This article analyses State reform in Portugal in the field of territorial administration, focusing on the relationship between central government, CCDRs, municipalities and intermunicipal communities (CIMs). It argues that Portuguese territorial reform remains incomplete not only because decentralisation has been limited in scope, but also because the distinction between decentralisation and deconcentration remains persistently blurred. Drawing on legal-institutional, documentary and comparative analysis, the article contends that systemic coherence depends on a clearer differentiation between four levels: central government, responsible for policy design, standards, funding and territorial equity; CCDRs, as regional coordination structures of State administration; municipalities, as the democratic core of proximity and responsiveness to citizens; and CIMs, as the functional intermediate level for supramunicipal integration, capacity building and territorial coordination. The article also develops the financial dimension of reform, arguing that administrative decentralisation only produces stable effects when accompanied by adequate financial autonomy, predictability and equalisation mechanisms. The comparison with Sweden and Denmark shows that more robust subnational systems rely on intelligible functional divisions, predictable intergovernmental coordination and congruence between powers, resources and political responsibility. It concludes that the next stage of State reform in Portugal should no longer be conceived as a simple transfer of burdens, but rather as a coherent reconfiguration of the territorial architecture of public power.