The 2011 State of the GCR set out in detail the institutional arrangements across the national, provincial and local spheres by which the city-region is currently governed.  Underlying these arrangements is a Constitutional scheme, which tries to protect each sphere of government from interference by others.  While the scheme is clear in broad terms, institutional arrangements remain bedeviled by the path dependency of previous arrangements, understandings and assumptions about the hierarchical ordering of the parts of government, as well as residual lack of clarity in the definition of the powers and functions of the three spheres. In this complexity, negative interpretations of co-operative government – that each sphere must not try to assume responsibilities of others or interfere with others – are not always helpful.