importance of the tradition of cooperation is emphasised.
Municipal residents’ service-related attitudes in bilingual areas –
attention to the peripheral areas of semi-urban municipalities
Relatively minor changes in municipal residents’ service-related attitudes took place
during the years 2008–2011. Satisfaction with services in bilingual areas has in general improved somewhat, especially among the Swedish-speaking population. Service
satisfaction has improved in small municipalities with less than 10,000 inhabitants.
In contrast, attitudes have become more critical in large cities with more than 50,000
inhabitants. Regardless of service type, service satisfaction is higher among the Swedishspeaking population than among the Finnish-speaking population. Although both
language groups are more satisfied in small municipalities than in large municipalities,
at the same time the results show that there are considerable municipal group related
profile differences in the attitudes of linguistic groups. Swedish speakers are the most
critical in merged municipalities, followed by the municipalities of local government
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co-management areas and other municipalities. The situation is the opposite for Finnish speakers. The differences between language groups are particularly great in the
large cities, where Swedish speakers’ service satisfaction is notably higher than average.
Moreover, service satisfaction among Finnish speakers is also higher than average in
municipalities with a Swedish-speaking majority.
The probable impact of the PARAS reform is reflected in the changes in servicerelated attitudes in the sense that municipal mergers are experienced as a greater threat
to services among Swedish speakers than among Finnish speakers. Service satisfaction
has improved, especially in local government co-management areas, which can in
part be seen as a kind of defence of the autonomous municipality. With regard to
the dimension centre–periphery, it should be noted that suburbs and the peripheral
areas of urban centres are the most problematic areas from the perspective of service
satisfaction. In these areas, residents’ service-related attitudes are more critical than
those of people living in urban centres or sparsely populated areas. This applies to
both language groups, but the differences between language groups are particularly
large among the Finnish-speaking population. It is therefore particularly challenging
to ensure an adequate service level and accessibility of services in the peripheral areas
of semi-urban areas. This pertains especially to social and health services.
Perspectives for ensuring linguistic rights
The development of language conditions on the whole involves two considerations:
firstly, capitalising on and developing the success factors of bilingual municipalities;
and secondly, taking account of the language dimension in the various stages of reform
processes. The most important perspectives are:

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In the long term, it is most important to strengthen the attractiveness of
municipalities, especially with regard to enterprise and labour.
Capitalising on and nurturing the tradition of cooperation also in the framework of new structures
Capitalising on the complementary modes of organising services also with
regard to linguistic services
Explicit definition of linguistic responsibility at both the political level and
the administrative level. Appointment of responsible persons. This is also
central when organising services targeted at immigrant groups.
Consideration of the linguistic dimension in merger agreements as well as
in cooperation agreements and outsourced service agreements.
Special attention to organising linguistic services in peripheral areas of urban
centres.
Capitalising on local features is a key resource for bilingual regions, irrespective of the municipal structure.
There should be more experimentation when applying both complementary modes of organising services and forms of participation. In this regard,
too, local features and identification with one’s municipality are important
resources in bilingual areas.
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3.6 Impacts on gender equality
The main perspectives examined in the separate study on the impacts of the PARAS
reform on gender equality were gender representation and roles in local government
decision-making, gender differences in the use of municipal services, and gender differences in views concerning municipal and service structure reform.
The slow but sure growth in the share of women municipal councillors that had
continued for decades waned in the municipal elections of 2008. At the start of 2009,
the share of women elected to municipal councils in merged municipalities decreased
by a few percentage points. The change remained minor in the centres of merged
municipalities, but in the peripheral municipalities merged into a larger centre, the
relative share of women elected was clearly less than in previous elections.
At the national level, women’s success in the municipal elections of 2012 was
slightly negative on all indicators. The proportion of women candidates, women
candidates’ share of votes, and the share of women elected to municipal councils were
all less than four years ago. Women accounted for 36.2 per cent of those elected, or
0.5 percentage points less than in 2008. The negative development this time did not
centre especially on the new merged municipalities or their peripheral areas. In the
municipalities that merged at the beginning of 2013, 37.1 per cent of those elected were
women; this is 0.5 percentage points less than in the same areas in 2008. The difference
between centres and peripheral areas differed from that in 2008: the relative share of
women elected to the municipal council decreased in central urban municipalities but
not in the peripheral areas. In the nine municipal mergers formed in 2010–2011, the
share of women out of all municipal councillors fell by 1.5 percentage points.
Compared against the past, the weaker success of women in the autumn 2012
elections is linked in part with the election victory of the Finns Party. The party received
more than 12 per cent of both the votes cast and the municipal council seats. Among
the Finns Party, the share of female candidates, and the share of women elected to the
municipal council, was only 23 per cent, which is clearly less than among the other
parties whose support exceeded 10 per cent.
Municipal management still male-dominated
The number of women chairing municipal councils and local executives had been
increasing slowly, but this rise came to a halt when positions of trust were distributed
after the 2008 elections. A little over one in four of the municipal council chairs and
one in five of the local executive chairs elected were women. Relatively fewer women
were elected to chair the local executive and the municipal council in merged municipalities than in the same areas after the previous municipal elections. In addition, the
chairs and the deputy chairs of the elected bodies of local government co-management
areas for social and health care, formed during the PARAS project, are rather maledominated. In the spring of 2012, clearly less than 30 per cent of the chairs and deputy
chairs of the elected bodies of local government co-management areas were women.
The proportion of women as local government officers varies by the size of the
municipality: small municipalities have the most women as municipal managers and
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administrative branch managers. The emphasis of the municipal structure on larger
units contributes to slower growth in the proportion of women managers. All of the
municipal mergers implemented at the start of 2009 have a man as the municipal or
city manager. Three of the municipalities where the merger was implemented in the
years 2010–2013 have a woman as the top manager.
One’s own municipality and municipal services especially important to
women
Women make more use of most municipal services than men do. The results of the
ARTTU municipal residents’ questionnaire for the years 2008 and 2011 show that
both women and men consider municipal services to be important. However, there was
a clear difference of degree between the genders: women felt that most of the services
are very important. As a rule, municipal residents also thought that services are run
well. As to service satisfaction, there were no major differences between the genders.
The vast majority of the respondents to the ARTTU municipal residents’ questionnaire considered it important that services are produced as close to home as possible,
but the importance of local services was emphasised among women. The majority still
thought that municipal service production should continue to be organised by the
municipality. Women stressed that services should remain municipal services slightly
more than men.
Gender also differentiates decision-makers’ views concerning the
municipal and service structure
The results of the ARTTU decision-makers’ questionnaire, conducted in 2010, show
that support for municipal mergers was stronger among men than among women.
Women, in turn, emphasised the importance of increased intermunicipal cooperation
more often than men did. Women holding positions of trust stressed the importance
of ensuring local services more emphatically than men. Female elected officials and
local government officers in management positions were less receptive to the idea of
increasing the size of service units than male decision-makers were.
Municipal elected officials considered it important that services continue to be
produced by the municipality itself – albeit not as strongly as municipal residents. For
women holding positions of trust, service production by the municipality was more
important than it was for men. To local government officers in management positions,
service production by the municipality itself was not as central an objective as it was
to the elected officials.
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Chapter 4. What factors have affected the
differing progression of the PARAS reform
in different municipalities?
The PARAS act defined the legal criteria on the basis of which municipalities had to take
measures for forming municipal mergers, creating local government co-management
areas and making urban region plans.
A number of factors have affected how willingly municipalities have begun to
formulate decisions and how municipalities have chosen between municipal mergers
and local government co-management areas. When for instance local government
co-management areas have been disbanded, there have been underlying factors where
the initial expectations of cooperation had not been met.
Concepts of the factors promoting and obstructing the PARAS reform were obtained at various stages of the ARTTU research. The study of elected officials and local
government officers conducted in autumn 2010 requested that the decision-makers
separately assess the extent to which various factors had promoted or obstructed the
implementation of the PARAS reform in their own municipality. (Summary of responses in Table 8).
Table 8. Municipal decision-makers’ opinions of the factors that promoted and obstructed the
PARAS reform the most in autumn 2010. Scrutiny by PARAS categorisation.
Municipalities of a
municipal merger
Factors • Economic incentives
promoting
• Local government
restructuring
officers' opinions
the most
• Opinions of business
and industry Factors obstructing
restructuring
the most
Municipalities pursuing
deepening cooperation
Other municipalites
• Local government officers' opinions
• Opinions of business and industry
• Previous inter-
municipal cooperation • Local government
officers' opinions
• Opinions of business
and industry
• Elected officials’
opinions
• Solution of other
municipalities
municipalities
• Solutions of neigh-
• Stands of the local media
bouring municipalities
• Municipal residents' • Solutions of neighbouring
opinions
municipalities
municipalities
• Municipal residents'
opinions
• Opinions of neighbouring municipalities
The factors listed in the table have had different weights in individual solutions. In the
following, the factors listed in the table and other factors that surfaced for discussion
during the research are opened up, in random order.
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1. State support for municipal mergers – merger grants
The questionnaire of elected officials and local government officers showed that national support and national rules have influenced local implementation of the reform.
Support for municipal mergers (economic incentives, the Act on the redetermination
of municipal boundaries, and other provisions) was clearer than the corresponding
government support for municipalities that had chosen the local government comanagement area as their solution. According to the assessment of decision-makers
in municipal merger municipalities, the State’s economic incentives (the municipal
merger grant) were important. In the other two municipal groups, State measures were
not experienced as having been decisive to the progress of the reform.
Municipal merger grants are justified for covering the fusion costs arising from
municipal mergers. However, fusion costs also arise in the formation of local government co-management areas, although not as much. Municipal merger grants give rise
to conflicting thoughts: since municipal mergers are justified in terms of “savings”,
it is contradictory that the State still pays for the achievement of municipal mergers.
Since central government transfers to many of the new municipalities arising from
municipal mergers would drop, another incentive has been to ensure unreduced central
government transfers for five years.
2. The economic situation of municipalities and
the expected benefits
The economic situation of municipalities is an underlying factor for municipal mergers.
A number of municipalities have opted for municipal mergers because their economic
development prospects are quite poor. A municipal merger has saved the situation in a
few cases, and among other things the number of municipalities in deficit has decreased
through municipal mergers.
On the other hand, it can also be seen that municipalities with reasonably good
prospects and conditions for development have voluntarily begun to prepare municipal
mergers. In these municipalities, municipal mergers are seen as promoting the region’s
development, wealth and residents’ well-being.
During the PARAS reform the global economy turned towards recession. Some
of the countries using the euro became over-indebted and in the last few years there
has been much debate about the euro and measures to rescue the euro zone. The
recession has affected the Finnish national economy as well, and through this it has
also affected the economy of municipalities in general. The economic trend has affected municipalities in different ways, and this has had an effect on the progress of
the PARAS reform. Some municipalities have been forced to make decisions deviating
from what was thought at the start of the PARAS reform. These include, on the one
hand, the changes in the information technology industry experienced in large cities
(Salo, Oulu, Jyväskylä) and, on the other hand, the economic problems of declining
industrial municipalities (Varkaus).
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3. Past experiences of intermunicipal cooperation
The development history of the municipality and the neighbouring municipalities
seems to influence the difference in progress.
Significant in terms of a positive response to the PARAS project has been the timing
of the project in the development history of cooperation and the economy, especially
in urban regions. The Jyväskylä urban region has emerged as the most positive case;
there the PARAS project seems to have served as a well-timed incentive stimulating
the waning regional cooperation driven by local government officers. The establishment of the Jyväskylä Regional Development Company Jykes Ltd laid the ground in
the Jyväskylä region for regional economic cooperation, appreciably alleviating the
competitive atmosphere with regard to the building of businesses and workplaces. The
climate of trust has been reinforced, and in this sense the ground for the PARAS project
has been favourable. On the other hand, as yet there are no clear signs of warding off
the on-going dispersion of the community structure in the Jyväskylä region, either.
4. Trust in the decision-makers of neighbouring municipalities
Trust in cooperation partners is a particularly important resource in deciding on
municipal mergers or co-management. Mutual municipal trust is not very strong,
especially if no positive experiences of cooperation have arisen or municipal decisionmakers feel that they have been betrayed at some point. Acquiring trust before the
municipal merger, but also during negotiations on merging, is an essential facilitator
for integration.
5. Municipalities’ differing interests
Both a municipal merger and the establishment of a local government co-management
area require concordant decisions by several municipalities. According to the decisionmakers’ questionnaire, the PARAS solutions of neighbouring municipalities and other
municipalities are experienced as obstructing the implementation of the reform in all
municipal groups. The Act on Restructuring Local Government and Services (the PARAS framework act) is based on voluntariness, which is why a single municipality can
present a veto that, for instance, prevents the rise of a sub-regional cooperation area.
There can be many types of conflicting interests. One such factor can be language
policy, which for example in the Vaasa urban region has created its own dimension
of tension as Korsholm, Vaasa’s neighbouring municipality, strives to safeguard its
Swedish-language services.
Municipal rivalry seems to affect, in particular, the forming of municipal mergers.
The competition setting between municipalities differs. Tax competition is not always
conscious; in some cases, the fragmented municipal structure can also lead to fiercer
competition between municipalities regardless of the characteristic features of land-use
policies. The negative impacts of the competition setting may, however, be real even
if the partial optimisation of municipalities were “unintentional”.
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6. Decline in municipalities’ own influence – the voice of
peripheral areas isn’t heard
Especially in municipal merger projects, smaller municipalities in peripheral areas have
feared the loss of their own authority and the reduction of their possibilities to exert
influence when representatives from their own area are a minority in the decisionmaking bodies of the larger municipality. In consequence it is feared that the peripheral
areas will be forgotten and the new municipality’s operations will be concentrated in
the municipal centre. This may overlook the reality that operations will be reduced
even without municipal mergers.
7. Opinions of municipal residents, local government officers,
the local media, and business and industry
In the reform situation, municipal decision-makers act in the face of cross-pressure
from many interest groups. The attitudes of municipal residents and the local media
are seen to have obstructed rather than promoted the reform. The opinions of business
and industry are perceived as promoting the reform.
In all three groups, local government officers’ opinions, and those of business and
industry, are seen as promoting the completion of the reform at the local level. Local
government officers have a key role from the perspective of practical implementation of
the reform. It is more difficult to picture the importance of business and industry with
regard to the reform, but for instance regional chambers of commerce have, in many
localities, presented initiatives in the public debate concerning the municipal structure.
8. The municipality’s general direction of development – how
to proceed after the choice
All municipalities publicly state that they are investing in developing their overall
vitality, and there is no reason to doubt this. However, municipalities develop in different ways when examined as changes in the number of inhabitants and the amount
of business and industry. It seems that the trend of differentiation will continue despite
the measures of municipalities. The forces underlying the changes are such that, at
least in the short term, individual municipalities have little possibility of influencing
municipal development.
From this general development it naturally follows that the measures taken by
municipalities following the formation of municipal mergers or local government comanagement areas will differ from one another. The task of sub-regions growing in
terms of population and business and industry is to organise more service capacity and
more services, as well as to make land use plans for new areas and to build infrastructure. The task of sub-regions shrinking in terms of population is to try to cut service
capacity and to target services in a new way. Development of the area, the making of
land use plans and the building of infrastructure are not central. In municipalities with
a shrinking population, the problems pertaining to land use planning are associated
with decisions on building permits in sparsely populated areas.
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In this context, it can be stated for instance that changes in the school network for
comprehensive school mirror population change more than whether the municipality
chooses to follow the path of a municipal merger, local government co-management
area, or continuing as an independent municipality.
9. Managers’ attitudes and management determine the
implementation of the reform
The attitudes and actions of local government officers in management positions and
elected officials determine which reform path the municipality chooses and how implementation of the reform proceeds in the municipality.
10. Development context and operating culture
The various ways of proceeding with the PARAS reform are most strongly differentiated by the development context and the situation in which it is located. In some
municipalities, there is a long continuum of reforms and strong administrative reorganisation, which has consequential impacts on the personnel as part of the chain
of reform. In others, it is more a juridical-political solution, which in turn may not
immediately reflect on the personnel. Operating cultures have two kinds of effects. On
the one hand, reconciliation of the operating cultures of merging and new operating
units is often slow and complex. On the other hand, the culture of a municipality or
administrative branch in general influences the seriousness with which strategic human
resource management is implemented.
Conveying the message of reform accurately to the entire personnel has been a
challenge to the reform machinery of municipalities. It can be said that this has clearly
failed. The personnel have received limited information about any change pertaining
to their work in general, and in particular about the PARAS reform. There has been
even less direct participation in planning the reform. The lower the employee level is,
the less has been known about the reform and the less employees have participated,
and this forms the base for all observations concerning the personnel’s role.
11. Reform fatigue
The study shows that reform fatigue set in over the course of the PARAS project. This
applies to both managers and employees, and is evidenced both directly in employees’ responses and indirectly from indicators of personnel participation. At the same
time as management work has grown stronger, the conflicts have remained as before.
Intermunicipal variation may be explained by the ability to capitalise on the PARAS
project as a fresh resource for reform rather than its becoming “yet another” insignificant change or a direct cause of uncertainty for employees. A negative attitude towards
the reform has not been a dominant observation of the research by any means, but it
defines some paths of progression for the PARAS project as well.
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Chapter 5. How has State steering
affected the implementation of the
PARAS reform in municipalities?
The PARAS reform is a reform that originated from the State and was marketed as the
reform of the century in public administration. The municipalities went along with
the reform in part on a voluntary basis and in part because participation was required
by the Act on Restructuring Local Government and Services (the PARAS framework
act). One interesting element is to examine whether the State has supported the implementation of the objectives set out and the use of the means determined in the
framework act, and how, or whether the State’s measures have obstructed progress.
1. The launch of new local government reform in 2011
The Katainen Government launched its own municipal reform in 2011, before the
validity of the PARAS framework act expired. Still in autumn 2011, the Ministry of
Finance asked the municipalities for reports on the progress of the PARAS framework act. It appears that when municipalities learned of the Government’s proposed
reform, this obstructed the progress of projects that had been planned in a number
of municipalities. In particular, these cases were affected by the release of municipal
maps. Municipal mergers in a few municipalities did not correspond to the proposed
municipal map; it seems that these reforms were frozen.
2. Merger grants have encouraged municipal mergers
Municipalities that have entered into municipal mergers have received so-called merger
grants, which have been bound to the number of municipalities merging and the time
of the merger as well as to the population of the new municipality. Merger grants are
distributed over three years’ time. Receiving merger grants is not very important to
the revenue of merged municipalities, but the grants may have an impact on the attitudes of elected officials. The last merger grants of the PARAS reform are paid for
the municipal mergers implemented in early 2013, which total ten.
3. Decisions on central government transfers and taxation
The recession that began, and strengthened, during the PARAS reform period further
deepened the sustainability gap of the public economy. In this situation the Government, through the Government Programme and its decisions on spending limits, has
decided to trim central government transfers for basic municipal services by 1,131
million euros from the level of 2011 by the year 2015. In addition, central government
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transfers are affected by decisions made for the administrative branch of the Ministry
of Education and Culture, which include the freezing of index increments.
Another change associated with central government transfers is the removal of the
property tax from calculating the tax revenue-based equalisation of central government
transfers to local government. This change, too, was implemented in 2012 in connection with central government transfers. Since municipal property tax revenue varies,
this is reflected as equalisation increments in some municipalities and as equalisation
deductions in others. Municipalities where property tax revenue was high benefit
from the reform.
The recession also affected the corporation tax revenue. The recession had a great
impact in some regions and municipalities where the corporation tax accounted for
a large share of tax revenue. The Government increased municipalities’ share of corporation tax revenue (in 2010, the share was 22% and in 2011 it was 32%), which
compensates for the loss of municipal corporation tax revenue.
4. Flaw in the PARAS reform?
The development of municipal structure in the urban regions listed in the PARAS
framework act has been against the spirit of the law in many places. Neighbouring
municipalities surrounding a central urban municipality have been unwilling to form
municipal mergers with the central urban municipality, often preferring instead to
seek co-management arrangements and municipal mergers with the other municipalities surrounding the central urban municipality. Municipalities situated in the “outer
ring” of the circle, in turn, have often been willing to form municipal mergers with the
central urban municipality. The result has been local government structures where the
central urban municipality extends to the “outer ring” of the region while the “inner
ring” remains free of the central urban municipality. For example, Greater Jyväskylä
now surrounds its neighbour Muurame as a “doughnut municipality”; Kempele and
Muhos opted to be outside the multiple municipal merger of Oulu urban region;
Siilinjärvi has rejected the deepening of cooperation with Kuopio; neighbouring municipalities have correspondingly rejected Turku; and the municipality of Vähäkyrö,
located “behind” Korsholm, is becoming Vaasa’s “enclave”.
In this context the PARAS framework act is accused of being flawed. It is considered that the minimum population base of 20,000 inhabitants for organising social
and health services mentioned in the law entitles well-off “inner ring” municipalities
to opt out of cooperation with the central urban municipality and to build service
production for this population base on their own. It is as though they would form a
functional entity without the central urban municipality at the same time as they are
only a part of the urban region and are linked with the central urban municipality in
many ways. There are problems both with the restrictions of the economic logic of
the framework act and with the “geographical blindness” of the act. In the logic of
economies of scale, the size of municipalities and their mergers has been determined
on the basis of thinking aimed at optimising the population base for municipal services
(the most decisive being social and health services). In other words, sufficient attention
has not been paid to regional and community structural factors, such as distances,
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accessibility, regionalisation trends and dispersion trends.
5. Steering not coordinated between the ministries
In the initial stages of the PARAS reform, demands for a more coordinated approach
to municipal steering were voiced. Even assessments made during the planning of the
reform concluded that there were conflicts despite the partially functional State steering.
Lack of coordination, it was stated, was seen for instance in the fact that the objectives
for steering by information, norms, and resources did not necessarily work in parallel.
It was felt, among others, that the approach to steering associated with the PARAS
reform and supporting the municipal structure would require strengthening through
the system of central government transfers to local government and the legislation
governing administrative branches. Moreover, it was felt that there was the need to
increase mutual coordination between other legislation projects simultaneously under
preparation and the PARAS project.
Basic public services programmes
The joint local government policy of the State and the municipalities has been implemented since 2004 through the basic public services programmes and the associated
annual assessments known as “Synthesis Reports on Basic Public Services”. In the basic
public services programme, municipal services and their funding are examined from
the perspective of the State economy and the municipal economy, focusing on social
and health care as well as on education and cultural services and funding. The basic
public services programme is prepared by the Ministry of Finance in cooperation with
the Ministry of Education and Culture and the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health.
The basic public services programme has been statutory since 2008. Also since that
year, the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities has participated in
preparing the programme. The basic public services programme is revised annually. The
latest basic public services programme, published in April 2012, has been compiled
for the years 2013–2016 and is the second of the current Government.
The PARAS framework act and the associated objectives were naturally reflected
mainly in the basic public services programmes approved during the previous Government’s term, during the years 2007–2011. The basic public services programmes
of 2007 and 2008 stressed, in particular, the launching of the PARAS reform and the
promotion of its objectives. The basic public services programme of 2008 foreshadowed
the legislative reforms possibly required by the PARAS reform and emphasised that the
structure for services at the responsibility of local government should be sufficiently
strong. The basic public services programmes drawn up for the years 2009 and 2010
still reflect the implementation of the PARAS project, the operational objectives associated with the integrity of social and health services, as well as the objective of broader
cooperation across municipal boundaries. With the new Government, the most recent
basic public services programmes depart not from the PARAS project but from the
preconditions of municipal reform.
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Social and health services
Municipal social welfare and health services in the years 2007–2012 faced a multi-levelled scheme of State steering. References laying the foundation for reform to restructure
municipalities and services can be found the most clearly in State policy documents
starting in 2003. Reform of social and health services and its coordination with the
PARAS project, and to an even greater extent with the new municipal reform, seem at
least at the State level to have been somewhat difficult. This is because especially the
Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health have had somewhat
conflicting objectives concerning the superiority of different organisational models.
Some municipalities have decided to wait for guidelines created through permanent
legislation. At the end of 2012, we can see that the municipalities are anticipating and
awaiting the legislative reforms under preparation, and reform appears to have stopped.
More generally, too, differences in nuances, at least, can be seen between the
ministries in their promotion of the PARAS project. Whereas the Government and
the Ministry of Finance promote and implement the reform to restructure municipalities, the ministries for administrative branches give more emphasis to service reforms.
The language viewpoint
Examined from the linguistic point of view, the changes that have taken place in steering systems have caused great challenges. The Constitutional provisions on linguistic
rights are supplemented, among others, by the Language Act (423/2003), which
emphasises the authorities’ own initiative: “An authority shall ensure in its activity
and on its own initiative that the linguistic rights of private individuals are secured in
practice.” In addition, the use of the national languages with the authorities and in
courts is provided for in more than 200 acts and decrees.
Problems encountered in the realisation of linguistic rights are not primarily
legislative. The protection of linguistic rights extended by legislation is sufficient in
itself. The problems are associated more with the development of steering systems since
the 1990s. The range of steering instruments has grown steadily and the number of
alternatives for organising services has increased. Because the legislation on language
does not take a stand as to how linguistic rights should in practice be implemented
in an authority’s internal functions, there is the danger that linguistic responsibility
becomes blurred. It is more important than ever to define linguistic responsibility in
the various stages of change processes but also in agreement situations, such as merger
agreements and outsourced service agreements.
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Chapter 6. In conclusion: Twenty lessons
learnt that are important for continuous
renewal
Local government reform is a continuous process which takes many different forms.
During the PARAS project period, the debate on the reform become deeper and richer
and the discussion topics changed. The reform taught new lessons that should be kept
in mind during the current and future reform processes. Reforms build on scientific
material which provides facts; yet research does not offer ready-made, practical solutions to specific problems. But there is always something that we have learnt.
The lessons learnt:
1. It is not possible to define the optimal size of municipalities
Local authorities have many tasks: provision of services, regional development and
the safeguarding of democracy. The optimal or adequate size of a municipality varies
according to the task: a municipality may be too small for some tasks, while for the
others it may be unnecessarily, or even undesirably large. The size of municipality is
usually measured in terms of its population, but a municipality may also be measured
in terms of its area.
2. The size of municipality and the size of service unit are two different
matters
The main means of implementing the reform to restructure municipalities and services are municipal mergers and creation of local government co-operation areas. So
the assumption is that large units bring benefits. The debate on size has mixed up
municipalities, service units and service points: benefits are primarily generated from
large service units and service points, although bigger municipalities have better opportunities to organise services in larger service units.
3. Municipalities and their problems vary
It does not seem easy to force all municipalities into a single mould. And it does not
make sense either. Regions seek different benefits from the reform depending on
whether they have a growing or a shrinking population and economy or depending
on whether they are urban or sparsely populated regions. Thus, the means of implementing the reform or the way these means are applied vary. One municipality may
benefit from a merger while the other may not.
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4. Trust is an asset
Local decision-makers do not often have high confidence in their neighbours; nevertheless, trust is a resource and a lack of trust drains resources.
5. Reforms should provide net benefits for municipalities, and
municipalities need to be convinced of the benefits
At least some of the reforms have been carried out under the obligation of the PARAS
framework act, and the arguments for how the municipalities will benefit from the
reform have been rather weak. It should be possible to convince the municipalities
of the reform’s benefits, which would make them more committed to the reform. It
should also be kept in mind that reforms usually have downsides as well as upsides.
While some of the municipalities benefit from the reforms, others may, in the short
term, suffer from drawbacks. Therefore, both residents and elected officials need to be
told facts about the projected benefits; it is important not to confuse fact with opinion.
Personnel’s poor knowledge of the reform has turned out to be the Achilles’ heel, the
weak spot, of the reform.
6. The monetary value of the impacts can rarely be measured
A main justification for the reform is the achievement of savings. It is important to
understand, however, that this does not mean savings in the textbook sense of the
word, i.e. setting money aside for future needs. Rather, municipalities can curb the
rise in spending with more cost-efficient operation. The word ‘savings’ is too vague
and its use should hence be banned.
7. Irrelevant details and emotional arguments are used in support of or
opposition to the reform
In the media, isolated arguments are used for or against municipal mergers in particular. Yet, merged municipalities form an integrated unit of local government, and the
benefits should be examined from this perspective. Thus the overall impacts of the
reform need to be properly investigated. Municipal identity and emotional matters are
important for local residents despite the fact that more and more people move from
one municipality to the next several times in the course of their lifetime.
8. Past and present are used as arguments for the reform
While the debate on the local government reform tends to revolve around the past and
the present, local government structures are built for the coming decades. Decisionmakers need to break with the present and forecast and plan for the future.
Were local government restructuring taken back to the drawing board, the local
government structure would fairly certainly be different. But municipalities do have
their history, identity and ways of operating which they find difficult to give up.
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9. Municipalities continue to diverge
The divergence of municipalities is a long-run phenomenon. Spending, or the safeguarding of services, is the most serious problem in areas that have a declining population, whereas growing urban regions need to secure the functionality of the region
and promote economic growth, that is, revenue.
10. Benefits of the reform are achieved in the long run; merger stage
generates fusion costs
Municipal mergers and creation of local government co-management areas generate
fusion costs. These include the harmonisation of salaries, the harmonisation of service
standards, consolidation of information systems, the termination of local government
co-management agreements and the conclusion of new ones, and the testing of the
new organisation. Some of these costs will fall away over time while others become
permanent. Benefits are gained in the long run, and they are not necessarily savings
in the textbook sense of the word.
11. Municipalities preparing for a merger need guidance
Some municipalities make last-minute investments before a merger: they use up the
funds and accumulate debt, which marks a rocky start for the new municipality.
12. Reforms are transforming democracy and democratic deficit
One argument against local government reform is the need to promote and sustain
democracy. Cooperation is claimed to create democratic deficit as some of the power
of decision making is transferred to a joint decision-making body. It seems that when
municipalities merge to become larger, democratic deficit is created within the municipality. In larger municipalities the voter turnout is lower, and residents in peripheral areas feel that they have limited opportunities to contribute and exert influence.
Further, larger municipalities often establish subsidiaries, which are further away from
democracy, and procure more services from outside their own organisation.
13. The reform process has two main stages at least — how to realise
development potential?
The first stage of the PARAS reform — formation of municipal mergers and local
government co-operation areas — offers development potential, but the real changes
take place in the second stage of the reform when services, service structures and management systems are reformed. It is only at this stage that real benefits are achieved.
In municipal mergers, what seems to matter a great deal is which municipality’s way
of operating is adopted by the new municipality. The way that the biggest of the
merging municipalities operates is not necessarily the most efficient way possible. The
importance of change management spanning over several years is highlighted in the
realisation of development potential.
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14. There are different development paths in otherwise similar
municipalities
Different development paths were discernible in municipalities that resemble each
other. The development paths seem to be influenced by leadership as understood in
a broad sense. This applies equally to the leadership of elected officials as to that of
local government officers.
15. Personnel are the key resource in local government reform and
operations
Municipalities have made steady progress in strategic human resource management,
but they have not really made any great leap forward in using personnel as a resource
and potential for change in the new systems. In all, most municipalities have put other
issues ahead of personnel matters in their restructuring efforts. Uncertainty has increased
and in the future, municipalities will have to compete over workforce.
16. Bilingualism needs to be translated into a resource
An improvement of the linguistic conditions typically involves two processes: first,
using and promoting local success factors; and second, taking the language dimension
into account in the different stages of the reform. Instead of being a constraint for
development, bilingualism should be translated into a resource.
17. Methods of service provision are diverging: fast solutions and change
The forthcoming reforms offer the alternatives of maintaining the status quo, going
back to the former structures, or finding a completely new direction fast. Steps have
been taken both forwards and back in the course of the PARAS reform. This is evident
in social welfare and health care as fast-paced creation and disbanding of local government co-operation areas. Identical social welfare and health care structures cannot be
imposed on all municipalities in future reforms either, which means that the diversity
of structures is likely to become permanent.
18. Operations can be enhanced without mergers
In education services, a municipal merger is not the only or often not even a necessary
remedy for improving or maintaining the current standard of services. A reasonable
standard of education services can be maintained, or perhaps the standard of services
can even be improved, with cooperation between municipalities. Nonetheless, municipalities have not been adversely affected by mergers either. Some schools have been
closed down, which has caused distress to local residents; however, this is something
that has affected residents in all types of municipalities.
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19. Central government guidelines are inconsistent
The new local government reform is State-led but there are inconsistencies in the
guidelines provided by the central government. The Government and the Ministry of
Finance are responsible for the local government reform whereas the services restructuring is being prepared by sectoral ministers and ministries. The inconsistency of the
guidelines has created confusion.
20. A bridge must be built between government programmes
Despite changes of Government and possible shifts in political power balance, it is
important to ensure that a genuine link is forged between government programmes.
Otherwise there is a risk that the development measures that are being planned or being
taken will come to nothing, and local government development will be put on hold.
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Appendix 1. Presentation of the ARTTU programme
researchers and of the working group responsible for
this report
Democracy and leadership:

Siv Sandberg (Licentiate of Social Sciences) works as a researcher in the Department of Political Science at Åbo Akademi University. Her areas of specialisation
are the local government systems in the Nordic countries, and local and regional
policies and democracy and participation.
Marianne Pekola-Sjöblom (Licentiate of Social Sciences) is Head of Research
at the Research and Development unit of the Association of Finnish Local and
Regional Authorities. She specialises in local government research, local democracy and participation.
Sari Pikkala (Doctor of Social Sciences) is Information Services Manager at the
Centre for Gender Equality Information in Finland. She has previously worked
as a researcher in the Department of Political Science at Åbo Akademi University. Her areas of specialisation include local democracy, local elections and issues
related to gender equality.
Structural functionality of urban regions:

Raine Mäntysalo (Architect, Doctor of Technology) works as a professor in the
Land Use Planning and Urban Studies Group (YTK) in Aalto University, Department of Real Estate, Planning and Geoinformatics. His areas of specialisation
are strategic land use planning and planning theory.
Jonne Hytönen (Master of Social Sciences) is a doctoral student in the Land
Use Planning and Urban Studies Group (YTK) in Aalto University, Department
of Real Estate, Planning and Geoinformatics. His areas of research interest are
strategic and regional planning.
Vesa Kanninen (Master of Science, Geography) works as a researcher in the Land
of Real Estate, Planning and Geoinformatics. He is specialised in spatial planning
and integration of land use and transport planning.
Ilona Akkila (Master of Social Sciences) is a doctoral student in the Land Use
Planning and Urban Studies Group (YTK) in Aalto University, Department of
Real Estate, Planning and Geoinformatics. She specialises in lifestyle studies and
housing policy.
Petteri Niemi (student of Geography) works as a research assistant in the Land
of Real Estate, Planning and Geoinformatics. His area of specialisation is geographic information analytics.
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Personnel:

Tuula Heiskanen (Doctor of Social Sciences) is Research Director at the University
of Tampere Work Research Centre. She specialises in multi-disciplinary research
on work life in the public and in the private sectors.
Esa Jokinen (Master of Social Sciences) is a researcher at the University of
Tampere Work Research Centre. He is specialised in evaluation of public sector
development and in workplace well-being.
Risto Nakari (Master of Administrative Sciences) works as a researcher at the
University of Tampere Work Research Centre. His areas of specialisation include
strategic human resource management, work life quality of personnel, and activity analysis.
Economy:

Jarmo Vakkuri (Doctor of Administrative Sciences) is Professor of Local Government Accounting and Finance at the School of Management, University of
Tampere. His areas of expertise include local government productivity, economic decision-making in modern organisations, performance measurement and
management in public administration, and institutional reforms and change in
the public sector.
Pentti Meklin (Master of Administrative Sciences; Doctor of Science (Economics
and Business Administration)) is Professor Emeritus at the School of Management,
University of Tampere. His areas of expertise are local government economic
analyses, measurement of service performance, methods of service provision, and
local authority corporations and their management.
Olavi Kallio (Doctor of Administrative Sciences) works as a researcher at the
School of Management, University of Tampere. His areas of specialisation include
the different methods of municipal service provision, local economy analyses
and computational economic modelling. He has also studied the impacts of
regionalisation on rescue services.
Jari Tammi (Doctor of Administrative Sciences) works as a researcher at the
School of Management, University of Tampere. He is specialised in Activity
Based Costing and in utilisation of accounting information in municipalities as
well as in competitive tendering.
Social welfare and health services:

Vuokko Niiranen (Doctor of Social Sciences, Licentiate of Administrative Sciences) is Professor of Social Management Sciences in the Department of Health
Policy and Management at the University of Eastern Finland. Her areas of expertise are public sector management, steering mechanisms, local government,
social welfare and health care service structures, and democracy and participation.
Juha Kinnunen (Master of Science (Health Care) and Doctor of Science (Health
Care)) is Professor of Health Management Sciences and the Dean in the Depart-
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ment of Business and in the Department of Social Sciences at the University of
Eastern Finland. His areas of expertise are research on the social welfare and health
care service system, management, issues related to change process management,
and analyses of organisational cultures.
Alisa Puustinen (Master of Social Sciences) works as a researcher in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the University of Eastern Finland.
Her areas of research interest are social networks and network management, and
social welfare and health care service structures.
Joakim Zitting (Master of Social Sciences) works as a research assistant in the
Department of Health Policy and Management at the University of Eastern Finland. He is specialised in neighbourhood services and in the European Union's
social policy.
Education services:

Jouni Välijärvi (Doctor of Education) is Professor of Educational Research and
Director at the Finnish Institute for Educational Research at the University of
Jyväskylä. His areas of specialisation are international comparative assessment of
educational outcomes, curriculum development and teacher research.
Jouko Mehtäläinen (Licentiate of Social Sciences) works as a researcher at the
Finnish Institute for Educational Research at the University of Jyväskylä. He is
specialised in basic education and in secondary education.
Hannu Jokinen (Master of Arts) works as a project manager and a researcher
at the Finnish Institute for Educational Research at the University of Jyväskylä.
He is specialised in research and development of basic education and continuing
education, and of peer-group mentoring and training of mentors, as well as in
research on teacher mobility.
The reform's impact on linguistic equality:

Stefan Sjöblom (Doctor of Social Sciences) is Professor of Local Administration
at the Swedish School of Social Science at the University of Helsinki. His areas
of specialisation include development of public administration, steering systems,
democracy and participation.
Siv Sandberg (Licentiate of Social Sciences) works as a researcher in the Department of Political Science at Åbo Akademi University. Her areas of specialisation
are the local government systems in the Nordic countries, and local and regional
policies and democracy and participation.
The reform's impact on gender equality:

Sari Pikkala (Doctor of Social Sciences) is Information Services Manager at the
Centre for Gender Equality Information in Finland. She has previously worked
as a researcher in the Department of Political Science at Åbo Akademi University. Her areas of specialisation include local democracy, local elections and issues
related to gender equality.
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Appendix 2. The following reports produced within the
ARTTU research programme were used as sources in
this report
Heikki Helin (2009): Parasta ennen. Kuntien talouden kehityksestä 2000-luvulla. (Developments in the economy of Finnish municipalities in the 2000’s). Evaluation Research Programme
ARTTU Studies No. 1. A web publication. City of Helsinki Urban Facts & the Association of
Finnish Local and Regional Authorities 2009.
Raine Mäntysalo, Lasse Peltonen, Vesa Kanninen, Petteri Niemi, Jonne Hytönen & Miska
Simanainen (2010): Keskuskaupungin ja kehyskunnan jännitteiset kytkennät. Viiden kaupunkiseudun yhdyskuntarakenne ja suunnitteluyhteistyö Paras-hankkeen käynnistysvaiheessa.
(Tense relations between the central city and adjoining municipalities. Structure of and planning cooperation in five urban regions in the start-up phase of the project to restructure local
government and services (PARAS project)). Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies
No. 2. Acta No. 217. The Centre for Urban and Regional Studies of Aalto University School
of Science and Technology & the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities.
Jarmo Vakkuri, Olavi Kallio, Jari Tammi, Pentti Meklin & Heikki Helin (2010): Matkalla kohti
suuruuden ekonomiaa? Kunta- ja paikallistalouden lähtökohdat Paras-hankkeessa. (Towards
increasing economies of scale. Municipal finances and local economy at the start of the project to restructure local government and services (PARAS)). Evaluation Research Programme
ARTTU Studies No. 3. Acta No. 218. The University of Tampere & the Association of Finnish
Local and Regional Authorities.
Olavi Kallio (2010): Paikallistalouden lähtökohdat ARTTU-tutkimuskunnissa (Local economic
conditions in local authorities participating in the ARTTU research). Evaluation Research
Programme ARTTU Studies No. 4. The University of Tampere & the Association of Finnish
Local and Regional Authorities. A web publication.
Pentti Meklin (ed.) (2010). Parasta Artun mitalla. Arviointia Paras-uudistuksen lähtötilanteesta ja kehittämispotentiaalista kunnissa. (Municipalities measured. Evaluation of the initial
situation and development potential of local authorities participating in the PARAS reform).
Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 5. An Acta Plus and a web publication.
The Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities.
Minna Kaarakainen & Vuokko Niiranen & Juha Kinnunen (2010): Rakenteet muuttuvat – mihin suuntaan? Sosiaali- ja terveyspalvelut Paras-hankkeessa. Lähtötilanteen kartoitus (Structures
are changing – in which direction? Social welfare and health services and the PARAS reform.
Survey of the initial situation). Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 6. Acta
No. 219. The University of Eastern Finland, Department of Health Policy and Management
& the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities.
Sari Pikkala (2011): Parasta naisille? Kuntaliitokset ja naisten edustus kuntien johdossa.
(Municipal mergers and women in municipal management positions). Evaluation Research
Programme ARTTU Studies No. 7. Åbo Akademi University & the Association of Finnish
Local and Regional Authorities. A web publication. An interim report of a separate study on
the reform's impact on gender equality.
Esa Jokinen, Tuula Heiskanen, Risto Nakari (2011): Henkilöstö PARAS-uudistuksessa (Personnel in the PARAS reform). Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 8. Acta No.
228. The University of Tampere & the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities.
Marianne Pekola-Sjöblom (2011): Kuntalaiset uudistuvissa kunnissa. Tutkimus kuntalaisten
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asenteista ja osallistumisesta ARTTU-tutkimuskunnissa 2008. (Local residents in a changing
local government landscape. A study on the attitudes and participation of residents in the local
authorities taking part in the ARTTU research 2008). Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 9. Acta No. 229. The Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities.
Jaana Halonen & Sirkka-Liisa Piipponen (2011): Toimintaympäristön muutokset ARTTUtutkimuskunnissa 2000-luvulla (Changes that took place in the 2000s in the operating environment of the municipalities participating in the ARTTU research). Evaluation Research
Programme ARTTU Studies No. 10. The Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities.
A web publication.
Karoline Berg, Johan Meriluoto, Siv Sandberg, Stefan Sjöblom (2010): Försiktighet och förändring på egna villkor. Kommun- och servicestrukturreformens första skede i de svensk- och
tvåspråkiga kommunerna. An interim report of a separate study on the reform's impact on linguistic equality. Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 11. The Swedish School
of Social Science at Helsinki University & Åbo Akademi University. Helsinki University Print.
Bettina C. Lindfors, Johanna Löyhkö (2011): Den svenska verksamheten i de regionala strukturerna. Summerande analys av organiseringsformer och deras språkliga konsekvenser på regional
nivå. Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 12. The Swedish School of Social
Science at Helsinki University & Åbo Akademi University. Unigrafia.
Stefan Sjöblom (2011): Den starka statens styrningsproblem. Evaluation Research Programme
ARTTU Studies No. 13. The Swedish School of Social Science at Helsinki University. Unigrafia.
Kenneth Nordberg & Erland Eklund (2011): De finlandssvenska regionernas karaktär. De två
senaste decenniernas förvaltningsreformer i historisk belysning. Evaluation Research Programme
ARTTU Studies No. 14. The Swedish School of Social Science at Helsinki University & Åbo
Akademi University. Unigrafia.
Jonne Hytönen, Ilona Akkila, Raine Mäntysalo (eds.) (2011): Kaupunkiseutujen kasvukivut.
Kuntien maankäyttöpolitiikka ja suunnitteluyhteistyö viidellä kaupunkiseudulla. (Urban regions
struggling with growth. Municipal land use policy and planning cooperation in five urban
regions). An interim report of the research on structural functionality of urban regions. Aalto
University & the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. Evaluation Research
Programme ARTTU Studies No. 15. A web publication.
Alisa Puustinen and Vuokko Niiranen (2011): Rakenteet, päätöksenteko ja toiminta sosiaali- ja
terveyspalveluissa. Sosiaali- ja terveyspalvelut Paras-hankkeessa. (Structures, decision-making
and operation regarding social and health care services. Social and health care services in restructuring of local government and services (PARAS project)). An interim report. The University
of Eastern Finland and the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. Evaluation
Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 16. A web publication.
Olavi Kallio, Jari Tammi, Pentti Meklin and Jarmo Vakkuri (2011): Rakennemuutoksen taloushyötyjä odotellessa. Kunta- ja palvelurakenneuudistus kuntatalouden näkökulmasta vuosina
2000–2010. (In wait of the benefits. Restructuring of local government and services from
the point of view of municipal economy 2000–2010). An interim report. The University of
Tampere and the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. Evaluation Research
Jouko Mehtäläinen, Hannu Jokinen and Jouni Välijärvi (2011). Koulutuspalvelut ARTTUkunnissa. Koulutuksen saatavuus ja saavutettavuus. (Education services in municipalities
participating in Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU. Availability and accessibility of
education). An interim report. The University of Jyväskylä and the Association of Finnish
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Local and Regional Authorities. Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 18. A
web publication.
Esa Jokinen, Tuula Heiskanen (2012): Kuntien henkilöstö uudistusten pyörteissä (Local government personnel in the face of reforms). An interim report on the evaluation of PARAS
reform 2011. The University of Tampere and the Association of Finnish Local and Regional
Authorities. Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 19. A web publication.
Siv Sandberg (2012): Paras-uudistus kuntapäättäjän silmin. (PARAS reform from the perspective
of local government decision-makers). Åbo Akademi University & the Association of Finnish
Local and Regional Authorities. Acta No. 235. Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU
Studies No. 20.
Marianne Pekola-Sjöblom (2012): Kuntalaiset kunnallisten palvelujen arvioitsijoina. The Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. An interim report. Evaluation Research
Jonne Hytönen, Raine Mäntysalo, Ilona Akkila, Vesa Kanninen & Petteri Niemi (eds.): (2012):
Kaupunkiseutujen kasvukivut II. Päätelmiä maankäytön suunnitteluyhteistyön kehityksestä
viidellä kaupunkiseudulla. (Urban regions struggling with growth II. Conclusions on the
development of land use planning cooperation in five urban regions). A final report. Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 22. Acta No. 241. Aalto University and the
Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. Helsinki.
Pentti Meklin, Marianne Pekola-Sjöblom (eds.) (2012): Municipalities measured II. A joint
report on the ARTTU research programme. Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies
No. 23. Acta No. 242. Aalto University and the Association of Finnish Local and Regional
Authorities. Helsinki.
Olavi Kallio, Pentti Meklin, Jari Tammi and Jarmo Vakkuri: Kohti parasta kuntatalouden
kehitystä? Kunta- ja palvelurakenneuudistus talouden näkökulmasta. (Finnish municipal and
service structure reform from an economy perspective). A final report. Evaluation Research
Programme ARTTU Studies No. 24. Acta No. 243. The University of Tampere and the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. Helsinki.
Vuokko Niiranen, Alisa Puustinen, Joakim Zitting and Juha Kinnunen: Sosiaali- ja terveyspalvelut kunta- ja palvelurakenneuudistuksissa. SOTEPA – sosiaali- ja terveyspalvelut Parashankkeessa. (Social welfare and health care services in local government and service structure
reform. The research module on social welfare and healthcare services). A final report. Evaluation
Research Programme ARTTU Studies No. 25. Acta No. 245. The University of Eastern Finland
and the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. Helsinki.
Jouko Mehtäläinen, Hannu Jokinen and Jouni Välijärvi. Kuntarakenne muutoksessa – entä
koulutuspalvelut? (Local government structure undergoing change – are education services
affected?) A final report of the evaluation of the PARAS project 2012. Evaluation Research
Programme ARTTU Studies No. 26. Acta No. 246 The University of Jyväskylä and the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. Helsinki.
Esa Jokinen and Tuula Heiskanen: Henkilöstö Paras-uudistuksessa ja sen jälkeen (Personnel
in the face of reforms). A final report. Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies. An
Acta research publication. The University of Tampere and the Association of Finnish Local
and Regional Authorities. Helsinki.
Sari Pikkala: Kuntavaalit liitoskunnissa - kuuluuko alueiden ääni? (Municipal elections in merged municipalities – Is the voice of the various areas heard?) Evaluation Research Programme
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ARTTU Studies. An Acta research publication. Åbo Akademi University and the Association
of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. Helsinki.
Stefan Sjöblom: De tvåspråkiga kommuner i kommunreformen. A final report. Publications
of the project Impacts of administrative decisions on linguistic equality. Evaluation Research
Programme ARTTU. The Swedish School of Social Science at Helsinki University. Helsinki
University.
Sari Pikkala: Paras-uudistus ja tasa-arvo (The PARAS reform and the equality perspective).
Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies. An Acta research publication. Åbo Akademi
University and the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities. Helsinki.
Marianne Pekola-Sjöblom: Kuntalaiset kunta- ja palvelurakenneuudistusten pyörteissä (Local
residents in the face of local government and service restructuring). (a working title). A study
on the attitudes and participation of residents in the local authorities taking part in the ARTTU research in 2008 and in 2011. Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies. An Acta
research publication. The Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities Helsinki.
Siv Sandberg (ed.): Systems of management in the municipalities participating in the ARTTU
research (a working title). A joint report on the ARTTU research programme. Evaluation
Research Programme ARTTU Studies.
Pentti Meklin (ed.): Reform of service structures — what changes did the municipalities really
make during the reform period 2007—2012? (a working title). A joint report on the ARTTU
research programme. Evaluation Research Programme ARTTU Studies.
Other sources used in the report:
Aronen Kauko (2009): Kaupunkiseutujen kuntaliitokset etenevät hitaasti. Hallinto 5/2009.
Berg Rikke, Ulrik Kjaer (2007): Lokalt politiskt lederskab. Odense: Syddansk Universitetsforlag.
Kunnat toteuttavat uudistuksen: Kunta- ja palvelurakenneuudistus. 2nd edition. The Association
of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities Helsinki 2007.
The statistics at kunnat.net: www.kunnat.net/kuntaliitokset and
http://www.kunnat.net/fi/tietopankit/tilastot/aluejaot/Sivut/default.aspx
The statistics of the Ministry of Education and Culture.
http://www.okm.fi/OPM/Koulutus/ammatillinen_koulutus/tilastoja_ja_tunnuslukuja/?lang=fi
Basic public services programmes. The Ministry of Finance.
Stenvall Jari, Hanna Vakkala, Antti Syväjärvi, Jaana Leinonen, Pekka Juntunen, Lasse Oulasvirta,
Aaro Tiilikainen (2009): Parasta nyt – Kunta- ja palvelurakenneuudistuksen suunnitteluvaiheen
loppuarviointi (Local government reform to date - Final report for the planning stage of the
local government reform). Ministry of Finance publications 11/2009. Helsinki.
Toimiva kaupunkiseutu – kuntalaisten, kuntien ja seudun etu (An Effective Metropolitan
Region - the Interests of Municipal Residents, Municipalities and the Region). The report
of an expert working group studying the economic interaction relationships of large cities
and suburban municipalities – Case: the Turku and Jyväskylä metropolitan areas. Ministry of
Finance publications 22/2009 Municipalities.
Government report on the reform to restructure local government and services (9/2009) (in
Finnish).
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VTV (2011) Vammaispalvelut muuttuvassa kunta- ja palvelurakenteessa (Services for persons
with disabilities in a changing municipal and service structure). Performance audit reports of
the National Audit Office 221/2011. National Audit Office: Helsinki.
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