The role of the Metropolitan Municipality in the transformation of local democracy in Turkey

It is known that the cities whose first formations were encountered in 4000 BC were later established in the Mediterranean basin, but cities in the modern sense emerged in Western Europe with the developments experienced after the second half of the 18th century. These developments, which have a great impact on the cities, are the increase in the urban population as a result of the population mobility that started from rural settlements to urban settlements in order to meet the workforce need in the cities where mass production started with the industrial revolution, and the population increase experienced as a result of the increase in welfare with mass production. With the increase in the diversity of services, difficulties began to be experienced in the provision of local public services, especially services that provide integrity such as zoning, infrastructure, cleaning, water and transportation. The method developed to overcome the difficulties experienced in service delivery was to enlarge the scales and reduce the number of municipalities by combining them. A similar situation began to be experienced in our country after the 1950s. Finally, in the cities where industrial activities are concentrated, the Metropolitan Municipality was established as a new model in the big cities that became increasingly unmanageable with the increase in the urban population due to urbanization and migration. In this study, the effect of the Metropolitan Municipality, which took its place in our lives as a new administrative unit designed in two stages in 1984, on local democracy in our country will be examined. Keywords: Autonomy, Decentralization, Local Democracy, Metropolitan Municipality, Two-Level Structure