Motives for revisiting inter-municipal cooperation

Inter-municipal cooperation (IMC) is a growing occurrence in Europe and one of the most diverse phenomena in local government’s landscape. This chapter presents the aim of the book, how it is organised and explains why a new approach to IMC is necessary. It examines the intrinsic features of these governance arrangements and institutions created to generate and maintain collaboration between different local governments: motives for cooperation and how their different origins can induce diverse cooperative experiences; perspectives and roles of the actors involved; consequences of such arrangements; and the democratic aspects of these governance settings, especially regarding legitimacy and accountability features. Looking for these multiple aspects requires not only a comparative approach but also an in-depth analysis of some specific cases, in order to enrich the already available knowledge.