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Język Polski
Local government - between a systemic and organisational form of executive power and fourth power
Abstract
RESEARCH OBJECTIVE: The aim of the article is to determine the conditions for recognising an entity of sociopolitical life as fulfilling the functions of the fourth authority and to verify whether the Polish local government can be considered the fourth authority.
THE RESEARCH PROBLEM AND METHODS: The research problem is whether the local government in Poland is the fourth authority or “only” part of the executive power? The research used desk research, institutional-legal analysis and comparative methods.
THE PROCESS OF ARGUMENTATION: It was examined which of the two main theories of local self-government could provide a theoretical basis for considering it as a fourth authority, the legal status of local self-government in Poland was determined, and an operational definition of the fourth authority was formulated. This made it possible to analyse the circumstances and key conditions for the recognition of local self-government as the fourth authority and to identify the instruments of this authority.
RESEARCH RESULTS: When certain conditions are met, the territorial self-government in Poland can be considered the fourth authority. The subject of this authority are the communities of inhabitants, while the instruments are institutionalised in legal form and/or formalised instruments of participatory democracy. A feature of this power is its dispersion, as it mainly appears within specific local government units.
CONCLUSIONS, INNOVATIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS: The fourth authority, associated above all with the media and control of public authorities, may also be understood differently, as a specific form of influence and a way of creating reality. It can be realised not only at the national level, but also at lower levels of public authority – in local government units. Making members of self-governing communities aware of this fact could contribute to an increase in citizens’ involvement in local public affairs.
Keywords
local government ; authority ; ‘fourth authority’ ; instruments of the ‘fourth authority’
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