Talk:Administrative divisions of Portugal

New NUTS Regions/subregions?
So is it official that Portugal is using these new NUTS regions and subregions? If so, how does the hierarchy work? Regions, subregions, municipalities? Thanks! Rarelibra 14:42 7 FEB 06

Cleanup
I marked the article for cleanup because it contains references to several divisions that don't really exist and it doesn't contain a single reference to the MAJOR subdivision of the country, the municipality. Afonso Silva 12:40, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
 * I tried to do something with this mess and I've added the municipality reference. Can someone help improve it? Gameiro 18:24, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
 * All the regions and subregions in the article exist and are official. As the article stated, there are also some historic regions that were discontinued. The NUTS II regions are instrumental in European Union's Structural Fund delivery mechanisms. Page Up 00:16, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, they are statistic regions, not administrative regions, Portugal is still divided into districts and municipalities, those are the two administrative regions, with political powers, this article is like a list with some original research, do you find it pretty? And there is almost nothing about the municipality, which is the most important divisions, at least, the one you vote for and pay taxes for and lots of other things you certainly know. The power is in the hands of the municipalities, not in the NUTS III, that's just EU stuff. Do you agree? Afonso Silva 09:09, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
 * The subdivisons are not merely a power issue, they handle every aspect of government, sociocultural and statistical matters. If you wish, you can expand a section about concelhos and freguesias, but the NUTS subdivisions are also important and an actual reality. Maybe in a couple of years we won't hear about anything else. Page Up 13:59, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
 * I don't care about what we will hear about in the future, as you surely know, wikipedia is not a crystal ball. And I don't know any kind of movement in the Portuguese society trying to create a subdivision structure based on NUTS III regions. The subdivisions are mainly a power issue, and I think that should be the basis for the article. Along with that thing of the NUTS III we have the metropolitan areas and intermunicipal communities, do we have two subidivision schemes? We don't. Actually, the latter are just a failure. We will have changes in the Portuguese subdivision structure sooner or later, sure, but right now, the article is quite bad, it looks like a list, it is incomplete and needs updating. Afonso Silva 19:24, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree when you say Intermunicipal Communities are a failure. In fact you can even say they are totally irrelevant in Portugal, but for the other side, that doesn't mean the NUTS divisions doesn't have any value. As you surely know, they are different things. I just hope you don't remove the references about NUTS, because NUTS divisions are absolutely relevant information to this article. And when you talk about NUTS II, you must talk about the NUTS III which are subdivisions of NUTS II. I will add external sources to the NUTS section in order to dissipate any doubt. Page Up 20:38, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
 * I will not remove any reference to NUTS, they are useful, I think you misunderstood my point. Along with that, I dislike editing an article against other cotnributor opinion, that's why I started this discussion. I just think the article shows that the Portuguese subdivision structure is mainly based on the european NUTS, that's wrong. I think we need a text explaining the nature of both types of subdivisions and separate sections for NUTS and Districts-Municipalities-Parishes, and, more important than that, the article is just a list with lots of info about the intermunicipal communities. Afonso Silva 20:51, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Ok Afonso, I understand. Do your best. Regards. Page Up 20:31, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, I agree with the proposed changes. Since Portugal does not have a very clear division (we have the statistical and economical division - NUTS and the political division - Districts and Municipalities) I think that those ambiguities should be adressed and made clear in any future revision of this article. Any other considerations should (the irrelevant ComUrb and similiar stuff), by now, be mentioned in a third part of the article. User:prvc 13:20 12/05/2006

Afonso Silva is basically right: if one talks about "politico-administrative" divisions, then either "distritos" are NOT included or they are included but with a reference to the fact that the respective "governadores civis" are not elected and their powers are extremely limited and not politically in content. Including districts in an article about administrative divisions can only create confusion: non-Portuguese readers will think distritos can be compared with, say, French districts or German Länder or Italian regions and provinces. In fact, and contrarily to all these examples, Portuguese districts almost don't have powers at all and they are not even elected (civil governos are nominated by central government).

What is important to stress in order to give an accurate description of the administrative division of Portugal is the fact that, except for Açores and Madeira, there is no true intermediate politico-administrative level in Portugal. Below central government, the main division is "município". Below "município", "freguesia" IS a politico-administrative level in the sense their are elected and have some administrative duties but it should be stressed these duties are extremely limited and non-politically in content (registry of cats and dogs, a residence certification, etc.).

Ricardo Vicente aw5678@gmail.com —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.103.40.149 (talk) 15:35, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Finally, a note about NUTS divisions: those are NOT Portuguese divisions: those are divisions of Eurostat: they are not created by the Portuguese constitutional or ordinary law and their purpose are not the Portuguese administration. NUTS division can best be seen as "administrative divisions" of the European Union: they relate to European Union policies on one hand; on the other hand, they do not relate in any way with the "Portuguese created" division of Portugal.

NUTS divisions should be explained in their own specific article; in the article about Portuguese administrative divisions they deserve only a brief reference.

Ricardo Vicente aw5678@gmail.com —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.103.40.149 (talk) 15:43, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Legislative authority
One issue not covered in the article is the extent to which legislative authority is devolved. MikeHobday 09:14, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

The Assembleia da República must not have enough real work
Well, this has made this article outdated: http://dre.pt/pdf1sdip/2008/08/16500/0600506011.PDF. My Portuguese legalese is fairly weak. Any natives want to take a stab at adjusting the article, se faz favor. --Nricardo (talk) 17:48, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

"Distritos" do not matter!
Do you want a rule of thumb to classify an encyclopedia either as good and accurate or bad and inaccurate? Read the article concerning Portuguese districts and the politico-administrative divisions of Portugal: if it says Portuguese "distritos" are very important, the encyclopedia might be deemed inaccurate and bad.

In Portugal, there are two main politico-administrative levels: central government and municipalities. With the exceptions of the autonomous regions of Açores and Madeira, there DO NOT exist any intermediate politico-administrative level in Portugal. I.e., except for the Atlantic Ocean archipelagos, Portugal administration goes directly from central power to local power.

But then... what are "distritos"? Each district has a "Governador Civil" ("civil governor") who is NOT elected but simply nominated by the central government; his/her functions are nothing much more than some responsibilities over civil protection (coordination of resources and efforts in the case and prevention of floods, fires, etc.) and to "determine" the day of local power elections (actually, local power election date is decided among political parties, central government and the President of the Republic, the "Governador Civil" plays only a formal and almost irrelevant role here). ---> Please correct this if you wish, I am just a guest... [The position of "Governador Civil" ("civil governor") was extinct on September 8th, 2011. Districts are important for elections of "Assembleia da República", because it is at district level that deputies are elected. Other than that, they are simply groups of geographically close municipalities. Reference: https://www.cmjornal.pt/portugal/detalhe/governos-civis-foram-oficialmente-extintos ] — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.189.159.125 (talk) 10:58, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

Since the competences of the civil governor are only a few, they are not political in content at all, and since the civil governor is not elected - one can accurately say that "distritos" are the less important politico-administrative division in Portugal. Actually, it is weird to call it a "political" division. And even though a district encompasses many municipalities, the civil governor has no power whatsoever over local power (i.e., municipalities and "freguesias").

It is "municípios" (and to a much, much lesser extent "freguesias") the politico-administrative divisions that do matter in Portugal: they are directly elected and have many responsiblities with direct influence on the daily life of citizens; some of those responsibilities are pretty much political in content; they have their own budgets and power.

In conclusion: all Wikipedia articles thay claim "distritos" are very important politico-administrative divisions of Portugal are wrong and should be changed; also, the articles about Portuguese cities: for instance, the article about Lisbon tells this city is the seat of the district with the same name even before stating Lisbon is the biggest Portuguese municipality. It would be just better not to make any reference to the fact that Lisbon is also the name of a district.

A final note: all the problems and strange statements about Portuguese districts one finds in encyclopedias, including this one, might have two reasons:

1. historically, the Portuguese concept of "distrito" was imported from the French concept of "district" and since in France "districts" are, I believe, important, so people who write encyclopedia articles believe "districts" are important in Portugal too;

2. since most European countries have intermediate politico-administrative level or levels (German Länder, Spanish autonomous regions, Italian regions and provinces, Belgian federal divisions, United Kingdom's countries, etc., etc.), people might just assume that the same is true in the case of Portugal. But the truth is other: according to the "Constituição da República Portuguesa", Portugal is an unitary state, PARTLY and PERIPHERICALLY regionalized: this means that only a part of Portugal has its own intermediate politico-administrative level. Except Açores and Madeira, there is no intermediate politico-administrative level in Portugal. And, to avoid any confusions, "mainland Portugal" or "continental Portugal" is not an autonomous region of Portugal and has no regional government of its own.

Ricardo Vicente aw5678@gmail.com —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.103.40.149 (talk) 15:03, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Regions of Portugal
Several of my edits were reverted, concerning to the regions where the capitals of the Portuguese districts were located. The regions in which these cities are described to be located (in this particular wikipedia) are actually artificial regions, created only for EU purposes, mostly for statistical purposes. According to common and widely accepted knowledge among the Portuguese people, Portugal is divided in 18 districts in the Portuguese mainland and 2 autonomous regions (Madeira and Azores), which continue to be relevant concerning to almost all administrative purposes, in spite of the abolition of the "Governos Civis". And, apart from the districts, the regions of Portugal are not usually defined as they're defined for EU purposes. It's quite ridiculous for any Portuguese to say that Santarém is in Alentejo, for instance, as it is widely known that it's located in Ribatejo which is a very distinct region of Portugal. Therefore, I don't consider to be correct to define the regions in Portugal according to EU definitions, since Portugal is a sovereign country (and not a colony of Brussels) and it has very well defined national subdivisions (districts and autonomous regions) as well as very well defined historical regions. Thanks for the attention of the readers in the English Wikipedia, though I mostly edit in the Portuguese and Spanish wikipedias and, therefore I will not dispute the edits on the English Wikipedia, which is not relevant for me in what concerns to issues related with Portugal.Viet-hoian1 (talk) 22:55, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * You have a different view from the majority and against the standards of Wikipedia. In infobox in articles about Portugal places there are two type of division: region of NUTS (NUTS of Portugal) and Districts of Portugal (based of 18 historical regions). Your edits are completely unnecessary. You write as if there was only one type of division: region of NUTS. No, in infoboxes there is also Districts of Portugal (based of 18 historical regions). The same is in Portuguese Wikipedia . Subtropical -man   talk   (en-2)   11:10, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

Original research
Municipal communities and metropolitan areas did not replace districts as 1st level divisions. Districts were never extinguished as a subdivision. They are only directly governed by the executive, instead of civil-governors. --B.Lameira (talk) 02:11, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
 * More than a year has passed and no one adresses this serious issue. Does no one even have interest on discussing it? B.Lameira (talk) 17:57, 2 September 2017 (UTC)

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