A municipality is an administrative entity composed of a clearly defined territory and its population and commonly denotes a city, town, or village, or a small grouping of them. A municipality is typically governed by a mayor and a city council or municipal council.
Municipalities are not necessarily the same as townships. A municipality is a general-purpose district, as opposed to a special-purpose district.
In some countries, municipalities are referred to as "communes" (for example, French commune, Italian comune, Swedish kommun and Norwegian/Danish kommune). The term derives from the medieval commune.
The largest municipalities can be found in Canada and Greenland. Most likely the largest municipality is Avernasuaq in Greenland, which is larger than the whole United Kingdom.
In some countries, especially in the Middle East, the term "municipality" is also used to refer to the municipal administrative building known elsewhere as the town hall or city hall.
Municipalities as lower-level entities
In Albania, a municipality is either part of a city or a province such as The municipality of Tirana which, in 2005, earned the international price of most efficient municipality in Europe."
In Argentina, a municipality (municipalidad) is a city, town, or township, which is part of a province. The provinces organize the municipalities in their territories according to their own municipal regime.
In Chile, a municipality (municipalidad) is a legal entity which administers one or more communes (comuna) which are the third-level division of the country. The first division are regions which a next divided into provinces (provincia). These provinces are next divided into comunas which are assigned to a municipality for administration. In most cases the municipality and the comuna have the same name, but the constitution permits a single municipality to be responsible for more than one commune.
In Finland, a municipality (kunta / kommun) co-operates with municipalities nearby in a sub-region (seutukunta / region) and region (maakunta / landskap); a region belongs to a province (lääni / län) of the state. A municipality can freely call itself a "city" (kaupunki / stad).
In Germany, a municipality (Gemeinde) is part of a district (Kreis). Larger entities of the same level are called towns (Stadt). In less populated regions, municipalities are often put together into collective municipalities (Verbandsgemeinde)
In Greece, a municipality is either demoi or koinotetes (demoi with little population) which is then part of a prefecture (nomos) and then a larger region known as a periphery. Municipalities are third-level administrative divisions and their heads (mayors in demoi, presidents in koinotetes) are appointed via popular vote held every four years.
In Hungary, a municipality (települési önkormányzat) is part of a county (megye).
In India, a municipality is often referred to town. It is neither village nor big city. Usually, a municipality would have 100,000 or more people, but if it exceeds one million, it becomes a corporation.
In Italy, a comune is part of a province (provincia) which is part of a region (regione). The term "municipality" is reserved for subdivisions of larger comuni (in particular, the comune of Rome).
In Japan, a municipality is the sphere of government within the prefectures, the sub-division of the state.
In Kenya, a municipality is one of four types of local authorities. Nearly 50 major towns are given the municipality status.
In Latvia, a rural municipality (sing.:novads, plur.:novadi) is part of a district (sing.:rajons, plur.:rajoni). A rural municipality normally consists of amalgatedparishes (sing.:pagasts, plur.:pagasti). An urban municipality is called rajons.
Every part of mainland New Zealand is part of either a "city" (mostly urban) or a "district" (mostly rural). The term "municipality" has become rare in New Zealand since about 1979 and has no legal status.
In Peru, a municipality (municipio) is another term for district (distrito) and is the lower-level administrative subdivision. It is part of a province (provincia), which is part of a department (departamento). As of 2002 a department is now called a region (región).
In Portugal, a municipality (município) is a directly elected local area authority generally consisting of a main city and surrounding villages, with wide-ranging local administration powers. It is also a subdivision of a district for central government purposes(distritos).
In Puerto Rico, a municipality (municipio) is a town or city with a popularly elected administration, including a mayor.
In Romania, a municipality (municipiu) is a town or a city ranked by law at this level. A commune is the lowest subdivision of a jude?.
In the United States, the entities that have status as a municipality vary from state to state. Cities, towns, boroughs, or villages are common terms for municipalities. Townships, counties, and parishes are not generally considered to be municipalities, although there are exceptions. In some states, towns have a non-municipal status similar to townships. Likewise, some townships have full municipal status.
In Jersey, a municipality refers to the honorary officials elected to run each of the 12 Parishes into which it is subdivided. This is the highest level of regional government in this jurisdiction.
In Macedonia, 84 municipalities (op?tini; singular: op?tina) were established in 2004, reduced from 123 created in 1996.
In Portugal, a municipality (município/concelho) is the primary local administrative unit. Although it is a part of a district (distrito) for certain national administrative purposes, the municipality is not subordinate to the district and decentralization is doing away with the districts. A municipality contains one or more freguesias.
In Puerto Rico, there are no first order administrative divisions, and the municipalities (municipio) serves as second-order, but first level, administrative divisions.
In Montenegro, a municipality (op?tina) is the topmost regional division
In Slovenia, a municipality (ob?ina) is the primary local administrative unit. There are 210 of them, 11 of which have a special "Urban" status with additional autonomy.
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