No abstract

The economic crisis has affected the EU regions very differently over the last five years, depending on the region's strengths or weaknesses, its sectoral structure and the response of national and regional governments. In some countries, downturns can lead to narrower interregional disparities, while in some can trigger regional divergence. Previous empirical studies indicate that there is a tendency for regional disparities to grow during recessions, and diminish in the period of economic growth (Dunford and Parron, 1994; Evans and MacCormic, 1994, Audas and Mackay, 1997). Although the reduction of regional disparities represents one of the priorities of EU regional policy and of Croatian regional policy, regional disparities within the Croatia are still significant. The current economic crisis that has emerged in the Croatian economy has already an enormous negative effect on several national and regional development indicators like GDP per capita, unemployment, and productivity. Some areas are coping with structural changes such as de-industrialization. In line with that 2 the main aim of the paper is to find out if regional imbalances within Croatia have been more exposed by the current crises? This paper analyses the disparities between economic developments of Croatian counties before the crisis (before 2009) in comparison with the recession period. The analysis focuses on regional development index and other available socioeconomic indicators (GDP per capita, unemployment rate). Obtained results can serve as a ground for improvements in Croatian regional economic policy.

The aim of this article is to construct a monthly coincident indicator of real economic activity in Croatia. For that purpose, we use a database containing altogether 278 time series, ranging from January 1998 to December 2010. In step one we use correlation analysis, logit and Markov switching (MS) model in order to select time series that closely follow the overall business cycle and its turning points. The following four series have been detected as having the best coincident properties: industrial production, volume of retail sales, VAT revenues and total credit to households. In step two we apply dynamic factor model methodology to the aforementioned coincident series in order to estimate their common component, which is then used to construct a monthly coincident indicator of real economic activity.

sandra švaljek, ivana rašić bakarić, marijana sumpor: citizens and the city: the case for participatory budgeting in the city of zagreb public sector economics 43 (1) 21-48 (2019) 22 Abstract Since there is constant concern that local government heads allocate budget resources in favour of various pressure groups, the paper investigates whether local participatory budgeting can be implemented in order to better align budget allocation with citizens' needs in the Croatian context. The paper analyses the results of the citizen survey intended to question whether the citizens of Zagreb could embrace the participatory budgeting, based on their interest in the way the money of Zagreb's taxpayers is spent and willingness to participate in the budget preparation process. The main determinants of the interest, awareness and participation of citizens in local budget processes are explored as well. The results of this study indicate a moderate level of citizen awareness and interest in local budget processes, but an extremely low level of participation. Since citizen participation is crucial for democratic decision-making and ensuring transparency and accountability, the identified factors should be addressed in a planned manner. Citizens' willingness and capacity can be increased through raising awareness and implementing measures intended to encourage spontaneous participation.

T he article deals with a proposal of a new administrative-territorial division at regional selfgovernment level in the Republic of Croatia. The main aim of the paper is to obtain optimal administrative -territorial division of the country which would provide optimal performance of public tasks and responsibilities at the regional level. The proposal is obtained through use of multivariate statistical methods, and it is based on a wide number of demographic, economic, and public functions indicators measured on 20 Croatian counties. The main grouping criterion is importance and representatives of identified public functions' dimensions. As a result of the analysis, seven new regions are created and they should replace the existing 20 counties. Each of the obtained regions contains counties with similar characteristics and similar capacity for public function completition. ARTICLE INFOJEL classification: C38, H70, O18