CITY COMPETITIVENESS IN CROATIA – REALITY OR UTOPIA?

Increasing global concern with competitiveness has inevitably left its trace on place marketing, as well. City regions administrations faced with changes in the economy structure, higher unemployment rates, rising social needs and higher local budget deficits which all reduces city-region level of competitiveness, have decided to apply different measures and to take actions. Some of these actions include the implementation of new management approaches, such as new public management or place marketing. The research conducted on the activities, opinions and knowledge of the representatives in the administration of Croatian cites, presented in this paper provide an insight into the level of understanding the notion of city region competitiveness and the perception of different views on the local government role among several stakeholders responsible for the city development. Furthermore with this research it has been possible to determine the influence which existing legislation, present fiscal and management decentralization exercise with regard to the functioning of Croatian cities and other levels of place marketing. The results of the research indicate that there is a high level of acceptance of the notion of place as a product and place competitiveness as well, but there is a significantly lower level of previous competitiveness measurement actions, which implies that the reality of the Croatian place marketing is considerably different from the perceptions about the importance of place competitiveness among stakeholders responsible for the city development. Finally, the determined level of awareness about the need for place performance measurement and the realization of activities intended for improving the place competitiveness represent a strong stimulus for creating a unique index of competitiveness among cites in Croatia and at the same time stressing the necessity for place marketing implementation, especially for cities.