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Constitutional Act no. 347/1997 Coll., on the Creation of Higher Territorial Self-Governing Units and on Amendments to the Constitutional Act of the Czech National Council, No. 1/1993 Coll., the Constitution of the Czech Republic.

Constitutional act n. 347/1997 should be seen as part of public administration (and territorial self-government) reform which took place mainly in the 1990s. Its outcome can be described as a two-tier system of territorial self-government that consists of municipalities and higher self-governing regions.

Even though the original wording of the Constitution safeguarded the self-government of territorial units, the real situation was more complex. Municipal self-government had been in place since the early 1990s. The higher self-governing regions (regions or lands to be more precise) have been envisaged by the Constitution (inter alia art. 99, 100 or 101) , but it took several years to put this into practice. This constitutional act was the first important step in this process (note that art. 100 para. 3 prescribes that a constitutional act is necessary to create a higher self-governing region).

The constitutional act created 14 higher self-governing regions (13 proper regions and the capital city of Prague. The capital city is not regulated by act n. 129/2000 Coll. on the regions, but by the special act on the capital city of Prague (n. 131/2000 Coll.). The capital city has a specific “hybrid” position. On the one hand, its competences are similar as those of the regions, on the other hand, it is led by a mayor and not a “hejtman”, the election takes place together with the municipal elections etc.

This constitutional act did by no means finish the reform of territorial self-government. The regions started working properly at the turn of 2000 and 2001 after the first regional elections.

As mentioned above, the original text of the Constitution allowed for regions of lands to be established. In the end, the former option was chosen. The term “land” can still be used to denote the historical lands of the Czech Crown (Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia); those lands however do not have legal significance anymore.

Regions as self-governing territorial units should not be confused with the former regions pursuant to act n. 36/1960 Coll. These former regions did not have (and do not have) a self-governing nature, but their territory still influences territorial organization of some state bodies (for example regional courts).