Serviciile publice exercitate de autorităţile publice şi instituţiile publice. Unele trăsături comune şi deoisebiri [Articol]

Abstract

Public authorities and public institutions represent important categories of public services in a broad sense. As for public institutions, their general status is currently regulated by civil legislation or private law. But recent legislative trends are directed towards establishing a separate law on public institutions. We consider important that, in the process of creating the new normative framework regarding public institutions, attention should be drawn to a series of fundamental aspects, because without taking them into consideration there is a risk of deviating from the purpose or aim of public institutions as an important category of public services. In theoretical-practical aspect we have three main categories of public services, which are created to ensure the public interest and fulfil the main functions of the state according to the constitutional provisions: i) public authorities (or state bodies), ii) public institutions, and iii) state or municipal enterprises. As for public institutions, they can be central and local, the latter being founded by local public administration authorities under the conditions of administrative decentralization and local autonomy. Although, even at the central level we have public institutions that enjoy autonomy, such as university institutions. Many public authorities, especially public administration authorities, combine the main activities, in the regime of public power, with activities of a provider nature – as a common feature for all categories of public services, respectively it is very easy to deviate and consider that it is about the activity of a public institution and vice versa. Therefore, it seems to be natural the activity of some public authorities that pursue mixed tasks: both authoritative and provider, including preserving the respective form of organization. In the same way, it would be necessary to consider the fact that part of the activities carried out by public institutions are concessioned to institutions and other private entities, that is, the element of public interest persists within their activity, implying similar public law regulations. Therefore, all the mentioned aspects would be useful to be taken into consideration in the framework of the new regulations regarding the legal status of public institutions, including in order not to admit excesses and turbulence in the activity of other categories of public services or public entities such as public administration authorities and state or municipal enterprises.