R5 - Regional Government AnalysisReturn

Financial stability of municipalities is an important aspect for long-term sustainable development and disproportionate debt can generate risks for their standard functioning. Although there are many methodologies for assessing the financial stability and health of municipalities, they are usually based on central government needs and are not used for financial management and planning. The aim of the article is to develop a set of indicators for assessing financial stability and health for needs of municipalities by using publicly available information. The selected indicators highlight two basic assumptions important for short and long-term budget balance and sustainability of funding. Concretely, the balance of the current budget should always be positive and the maximum debt service should not exceed the surplus of the current budget. The set of indicators includes three groups of indicators: budgetary management, indebtedness and liquidity. There is a clearly defined and interpretable assessment for each indicator in terms of financial stability and potential risk.

Research, development and innovation is considered to be a main driver of economic development. Innovation policy becomes therefore one of the most important public policies. There exists general agreement that the best way to support innovation is to aim at the regional level while realizing innovation policy. Proximity enables regional actors to create tacit knowledge ensuring powerful competitive advantages for both firms and regions. At the same time, the concept of regional innovation systems is the most promising way to support innovation and knowledge transfer in the region. The paper presents the case of Tampere innovation system as an example of good practice for the South Moravian Region. Although it is only possible to learn limitedly from other regions it the case of innovation policy (because of regional specifics), an analysis of Tampere innovation system can provide useful information. The paper argues that the most important strength of Tampere innovation system is an intensive cooperation between actors of innovation process based on long-lasting trust.