Municipal autonomy in Ecuador and Cuba. challenges in its practical implementation

Abstract

Within the municipalist doctrines, autonomy becomes in principle the cardinal theoretical principle of the municipalities that materializes in the practical action of the local entities. Autonomy can only be understood from the relations of the municipality with the State, as the latter will always be part of a superior political and territorial entity, which determines that it will have independence and capacity for self-determination in the exercise of its competences and attributions, always limited, depending on the general interests of the nation to which it is due. State-municipal relations have historically gone through stages of greater or lesser centralization or decentralization according to the different countries and eras. In the Republic of Ecuador and the Republic of Cuba this principle is recognized in the constitutional texts of 2008 and 2019, respectively, as well as in ordinary legislation. Although there are notable differences between the Ecuadorian conception of decentralized autonomous governments – with a scope that goes beyond the municipality – and the Cuban conception of municipal autonomy, in both countries its realization in practice faces challenges, conditioned by the political, social, and historical particularities of both countries.