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Department
Departamento (Spanish)
Department; Departamento (Spanish)
Category	Unitary state
Location	Oriental Republic of Uruguay
Number	19 departments
Subdivisions	Municipalities;

Uruguay consists of 19 departments (departamentos). Each department has a legislature, called a Departmental Board, and a chief executive called a Intendente.

History

The first division of Uruguay into six departments occurred on 27 January 1816. In February of the same year, two more departments were formed, and in 1828 one more was added. When the country's first constitution was signed in 1830, there were nine departments: Montevideo, Maldonado, Canelones, San José, Colonia, Soriano, Paysandú, Durazno and Cerro Largo. At that time, the department of Paysandú occupied all the territory north of the Río Negro, which included the current departments of Artigas, Rivera, Tacuarembó, Salto, Paysandú and Río Negro.

On 17 June 1837, this northern territory was divided in three, by the creation of the departments of Salto and Tacuarembó. At the same time, the department of Minas (which was eventually renamed to Lavalleja) was created out of parts of Cerro Largo and Maldonado. In 1856 Florida was created, and on 7 July 1880 the department of Río Negro was split from Paysandú and Rocha was split from Maldonado. In 1884 Treinta y Tres was formed from parts of Cerro Largo and Minas, while Artigas was split from Salto. The same year the department of Rivera was split from Tacuarembó, and in 1885 Flores was split from San José.

1830	1837	1856	1880	1884-85
Series of maps showing the gradual formation of the current 19 departments of Uruguay.

List of departments

Department	ISO 3166-2 code	Formation	Area (km²)	Population (2011)^[1]	Density (/km²)	Capital	Capital population
Artigas	UY-AR	1884 (from Salto)	11,928	73,378	6.15	Artigas	40,658
Canelones	UY-CA	1816 (as Villa de Guadalupe)	4,536	520,187	114.68	Canelones	19,865
Cerro Largo	UY-CL	1821	13,648	84,698	6.21	Melo	53,245
Colonia	UY-CO	1816	6,106	123,203	20.18	Colonia del Sacramento	26,231
Durazno	UY-DU	1822 (as Entre Ríos Yí y Negro)	11,643	57,088	4.90	Durazno	34,372
Flores	UY-FS	1885 (from San José)	5,144	25,050	4.87	Trinidad	21,429
Florida	UY-FD	1856 (from San José)	10,417	67,048	6.44	Florida	33,640
Lavalleja	UY-LA	1837 (as Minas)	10,016	58,815	5.87	Minas	45,638
Maldonado	UY-MA	1816 (as San Fernando de Maldonado)	4,793	164,300	34.28	Maldonado	62,592
Montevideo	UY-MO	1816	530	1,319,108	2,489	Montevideo	1,319,108
Paysandú	UY-PA	1820	13,922	113,124	8.13	Paysandú	76,429
Río Negro	UY-RN	1868 (from Paysandú)	9,282	54,765	5.90	Fray Bentos	24,406
Rivera	UY-RV	1884 (as Tacuarembó)	9,370	103,493	11.04	Rivera	64,465
Rocha	UY-RO	1880 (from Maldonado)	10,551	68,088	6.45	Rocha	25,422
Salto	UY-SA	1837 (from Paysandú)	14,163	124,878	8.82	Salto	104,028
San José	UY-SJ	1816	4,992	108,309	21.70	San José de Mayo	36,747
Soriano	UY-SO	1816 (as Santo Domingo Soriano)	9,008	82,595	9.17	Mercedes	41,975
Tacuarembó	UY-TA	1837 (from Paysandú)	15,438	90,053	5.83	Tacuarembó	54,757
Treinta y Tres	UY-TT	1884 (from Cerro Largo and Lavalleja)	9,676	48,134	4.97	Treinta y Tres	25,477

Statutory framework

Establishment of departments

The General Assembly has the powers to create new departments, requiring a supermajority vote of two thirds in both chambers, as provided by the Constitution in article 85. The General Assembly can also define their borders, requiring the same majority.^[2]

Politics and governance

The basic statutory framework of departments is defined by Section XVI of the Constitution. Each department has executive and legislative branches, in the form of the Intendant and the Departmental Board respectively. The Municipal Organic Law No. 9515 regulates more specific details of these rules.^[3]

Finances

The sources of financial resources of the departmental governments are detailed in article 297 of the Constitution, being the departmental taxes, national taxes whose administration is granted to departments, earnings from services or incomes, money obtained from sanctions, donations, inheritances and bequests received and accepted, and their own part of the national budget that they were granted by budget laws.^[4]

Municipalities

Since 2009 (Law No. 18567 of 13 September 2009),^[5] the Uruguayan departments have been subdivided into municipalities. This system has been widely criticized as a waste of resources, due to Uruguay's small population of 3.4 million. The inaugural municipal elections were held in 2010, with municipal officials assuming office later in the year. Currently there are 125 municipalities.

References

^ "Censos 2011". Instituto Nacional de Estadística. 10 August 2012. Retrieved 11 November 2016.
^ "Constitution of Uruguay - Article 85" (in Spanish). IMPO. Retrieved 15 September 2020.
^ "Constitution of Uruguay - Article 262" (in Spanish). IMPO. Retrieved 15 September 2020.
^ "Constitution of Uruguay - Article 297" (in Spanish). IMPO. Retrieved 15 September 2020.
^ "Ley Nº 18.567 del 13 de septiembre de 2009" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2009-12-22. Retrieved 2013-08-05.