Local self-government in the Republic of Belarus is an institution of constitutional law. It declares functioning of institutions of direct and indirect democracy. The aim of following paper is to describe legal aspects of institutions of direct democracy in the system of local self-government in Belarus including local referendum, local assembly and territorial social self-government. It discusses also problems in implementation of direct democracy mechanisms, relating this with the specificity of nondemocratic political regime in contemporary Belarus.

Od kilku dekad, nie tylko w Wielkiej Brytanii, obserwować można spadające zainteresowanie obywateli uczestnictwem w polityce i symptomy kryzysu demokracji przedstawicielskiej. Za jeden ze sposobów przeciwdziałania temu zjawisku uważa się wykorzystanie nowych technologii. Z jednej strony ich upowszechnienie umożliwia obywatelom szeroki dostęp do informacji, z drugiej rozszerza oferowane im możliwości udziału i wpływania na decyzje polityczne. Celem artykułu jest omówienie i analiza polityki kolejnych brytyjskich rządów dotyczącej wykorzystania Internetu do budowania skuteczniejszych kanałów komunikacji na poziomie lokalnym w Anglii i wzmocnienia demokracji. Wykorzystane metody badawcze to przede wszystkim analiza dokumentów oraz źródeł wtórnych. Szczególna uwaga została skupiona na analizie regulacji dotyczących wprowadzenia i rozwoju na poziomie lokalnym jednego z najpopularniejszych mechanizmów e-demokracji w Wielkiej Brytanii, który doczekał się regulacji ustawowej – elektronicznych petycji.

In this article, we write about the key principles of decentralization of state power and peculiarities of its realization in conditions of democratic transformation (experience of Ukraine). Decentralization became a real megatrend of the XX and probably XXI centuries (at least in Ukraine). First of all because of the ever-increasing interest of people in the role of civil society and the private sector as the primary partners of the state and local self-government bodies to search for new methods, instruments and approaches to solve local issues at the level of their emergence. Decentralization as a process involves, first of all, restructuring, review of procedures and redistribution of powers to increase the competitiveness of territorial communities, to strengthen democracy and effectively address local issues at the level of their emergence. At the time of globalization, decentralization has become its foundation, as it increases the weight of local rule-making and the importance of relationships at the international, national, regional and local levels through the practical application of the principle of subsidiarity.

Normative model for the verification of municipal elections’ validity – analysis based on the jurisprudence

The democratic electoral process implies the existence of mechanisms that verify the elections’ validity. In Poland, competence in this area has been entrusted to the courts. The assessment of the elections’ validity is based on the rules deriving from the binding provisions of law. The purpose of this article is to discuss the claim that the model for verifying the validity of local elections, which is shaped by the normative regulations and the jurisprudence, is characterised by a significant, perhaps excessive, degree of restrictiveness. The rigorous provisions determine the course of interpretation thereof. In practice, it means that the presumption of elections’ validity is enhanced. This analysis of the provisions of law and selected court judgments will allow for the formulation of final conclusions regarding the current model for verification of the municipal elections’ validity.

The aim of the text is the analysis of the tasks and activities of the municipal self-government during the organization of the 2020 election of the President in Poland during the period from the beginning of February to May 10, 2020, when, due to the development of the pandemic, the process of preparing the election took a different course. The study is based on documents and five in-depth expert interviews conducted with persons associated with the organization of the elections. This publication draws attention to the lack of knowledge about various aspects of the pandemic, the protraction of the decision-making process, the lack of cooperation, and citizens’ fears.