The informational basis of the dissertation research was the materials of the Ministry for Communities and Territories Development of Ukraine, the State Statistics Service of Ukraine, normative and legal documents, in particular, the Constitution of Ukraine, laws of Ukraine, analytical and statistical materials of central state authorities, local authorities and local self-government bodies, scientific works of national and foreign scientists, collected personally by the author during the cameral and expedition stages, as well as theses of reports and scientific publications in specialized journals.
The aim of the dissertation is socio-geographical analysis of the development potential of territorial communities of Chernivtsi region and the development of priority directions for increasing their capacity.
The essence of the notion of "community" and "territorial community" is revealed, three stages of approaches to the interpretation of the notion of "territorial community" by domestic scientists are highlighted: pre-charter, post-charter and post-revolutionary. It was found that the territorial community, considered as a basic link of the administrative-territorial system, falls into a wide range of socio-geographical studies, the key issue in this context is the importance of forming self-sufficient, capable communities. Models of local self-government are determined and their implementation is characterized on the example of foreign countries.
The methodology of socio-geographic research of territorial communities as administrative-territorial units of the basic level is formulated. It is offered to distinguish three research stages: theoretical-methodological, analytical-synthetic and constructive. The factors of the development potential of the territorial communities of Chernivtsi region were analyzed, in particular, the natural resource potential of the territory of Chernivtsi region and the geographical and neighborhood position of the territorial communities of the region are characterized; an analysis of the historical-geographic features of the development of the administrative-territorial structure of the modern territory of Chernivtsi region was carried out, as well as an analysis of the methodology and approaches to the selection of administrative-territorial units of the basic and subregional levels during the decentralization reform; the impact of the decentralization reform on the financial capacity of territorial communities, which led to an increase in the income of voluntarily united communities of the region, was determined.
The ranks and disproportionality in the development of the communities of Chernivtsi region were determined according to the following key indicators of demographic development: the number of the population of the territorial community, the change in the number of the population during the years 2001-2021, the share of the population younger than working age, the share of the population of working age, the share of the population older than working age; according to the following key indicators of financial development: revenues of the general fund, tax capacity index, subsidization, the share of labor costs for general government functions (local self-government) from the revenue part of the general fund budget, income from a single tax, land tax, housing and communal services expenses, capital expenses, cultural expenses, physical education and sports; according to the following key indicators of territorial and infrastructural development (quantitative characteristics): the area of the territorial community, the number of educational institutions (the sum of preschool and general educational institutions), primary medical care institutions, cultural institutions (houses of culture, libraries, museums and art schools).
