Rio's metropolitan region includes the 14 independent municipal governments which make up the urban area. 

Municipalities are the foundation of democratic government in Brazil, as laid out in the 1988 constitution. They are governed by elected mayors and municipal councils and have responsibility for primary education, basic health services, solid-waste collection and disposal, and municipal upkeep, including streets and parks. 

Municipal funding sources include taxes on property and services, as well as revenue from state and federal sources. There is no metropolitan planning or development authority, although in the 1980s the state-instituted Metropolitan Development Foundation attempted to fulfill such a role. It has since been disbanded. 

Although Rio may be Brazil's most beautiful city, it is also one of its most troubled. The favelas which blanket the slopes of surrounding hillsides house approximately 20 percent of the city's residents and are often dangerous, unsanitary, and lacking in basic services such as water, sewerage, and, to a lesser extent, electricity. Many of the city's poor have no jobs, no access to schools, and only limited access to medical care. However, literacy rates for Rio are high, nearly 90 percent, and a system of public hospitals and clinics provides at least some medical care to the city's poorest residents. Police corruption is widespread. Environmental pollution is a problem throughout the metropolitan region, and the waters of Guanabara Bay are considered too polluted for safe bathing. Rio experienced serious crime problems in the early 1990s, when powerful criminal gangs took over entire favela neighborhoods. The murders of homeless children in 1993 by corrupt police officers acting on behalf of commercial interests drew international attention to Rio's social and criminal problems. With a murder rate of 61 per 100,000 people in 1994, Rio was one of the world's most violent cities. This was more than twice the rate of 28 per 100,000 for São Paulo.