Public function and public service

analysis from the perspective of legislation on the subject civil protection

Abstract

The Article 1.2 of Act 2/1985, on Civil Protection, states that civil protection as a whole is legally considered as a public utility. This statement is a good example of misapplication of legal categories. In this paper it is highlighted both the motives of this legal declaration and the reasons why this legal affirmation does not fit with an evolutive interpretation of the ‘public utilities’ legal concept. In the propositive part of this paper it is assumed that civil protection, as field for administrative action, is a multi-functional shared competence which takes shape in the exercise of authority and the multi-level provision of public utilities.