Urban districts of Sweden

Municipalities in Sweden are in some rare cases divided into smaller districts (sometimes translated boroughs) or urban districts, and are sometimes assigned administrative boards responsible for certain areas of governance in their respective areas. These districts are not specified by national Swedish law, but rather are created by individual municipalities, and thus the Swedish names of these districts vary greatly from municipality to municipality, including kommundelar, stadsdelar, stadsdelområden, primärområden, or stadsdelsnämndsområden. The degree of administrative autonomy of these districts similarly varies greatly, but is normally very limited.

The city council (kommunfullmäktige) of has divided the city into smaller subdivisions. The city uses the English term "district" (Swedish: stadsdelområde) to describe these subdivisions.

The districts were first created in 1997 to facilitate the efficiency of local government in Stockholm. The number of districts was reduced from 24 to 18 the following year, and reduced again to the current 14 in 2007. Since the establishment of these districts, certain administrative tasks, such as school administration were re-centralized.

Each district has its own district administration, led by a district council, which is responsible for certain areas of municipal governance within their district, including pre-school education, park maintenance, local economic initiatives, elderly services, financial counseling, and refugee reception services. Individual district councils have no power over city planning or tax policy, both of which are retained by the central city council.

The councilors that serve on these district councils are often part-time politicians, also holding other employment. They are preferably residents of the district whose council they serve upon. The central city council itself is responsible for setting the budget, goals, and responsibilities of the district councils. The city council also appoints the members of each district council, so the political makeup of the district council resembles that of the central city council, not necessarily that of the district. The member of the district council are not elected in any fashion by the residents of the district in question.

Stockholm's 14 districts are sometimes divided into smaller parts for statistical purposes, however these smaller districts have no administrative function in the city's governance.

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