Showing papers in "Governance in 2008"
TL;DR: In this article, the authors propose a more coherent and specific definition of QoG: the impartiality of institutions that exercise government authority, which they relate to a series of criticisms stemming from the fields of public administration, public choice, multiculturalism, and feminism.
Abstract: The recent growth in research on "good governance" and the quality of government institutions has been propelled by empirical findings that show that such institutions may hold the key to understanding economic growth and social welfare in developing and transition countries. We argue, however, that a key issue has not been addressed, namely, what quality of government (QoG) actually means at the conceptual level. Based on analyses of political theory, we propose a more coherent and specific definition of QoG: the impartiality of institutions that exercise government authority. We relate the idea of impartiality to a series of criticisms stemming from the fields of public administration, public choice, multiculturalism, and feminism. To place the theory of impartiality in a larger context, we then contrast its scope and meaning with that of a threefold set of competing concepts of quality of government: democracy, the rule of law, and efficiency/effectiveness.
922 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors extend the applicability of governance theory by developing hypotheses about how different governance types can be expected to handle processes of change characterized by nonlinear dynamics, threshold effects, cascades, and limited predictability.
Abstract: Unexpected epidemics, abrupt catastrophic shifts in biophysical systems, and economic crises that cascade across national borders and regions are events that challenge the steering capacity of governance at all political levels. This article seeks to extend the applicability of governance theory by developing hypotheses about how different governance types can be expected to handle processes of change characterized by nonlinear dynamics, threshold effects, cascades, and limited predictability. The first part of the article argues the relevance of a complex adaptive system approach and goes on to review how well governance theory acknowledges the intriguing behavior of complex adaptive systems. In the second part, we develop a typology of governance systems based on their adaptive capacities. Finally, we investigate how combinations of governance systems on different levels buffer or weaken the capacity to govern complex adaptive systems.
543 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated the effect of democratization on the state's administrative capacity and found a curvilinear (J-shaped) relationship between the two traits.
Abstract: In this article we probe the effect of democratization on the state's administrative capacity. Using time-series cross-section data, we find a curvilinear (J-shaped) relationship between the two traits. The effect of democracy on state capacity is negative at low values of democracy, nonexistent at median values, and strongly positive at high democracy levels. This is confirmed under demanding statistical tests. The curvilinear relationship is due, we argue, to the combined effect of two forms of steering and control; one exercised from above, the other from below. In strongly authoritarian states, a satisfactory measure of control from above can at times be accomplished. Control from below is best achieved when democratic institutions are fully installed and are accompanied by a broad array of societal resources. Looking at two resource measures, press circulation and electoral participation, we find that these, combined with democracy, enhance state administrative capacity.
284 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the role of transgovernmental networks of national regulators in addressing collective action problems endemic to international cooperation is investigated, and the formal incorporation of trans-governmental networks into European Union (EU) policymaking is examined.
Abstract: This article investigates the role of transgovernmental networks of national regulators in addressing collective action problems endemic to international cooperation. In contrast to recent work on transgovernmental actors, which emphasizes such networks as alternatives to more traditional international institutions, we examine the synergistic interaction between the two. Building on the broader premise that patterns of “dual delegation” above and below the nation-state enhance the coordinating role of networks of national agencies in two-level international governance, the article examines the formal incorporation of transgovernmental networks into European Union (EU) policymaking. The focus on authoritative rule-making adds a crucial dimension to the landscape of EU governance innovations while connecting to the broader study of transgovernmental networks in international governance. The article develops an analytical framework that maps these incorporated networks across different sectors in terms of function, emergence, and effectiveness. Two case studies of data privacy and energy market regulation are presented to apply and illustrate the insights of this mapping.
203 citations
TL;DR: The authors examined the degree to which political advisers are perceived as a threat to civil service neutrality, and described the form taken by that threat as variously perceived, and suggested that traditional understandings of "politicization" need to be reconceptualized if they are to fully account for the relationship between political and civil service advisers.
Abstract: In recent times much has been made of the threat some argue is posed by political advisers to the impartiality of the Westminster civil service. Drawing on survey of senior New Zealand civil servants, this article examines the degree to which political advisers are perceived as a threat to civil service neutrality and describes the form taken by that threat as variously perceived. On the evidence reported, it is suggested that traditional understandings of “politicization” need to be reconceptualized if they are to fully account for the nature of the relationship between political and civil service advisers. To existing conceptions of politicization, therefore, the article proposes adding another: “administrative politicization,” allowing for different gradations of politicization to be identified, and enabling a nuanced assessment of the nature and extent of a risk to civil service neutrality that, the data suggest, is not as great as is sometimes alleged.
135 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors look at the evolution of self-regulatory standards in the global labor governance debate and argue that despite the lacking legal framework of global regulation and enforceability, patterns of local self-regulation, norm-setting, and international codes lead not only to higher expectations of the behavior of transnationally operating firms but also to an indirect pattern of regulation.
Abstract: During the last decade, the approach by businesses and governments toward labor and social issues at the global level has fundamentally changed. Industrial relations are rapidly internationalizing by developing new actors and forms of governance to deal with the regulation of labor. This article looks at the evolution of self-regulatory standards in the global labor governance debate. Key is that notwithstanding problems with the lacking legal framework of global regulation and enforceability, patterns of local self-regulation, norm-setting, and international codes lead not only to higher expectations of the behavior of transnationally operating firms but also to an indirect pattern of regulation. The article argues that particularly the adoption of the core labor standards by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the setup of the Global Compact by the UN serve as points of convergence. A plethora of voluntarist initiatives that converge over time toward a shared understanding of labor standards is part of the transformation of global labor governance institutions.
108 citations
TL;DR: The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has adopted a practitioner-based innovation known as the Incident Command System (ICS) that assumes that crises require a network of responders, but that these networks should be managed by a hierarchy.
Abstract: As governments search for policy tools to deliver public services, two choices—hierarchy or network—are portrayed as stark alternatives. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has adopted a practitioner-based innovation known as the Incident Command System (ICS) that assumes that crises require a network of responders, but that these networks should be managed by a hierarchy. While the ICS illustrates the potential for mixing hierarchies and networks, it was mandated by policymakers willing to make broad assumptions about the applicability of the ICS on limited evidence. An overdependence on practitioner claims displaced careful analysis of the underlying logics vital to understanding the operation of the policy tool. A case study of the ICS in managing an exotic animal disease outbreak points to the importance of crisis characteristics and management factors as contingencies affecting the operation of the ICS.
98 citations
TL;DR: The authors analyzes the extent to which partisan control of the government can account for the differences in the privatization proceeds raised by EU and OECD countries between 1990 and 2000, finding that privatizations are part of a process of economic liberalization in previously highly regulated economies as well as a reaction to the fiscal policy challenges imposed by European integration and the globalization of financial markets.
Abstract: The 1990s have witnessed unprecedented attempts at privatizing state-owned enterprises in virtually all OECD democracies. This contribution analyzes the extent to which the partisan control of the government can account for the differences in the privatization proceeds raised by EU and OECD countries between 1990 and 2000. It turns out that privatizations are part of a process of economic liberalization in previously highly regulated economies as well as a reaction to the fiscal policy challenges imposed by European integration and the globalization of financial markets. Partisan differences only emerge if economic problems are moderate, while intense economic, particularly fiscal, problems foreclose differing partisan strategies.
86 citations
TL;DR: The authors analyzes how focusing events affect the public and political agenda and translate into policy change, focusing on the policy changes initiated by paedophile Marc Dutroux's arrest in 1996 in Belgium, and argues that political parties, as key actors in the Belgian policy process, should be integrated more explicitly in the punctuated equilibrium theory.
Abstract: The article analyzes how focusing events affect the public and political agenda and translate into policy change. Empirically, the study focuses on the policy changes initiated by paedophile Marc Dutroux’s arrest in 1996 in Belgium. Theoretically, the article tests whether Baumgartner and Jones’s (1993) U.S. punctuated equilibrium approach applies to a most different system case, Belgium being a consociational democracy and a partitocracy. Their approach turns out to be useful to explain this “critical case”: Policy change happens when “policy images” and “policy venues” shift. Yet, the Dutroux case shows also that political parties, as key actors in the Belgian policy process, should be integrated more explicitly in the punctuated equilibrium theory. Finally, the article argues that the quanti- tative analysis of longitudinal data sets on several agendas should be supplemented with qualitative case study evidence (e.g., interviews with key decision makers) to unravel the complex case of issue attention and policy change.
83 citations
TL;DR: In this article, it is argued that the varying output from political processes on school vouchers in the USA and Sweden is to be explained by the different ways in which political institutions affect political decision making in the two countries.
Abstract: School vouchers might seem a natural feature of the liberal welfare model of the U.S. and American society generally. However, for social democratic welfare states in Scandinavia, school vouchers would seem to be a contradiction. Nevertheless, school vouchers have faced severe resistance in the USA, and the program has so far not been adopted as a national educational reform, although sporadic and limited state-level developments can be observed. In Sweden, however, the social democratic welfare state adopted a national, universal public voucher scheme in the early 1990s. The goal of this article is to explain this counter-theoretical empirical puzzle. It is argued that the varying output from political processes on school vouchers in the USA and Sweden is to be explained by the different ways in which political institutions affect political decision making in the two countries.
72 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, seconded national civil servants (SNEs) hired on short-term contracts are studied and the decision-making dynamics of SNEs are shown to contain a compound mix of departmental, epistemic, and supranational dynamics.
Abstract: textThis article explores the compound machinery of government. Attention is directed toward decision making within the core executive of the European Union - the European Commission. The article studies seconded national civil servants (SNEs) hired on short-term contracts. The analysis benefits from an original and rich body of surveys and interview data derived from current and former SNEs. The decision-making dynamics of SNEs are shown to contain a compound mix of departmental, epistemic, and supranational dynamics. This study clearly demonstrates that the socializing power of the Commission is conditional and only partly sustained when SNEs exit the Commission. Any long-lasting effect of socialization within European Union's executive machinery of government is largely absent. The compound decision-making dynamics of SNEs are explained by (1) the organizational affiliations of SNEs, (2) the formal organization of the Commission apparatus, and (3) only partly by processes of resocialization of SNEs within the Commission.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined the relationship between European Union (EU) conditionality for membership and policy entrepreneurship in a candidate country and found that the EU conditionality opened a window of opportunity for policy reform by lowering the political costs of controversial reforms.
Abstract: This article examines the relationship between European Union (EU) conditionality for membership and policy entrepreneurship in a candidate country. In Turkey, EU conditionality opened a window of opportunity for policy reform by lowering the political costs of controversial reforms. The study demonstrates that the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Turkish Industrialists' and Businessmen's Association (TUSIAD) responded to a window of opportunity by advocating a series of reforms that represented a bold challenge to the traditionally reform-averse and Euro-skeptic political culture in Turkey. The study finds a difference in the duration of both actors' commitment to reforms. To explain this difference, we distinguish between policy entrepreneurs, who are actors with a long time horizon, and policy opportunists, who are actors with a short time horizon. The policy implication of this finding is that the European Commission's expectations of the AKP government to deliver the necessary reforms may be too optimistic.
TL;DR: This paper found that in political systems where majoritarianism is constrained by institutional “checks,” governing parties support immigration more strongly, even when controlling for a broad range of alternative explanations.
Abstract: Most scholarship on immigration politics is made up of isolated case studies or cross-disciplinary work that does not build on existing political science theory. This study attempts to remedy this shortcoming in three ways: (1) we derive theories from the growing body of immigration literature, to hypothesize about why political parties would be more or less open to immigration; (2) we link these theories to the broader political science literature on parties and institutions; and (3) we construct a data set on the determinants of immigration politics, covering 18 developed countries from 1987 to 1999. Our primary hypothesis is that political institutions shape immigration politics by facilitating or constraining majoritarian sentiment (which is generally opposed to liberalizing immigration). Our analysis finds that in political systems where majoritarianism is constrained by institutional “checks,” governing parties support immigration more strongly, even when controlling for a broad range of alternative explanations.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examine the paradoxical case of the Phnom Penh Water Supply in Cambodia to illustrate how public provision of urban water can be substantially improved by getting prices and governance right.
Abstract: Public sector monopolies are often associated with inefficiencies and inability to meet rising demand. Scholars attribute this to fundamental problems associated with public provision: (1) a tradition of below-cost pricing due to populist pressures, (2) owner–regulator conflicts of interest, and (3) perverse organizational incentives arising from non-credible threat of bankruptcy, weak competition, rigidities, and agency and performance measurement problems. Many governments worldwide have shifted to private provision, but recent experience in urban water utilities in developing countries has shown their limitations because of weak regulatory regimes compounded by inherent problems of information, incentives, and commitment. This article examines the paradoxical case of the Phnom Penh Water Supply in Cambodia to illustrate how public provision of urban water can be substantially improved by getting prices and governance right. Findings have implications for the search for solutions to provide one billion people worldwide with better access to potable water.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors combine the methods of institutionalist analysis and the sociology of elites to look inside the black box of the French state and identify key groups of policymakers in the social policy sector and track both their policy preferences and the results of their efforts from the mid-1980s through the late 1990s.
Abstract: This article combines the methods of institutionalist analysis and the sociology of elites to look inside the black box of the French state. We identify key groups of policymakers in the social policy sector and track both their policy preferences and the results of their efforts from the mid-1980s through the late 1990s. Our conclusion is that budgetary and ideological challenges to existing policies led to the consolidation within the Ministry of Social Affairs of what we label a “programmatic elite,” whose influence derived less from the positions held by its members than from the coherence and applicability of its state-centered policy model. The competition for legitimate authority between such programmatic elites, we conclude, is an important but often overlooked endogenous source of policy change in situations of institutional stability.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors consider the democratic qualities of multilevel governance at the stage of policy implementation closest to the ground, involving local residents and organizations, and propose three models of democracy through which to evaluate the democratic credentials of multi-level governance.
Abstract: This article considers the democratic qualities of multilevel governance at the stage of policy implementation closest to the ground, involving local residents and organizations. Drawing on a case study of the structural funds in South Yorkshire (United Kingdom), it puts forward three models of democracy through which to evaluate the democratic credentials of multilevel governance. The case study illustrates that among the expected complexity and technocracy at this stage of policymaking, there are also experiments in local democracy that have not previously been identified in the academic literature. As such, in the context of deep multilevel governance, there is evidence that while traditional mechanisms of accountability may be undermined, other mechanisms may provide a valuable alternative
TL;DR: Aberbach, Putnam, and Rockman (APR 1981) were the first to use survey methods and to advance empirically based theory on political-administrative relations as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: Political-administrative relations became an issue once politicians and administrators came to be considered as distinct actors in the public realm. This happened in the late eighteenth century, and several authors since then explored the nature of this relationship in normative and/or juridical terms. But it took almost two centuries before it became an object of systematic empirical study in a comparative perspective: Aberbach, Putnam, and Rockman (APR 1981). The APR study was the first to use survey methods and to advance empirically based theory. In this article we discuss the intellectual attention for this topic since the early nineteenth century, APR's findings and impact and—given APR's influence upon methods—some intriguing problems with the framework that they developed. Finally we list some potential new avenues of research.
TL;DR: The authors examines the transformation of Israel's higher education system since the 1990s and argues that the trajectory and policy options preferred were shaped by ideational factors, while external factors such as demographic trends and demographic trends exerted pressure for change.
Abstract: This article examines the transformation of Israel's higher education system since the 1990s. During that period, the system underwent expansion, diversification, privatization, and internationalization in a series of pathbreaking reforms. The main argument is that while external factors—such as demographic trends—exerted pressure for change, the trajectory and policy options preferred were shaped by ideational factors. Policy entrepreneurs played a crucial role in advancing pathbreaking institutional change when they reframed policies through linking cognitive ideas of “what has to be done” with the normative ideas that granted legitimacy to the proposals for reform.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examine the recent reforms in the United Kingdom, Germany, and Italy, engaging in a structured, focused comparison, mainly using process tracing and adopting an analytical framework articulated across three levels of analysis.
Abstract: National frameworks for banking and, more generally, financial supervision in various European countries have undergone significant changes in the last decade or so. What explains these supervisory reforms? This work addresses this question by examining the recent reforms in the United Kingdom, Germany, and Italy, engaging in a structured, focused comparison, mainly using process tracing and adopting an analytical framework articulated across three levels of analysis. It is argued that while international and EU factors acted as antecedent variables, establishing the background for the reforms, they were mediated by national factors-to be precise, by two independent variables-that account for distinctive modes and outcomes of reforms. In addition, the institutional strength of the central bank-the intervening variable-can make a difference to the process of reform by either inhibiting or catalyzing change.
TL;DR: In this paper, a random theory characterizes unfairness as the result of idiosyncratic conditions that give everyone an equal probability of being treated unfairly regardless of their social characteristics, such as income, education, ethnicity, and gender.
Abstract: In real-world bureaucratic encounters the Weberian goal of perfect impersonal administration is not completely attained and unfairness sometimes results. Theories of bias attribute unfairness to social characteristics such as income, education, ethnicity, and gender. A random theory characterizes unfairness as the result of idiosyncratic conditions that give everyone an equal probability of being treated unfairly regardless of their social characteristics. In Latvia, bias would be expected on grounds of ethnicity as well as social characteristics, since its population is divided politically by citizenship, language, and ethnicity as well as socioeconomic characteristics. Survey data from the New Baltic Barometer shows that a majority of both Latvians and Russians expect fair treatment in bureaucratic encounters and multivariate statistical analysis confirms the random hypothesis. Insofar as unfair treatment occurs it tends to be distributed according to idiosyncratic circumstances rather than being the systematic fate of members of a particular social group. The evidence indicates that the professional norms and training of service deliverers are more important in bureaucratic encounters than individual attributes of claimants, even in a clearly divided society.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that incompatible underlying paradigms, differentiated patterns of power structure, and unsynchronized institutional arrangements may resist even strong pressures to harmonize regulative practices.
Abstract: Both in the United States and the European Union, patent policy instruments in information and communication technologies are contested. Although current reform proposals would lead to a uniform patent eligibility for computer programs in both economic spheres, such an outcome is rather unlikely. In a theoretic perspective, contrasting policies in one of the most important technology sectors challenge the expectation of converging regulative regimes. In a view to reveal the structural causes for the persisting divergence, it is argued that incompatible underlying paradigms, differentiated patterns of power structure, and unsynchronized institutional arrangements may resist even strong pressures to harmonize regulative practices. The interaction between these elements will be addressed and discussed as a perspective to define restraints on the scope of convergence theories.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors investigate why, in the aftermath of the 1998 Sydney water contamination crisis, policy and institutional reform was comparatively minor, despite intense scrutiny and criticism of the framework of water policy in New South Wales (NSW).
Abstract: The aim of this article is to understand why, in the aftermath of the 1998 Sydney water contamination crisis, policy and institutional reform was comparatively minor-despite intense scrutiny and criticism of the framework of water policy in New South Wales (NSW). The article should be of serious interest to scholars interested in crisis and policy change, rather than simply those with a particular interest in water policy in Australia. It frames the Sydney case as a disconfirming one but finds that an understanding of the stability/change relationship in NSW water policy can only partially be understood through applying key contemporary institutional, actor, and interest-centered explanations. Therefore, it probes the plausibility of an additional explanation and develops the rudiments of a new "policy configuration" approach to help explain policy stability and change. It concludes by suggesting that there is potential for a policy configuration perspective to be tested against other cases.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors make a distinction between successful and unsuccessful institutional reforms in post-communist countries, based on a table on page 87 (“Timeline of Formal Institutional Reforms and Introductions.
Abstract: in my opinion, not its strongest feature. The argument linking robust party competition with successful state building would have lost little, if anything, without drawing such a strong line. A good example of why such a line drawing could distract the reader from the main argument comes from a table on page 87 (“Timeline of Formal Institutional Reforms and Introductions”). In that table, two clear clusters seemingly emerge: those countries where formal institutional reforms were adopted from 1990 to 1997, and those where reforms were adopted in 1998– 2002 or later. However, a closer inspection reveals that the clusters represent predictions, and that the actual picture is a little more varied (the institutional reforms being spread out a little more evenly). Moreover, the actual picture is even more complicated, since the author has classified a number of early institutional reforms in “unsuccessful” countries as insignificant, due to the arguably politicized and/or limited institutions that emerged from the reform. At the same time, only one institution in the “successful” countries, the Polish civil service, was similarly limited. I do not believe that any of the institutions in postcommunist countries could be considered as strictly politicized or not—there has always been a sliding scale of politicization in those institutions, both within as well as between countries. By making the argument that there were successful and unsuccessful countries, the author presents evidence that sometimes seems selected to fit that dichotomy, disregarding a more nuanced reality. Even though the research is generally exemplary, there are some problems with coding. I believe that these issues only illustrate the difficulty of gathering data about postcommunist democracies from the early to mid-1990s. Since I am a little more familiar with Estonia, I could identify several minor inaccuracies or questionable judgments in coding institutional reforms in that country (p. 101). First, Grzymała-Busse claims that the Estonian civil service was apolitical and extensive from 1995. However, discussions about the politicization of civil service never disappeared from political discourse, with both opposition parties and neutral observers constantly protesting against the extent of political influence in dispensing civil service jobs (or, alternatively, the extent to which civil servants were pressured to enter the party in power). Second, the book is correct that the position of Chancellor of Judiciary was established in 1993. However, it did not have any ombudsman functions until 1999, when its powers were redefined. Finally, two dates are inaccurate: The State Audit Office was created in 1990 instead of 1995, and the first anticorruption act was adopted in 1995 instead of 1999. Similar issues arise when looking at party funding (p. 184): For example, contrary to the information in the table, the Estonian National Audit Office does not have, nor has ever had, any authority to audit political parties. Grzymała-Busse herself points out particularly well the limits of comparing the stateadministration employment figures (Appendix B). To be sure, none of these data limits, inaccuracies, or arguably questionable coding decisions undermine the basic arguments and conclusions of the book. However, they do question the validity of clustering postcommunist countries into two distinct groups, and warn about the need to go far beyond the official figures and legislative texts in making assessments of the situation on the ground. In conclusion, Rebuilding Leviathan is a notable contribution to the study of postcommunist politics, state building, and party politics. Scholars of these fields will find it an interesting and intriguing read, and graduate students will learn a lot from this book, not only about these topics but also about comparative design and method.