Regions of Slovenia

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Updates: 

I've updated the populations of the statistical regions of Slovenia to the 2002 census.

Slovenia's Government Communication Office  says that (as of 2007-03-13) the legislature is considering proposals to divide the country into fourteen provinces.

New proposed NUTS codes for Slovenia were issued on 2004-09-15. I have updated the table to show them.

ISO 3166-2 Newsletter Number I-4 is dated 2002-12-10. It replaces the division of Slovenia into twelve statistical regions with a division into 193 municipalities. I have the municipalities listed as secondary subdivisions.

Note: Some accented letters may not display properly on your browser. The characters C, c, S, s, Z, and z, with the diacritic known as caron or hacek, will display on your screen as Č, č, Š, š, Ž, and ž, respectively.

There are various ways of partitioning Slovenia. The basic building blocks seem to be the opčine (communes, or municipalities). There were 62 of them in 1991; 147 after a reorganization on 1994-10-04; and 192 after a referendum on 1998-08-07. There are 58 upravne enote (administrative units), which are almost all made up of one or more entire communes. There are other subdivisions called okrajna sodišča, okrožna sodišča, and višja sodišča. The Statistical Office of the Republic of Slovenia has defined twelve statistična regije (statistical regions). It remains to be seen which, if any, of these systems becomes established as a standard for Slovenia.

Erratum: In "Administrative Subdivisions of Countries", the statistical regions were incorrectly identified as administrative areas.

International standard ISO 3166-2 was published on December 15, 1998. It superseded ISO/DIS 3166-2 (draft international standard). For Slovenia, the draft standard showed no subdivisions. The final standard showed the twelve statistical regions. These regions and their codes are shown in the first table below. FIPS PUB 10-4 originally listed no subdivisions of Slovenia. Change 1, dated December 1, 1998, lists the 147 communes that existed before the 1998 referendum. They are shown on the Communes of Slovenia page.

Country overview: 

Before World War I, Slovenia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It consisted of Carniola and parts of Carinthia, Coastland, and Styria provinces of Austria, as well as small parts of Vasvár and Zala counties of Hungary. In the aftermath of World War I, this area was divided between the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (later Yugoslavia) and Italy. The border between Italy and Yugoslavia wasn't settled until 1924. In the settlement, Italy received Istria. Yugoslavia was occupied by the axis powers in World War II. After the war, Istria was joined to Yugoslavia. Part of it went to Croatia; the rest eventually became Južna Primorska and Severna Primorska in Slovenia. Meanwhile, Trieste became an independent city in 1947. Its territory was divided into the A Zone (north) and the B Zone (south). In 1954, the B Zone was annexed to Yugoslavia. Slovenia received part of it. On 1991-10-08, Slovenia declared independence from Yugoslavia.

Other names of country: 

1. Danish: Slovenien
2. Dutch: Slovenië, Republiek Slovenië (formal)
3. English: Republic of Slovenia (formal)
4. Finnish: Slovenia
5. French: Slovénie f
6. German: Slowenien n
7. Icelandic: Slóvenía
8. Italian: Slovenia f
9. Norwegian: Slovenia, Republikken Slovenia (formal)
10. Portuguese: Eslovénia, Eslovênia (Brazil), República f da Eslovénia f (formal)
11. Slovenian: Republika Slovenija (formal)
12. Spanish: Eslovenia
13. Swedish: Slovenien

Origin of name: 

from ethnic name Slovene, a variant of Slav

Primary subdivisions: 

Slovenia is divided into twelve statistična regije (statistical regions).

Postal codes: 

Slovenia uses four-digit postal codes. Slovene addresses can be identified by prefixing the postal codes with "SI-".

Further subdivisions:

See the Communes of Slovenia page.

It appears that after Slovenia became independent in 1991, it had 62 opčine (communes, although the CIA World Factbook described them as pokajine [provinces]). In 1995, they were reorganized into 146 communes. A referendum in 1998 created 37 more communes. There are also several unofficial sets of higher-level divisions, which are defined as groups of communes. I felt that almost 200 divisions was too long a listing for such a small country, especially when most useful information (such as area and population) is unavailable. The international standards don't list any divisions for Slovenia. I chose a set of divisions which seem to be in current use, although they may not have a legal basis.

Change history: 

1. 1920-07-16: Treaty of Saint-Germain took effect. Most of Coastland province annexed to Venezia region of Italy. Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes created.
2. 1946: Yugoslavia organized as federal republic, with Slovenia as one of its constituent republics.
3. 1947-02-10: Peace treaty signed. Trieste and a surrounding area were made into the Free Territory of Trieste. The rest of Venezia Giulia e Zara region transferred from Italy to Yugoslavia.
4. 1954: Yugoslavia received Zone B of Trieste, part of which (including the port cities of Izola, Koper, and Piran) merged with Slovenia republic. During the 1950s and early '60s, Slovenia was divided into the following counties (population is 1959 estimate):

1. 1995-01-01: Slovenia reorganized. The 62 communes were replaced with 146 communes. The latest FIPS list available shows these communes.
2. 1998-03-20: Referendum created 37 new communes.
3. ~1997: two administrative units (Kočevje and Ribnica) were transferred from Osrednjeslovenska region to Dolenjska region.

Other names of subdivisions: 

1. Dolenjska: Jugovzhodna Slovenija (variant)
2. Goriška: Severna Primorska (variant)
3. Ljubljana: Laibach (German)
4. Notranjsko-kraška: Kraška, Notranjska (variant)
5. Obalno-kraška: Južna Primorska (variant)
6. Osrednjeslovenska: Ljubljana (variant)
7. Spodnjeposavska: Posavska (variant)

Note: Source for area figures: Pecar, Janja: "Regional Aspect of Slovenia’s Development Based on Financial Results of Commercial Companies in 1997", IMAD, December 1998. Found at http://193.2.236.10/meor/ang/regional/pdf/an-pdrp.pdf (visited 2001-04-14, no longer available online).

"Ershiyi (21) Shiji Shijie Diming Lu", a Chinese gazetteer, gives the areas of the 147 communes as of 1997. When the areas of the communes in regions 07 and 08 from "Ershiyi" are added up, they disagree significantly with the areas of those regions given above. They imply that the area of Dolenjska should be about 2,774 km.², and of Osrednjeslovenska, 2,466. The total of the two is about the same (off by 10 km.², which could be explained as rounding error). On a map, regions 07 and 08 appear to be about the same size. Therefore, I am inclined to agree with the Chinese source. The communes have unquestionably been assigned to the right regions.