Effects of local government social media use on citizen compliance during a crisis: Evidence from the COVID-19 crisis in China

Improving citizen compliance is a major goal of public administration, especially during crises. Although social media are widely used by government agencies across the globe, it is still unclear that whether the use of social media can help local governments improve citizen compliance especially during crises. Based on an original daily panel dataset of 189 cities in China during COVID-19, this study provides empirical evidence for the positive effect that crisis-related social media posts published by local government agencies has on citizen compliance. In addition, this effect is mediated by the topic of prevention measures in social media posts, and is stronger in cities with higher GDP per capita, better educated citizens and wider internet coverage. The findings imply that social media is an efficient and low-cost tool to assist local government agencies to achieve public administration objectives during crises, and its efficacy is largely dependent on regional socioeconomic status.     

What Drives For-Profit and Nonprofit Organizations’ Entry into Voucher Markets?

This study investigates a social service voucher program in Korea to examine why local governments rely on external actors, such as for-profit and nonprofit organizations, in provisioning social services and what encourages such market entry in view of the transaction cost theory. The social service voucher program, first introduced in 2007, offers a unique dataset of 1,101 local markets to examine how local governments are willing to stay in control of provisioning the nationwide program while promoting private actor entry. This study finds that local governments with lower fiscal capacities or in markets in which multiple existing organizations operate are more motivated to foster for-profit entry, whereas only existing nonprofit organizations in the market that provide the same services predict nonprofit entry. The implication is that the facilitation of for-profit entry is associated with local governments’ need to manage transaction costs, although this may not be true for nonprofit entry.     

Improved budgeting and financial management as a tool for enhancing the performance of local government in developing countries

Rapid economic and social changes in developing countries are impacting on their governments' ability to manage those changes, and local governments in these countries are becoming the core of decentralization experiments. This article examines the problems local governments face in meeting the challenges of rapid transformation and change. This paper suggests that budgeting be used as a means for strengthening local governments' abilities to deal with such changes. Until now, budgeting has not been used as a key intervention tool for strengthening local governments. A working model to assess the state of financial and related management conditions of local governments is provided. This model can serve as a useful point of reference for change agents involved in the strengthening of local governments.     

A political economy for social movements and revolution: popular media access,power and cultural hegemony

Abstract

One key marker of mass social movements transitioning to participatory democratic governance is popular media access. This essay argues that democratic media access by public constituencies becomes a site for constructing social revolution and simultaneously a manifest empirical measure of the extent of democratic participation in the production, distribution, and use of communication with new cultural possibilities. The participatory production practices (with citizens producing and hosting their own programs) and the democratic content (of oral histories, local issues, critiques of government and business, and everyday vernacular) reflect the hegemony of emerging ‘Bolivarian’ twenty-first century socialism expressed as popular participation in media production. Bolstered by constitutional changes and public funding, popular social movements of civil society, indigenous, women, and working class organizations have gained revolutionary ground by securing in practice the right of media production. Findings indicate that public and community media (that move beyond alternative sites of local expression and concerns) provide a startling revolutionary contrast to the commercial media operations in every nation. Popular media constructions suggest a new radically democratic cultural hegemony based on human solidarity with collective, participatory decision-making and cooperation offering real possibilities and experiences for increased equality and social justice.     

Social Capital and the Number of Governments within a County: A Potential Problem with Social Capital

Social capital has been demonstrated to be a benefit to a community in a variety of ways. However, researchers have begun to point out that social capital does have a downside. Communities that use bonding social capital to mobilise residents to action have the potential to exclude outsiders from their communities. The number of governments in a county could be used as an indicator of bonding social capital within a region. Residents use their local government to create and pass laws that have the potential to exclude others. The current analysis used the number of governments as a proxy for bonding social capital. Findings demonstrate that as the level of bonding social capital (the number of governments) increased the social capital in the county increased. Residents use their bonding social capital to respond to others, which then increases the level of social capital to be able to mobilise in the future.     

Why Does Citizens' Knowledge of New Policy Vary Between Municipalities? The Case of the Social Support Act

Providing information to citizens is an important first step in the implementation of new policy. In this study we explain differences in the knowledge of citizens between municipalities of a newly introduced law in the Netherlands, the Social Support Act, 10 months after it became into force. This law is especially important for older people that need support in their daily functioning and participation. We focused on two aspects of knowledge related to the act, i.e. having heard of the new act, and knowing how voice with regard to policy on support is organised in the place of residence. Given that socialist local governments focus more on social topics than liberal local governments, we expected citizens of municipalities with socialist councils to have more knowledge about the new Social Support Act. Contrary to our expectations, citizens from municipalities where a liberal party or a collaboration of liberal/socialist parties is the largest, have a better understanding of how voice is organised. On the other hand, citizens in municipalities with an alderman from a combination of liberal/socialist parties have a lower chance of having heard of the Social Support Act. We argue that in view of the Social Support Act, the ideology of a local government related to citizens' responsibilities (liberal view) may have more influence on citizens' knowledge than being a government that pays attention to social issues (socialist view). As far as individual differences between citizens are concerned, as expected, older people that are more educated but in poorer health status have more knowledge about the new act. A higher educational level and an excellent mental health status are related to more knowledge about voice. Educational level is the most powerful predictor for knowledge about the act.     

Revenue Portfolio and Expenditures: An Examination of the Volatility of Tax Revenue and Expenditure Patterns during the Great Recession

ABSTRACT

Local governments in the United States are diversifying their revenue streams and becoming less reliant on the inelastic revenue from property taxes. This article examines both how this affects local governments’ revenue stability in economic downturns as well as their levels of expenditures in key functions: capital and social services. Using data from North Carolina counties from both before the Great Recession and after, this article examines reliance on local sales taxes and stability of revenue. The findings suggest that dependence on local sales taxes do increase volatility and reduce expenditures on social services, all else being equal.     

How does ethnic diversity shape the design of intergovernmental fiscal relations? Evidence from China

This study examines how ethnic diversity shapes the design of intergovernmental fiscal relations in regimes such as China, where local accountability and resident mobility are largely absent. We argue that in these regimes, ethnic diversity largely captures potential social conflicts and instability, consequently requiring a higher level of fiscal centralization and regional equalization from upper-level governments to preserve social stability. Using provincial and sub-provincial level panel data from China for 1995–2019, we find strong supporting evidence that an increase in a province's ethnic diversity significantly increases fiscal centralization and the provincial government's fiscal equalization efforts. We also show that these effects tend to be stronger in provinces whose leaders have closer ties with the central authority and where local capture is less serious. Our study contributes to a better understanding of ethnic diversity's consequences on the policy choices governments make.     

Changes in the dimensions of political competition in Europe and their impact on citizens’ engagement via Facebook

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on a little-explored area of research, seeking to explain how political changes influence the participation of citizens in the social networks of local governments. In the context of the recent upsurge of anti-system movements and political parties in the European Union, we analyse a new set of data on participation via local governments’ Facebook pages during a turbulent period in European politics. The results obtained show that when a local government is affected by changes in political competition there is a greater degree of citizens’ engagement through social networks. Our analytical framework shows that this increased engagement is directly associated with the vulnerability of political parties, especially when the governing party loses its absolute majority and is constrained or prevented from carrying out political initiatives.     

U.S. treasury department studies of federal- state-local fiscal relations: the context,the major themes,and the outcome

This article provides an assessment of the condition of the literature on several major issues of Federal-State-local fiscal relations. The assessment is provided in the context of a three-volume report on Federal-State-local fiscal relations recently published by the U.S. Treasury Department. The author was a major participant in the studies who generally views them favorably, but who also raises his real concerns about a number of matters.

This article summarizes and evaluates certain aspects of the economic theory of federalism, the intellectual underpinnings of the report. This article addresses the institutional context in which the report was written, which helped shape its approach, content, and conclusions. The report itself generally lacks detailed recom-mendations.

Three main themes of the report are addressed in detail in this article. These are: (a) issues relevant to programs of general-purpose fiscal assistance, which include the adequacy of any potential improvements that might be made in measures of the fiscal capacity of State and local governments; (b) the role, if any, for tax subsidies to State and local governments through the deductibility of State and local taxes in the computation of individual Federal income taxes, and the exemption from Federal income taxes of interest paid on bonds and notes issued by State and local governments; and (c) the projection of the long-term outlook for the fiscal condition of the State-local sector on a current services basis, compared with projections of the long term outlook for the Federal government.     

Framing the revolution: the role of social media in Ukraine’s Euromaidan movement

The role of social media as a tool of mobilization, communication, and organization of social movements has been well documented since the Arab Spring. The public information posted on social media sites also presents researchers with a unique tool to study protests movements from within. The proposed study utilizes the theoretical foundation of issue framing literature and examines the social media framing of the Ukrainian Euromaidan protest movement. The original dataset traces the activities of the users on the social media site Facebook from 21 November 2013 to February 2014. While foreign media sources portrayed the Ukrainian crisis as a geopolitical struggle, the results of our analysis show that the participants of the protest conceptualized their movement in terms of domestic issues and an anti-regime revolution rather than a geopolitical crossroad between the EU and Russia. This study contributes to our understanding of the role social media sites play in the activities of protest movements, such as Euromaidan. Furthermore, it highlights the importance of social media as a tool of issue framing on par with the traditional sources of framing such as mass media and political elites.     

Using Twitter for Dialogic Communication: Local Government Strategies in the European Union

Abstract

Social networks have changed the way in which governments communicate with citizens, encouraging them to participate in decision-making processes. Nevertheless, few studies have specifically addressed the use of social networks in public sector from the standpoint of dialogic communication theory. The aim of this study is, first, to analyse the extent to which European local governments are developing dialogic strategies in their Twitter profiles in order to establish and enhance relations with their citizens and then to examine the impact of certain factors on the implementation of these dialogic strategies. The findings show that the situation is open to improvement, because local governments are mostly unaware of the benefits offered by the use of dialogic principles when establishing online relationships with stakeholders. Therefore, this paper sheds light on the dialogic potential that social networks provide in public sector, and particularly, it offers a guide regarding how local government should implement Twitter to foster the dialogic communication with citizens.     

The Effect of Fiscal Decentralization on the Financial Condition of Municipal Government

This study examines the effect of fiscal decentralization between states and their local governments on the financial condition of municipal governments. There are strong theoretical arguments on both sides of the federalism debate about the benefits for and against decentralization. Most of the research in this area investigates economic and social welfare consequences of fiscal decentralization. There is limited research, however, on the effects of fiscal decentralization on the financial health of local governments. Using data from the nation’s 150 largest cities, this study finds that intrastate fiscal decentralization results in weaker financial condition for municipalities in those states.     

Going online. Does ICT enabled-participation engage the young in local governance?

Local governments increasingly use online strategies to strengthen political participation of citizens in policy and politics. Young people, however, are generally under-represented. This article studies age patterns of participation across offline and online forms of action to test whether online initiatives are able to overcome this age bias. We first report a case study of online and offline problem reporting to local authorities. We find that simply going from offline to online participation reinforces rather than mitigates age bias. We then report a case study of message posting on an online political forum. In this case, age bias disappears. In contrast to the traditional instrumental modes, a forum is an expressive form of online participation. The young seem to value the act of participating over the outcomes of participation. For practice, these findings suggest a need for participation policies that speak to these expressive needs of young. In recent years, social media have reinforced the potential for expressive participation.     

Contextualising City-regional Issues,Strategies and their Use: the Flemish Story

This paper presents a contextualised analysis of what might be called the city-regional debate. The debate is unfolded in terms of four types of city-regional issues, eight common strategies to tackle the latter and the use thereof in Flanders. It is concluded that the way in which city-regional issues are dealt with in Flanders can be explained by its regime, consisting of an administrative, political and cultural dimension, in terms of a centralistic policy style combined with a weak institutional position of local governments, by a ‘localisation’ of regional politics and policies, both dominated by an anti-urban bias.     

Governing environmental conflicts: A comparative analysis of ten protests against industrial facilities in urban China

With the increasing numbers of environmental conflicts in recent years, Chinese local governments are deploying a variety of strategies to address them. Using the method of agreement and the method of difference, this article explores the question of why local governments adopt particular strategies during conflicts over the construction or operation of industrial facilities. The findings reveal that the position of higher-level governments, the costs involved in adapting projects and the threats posed by the form of protest to social stability are important conditions in explaining the differences in the patterns of government strategies. The authoritarian responsiveness that characterises Chinese government strategies results in high political, economic and environmental costs. The big challenge for Chinese governments is to develop policies, institutions and capacities to deal with environmental concerns in a more proactive and balanced way.     

Local Government Policy Diffusion in a Decentralised System: Childbirth Support Policy in South Korea

South Korean local governments have recently adopted pronatalist policies to cope with the pressing problem of low and declining fertility, despite this central coordination by the national government has been limited in this policy domain. This study attempts to explain the process by which childbirth support policies have spread among localities over time by addressing two questions: whether interjurisdictional and internal factors of policy diffusion have been at work; and how vertical and horizontal diffusion mechanisms have interactively affected local policy adoptions in the developing country. Empirical findings show that horizontal and vertical mechanisms of diffusion considerably outperform intrajurisdictional factors in spreading childbirth support policies among localities. Furthermore, the vertical influence from the central government has a positive conditional effect that stimulates horizontal interactions among local governments for policy formulation. These findings thus suggest that horizontal interactions among localities can provide an important route for the nationalisation of a domestic social policy in the nascent decentralised system.     

The county perspective on intergovernmental relations and government capacity

This analysis examines the issues of state and federal responsiveness and state and local government capacity from the perspective of county officials. Using data from a national survey of county administrators, elected executives, and commission chairpersons, the study finds that county officials are: (1) very confident of their own capacities to respond to local problems, but not as confident of local fiscal capacities; (2) very concerned about the responsiveness of state governments, particularly state legislatures, to local needs; and (3) not confident of the responsiveness of federal government to local needs either, but desirous of federal fiscal support. The assessments of state responsiveness appear related to state efforts to expand the policy making, taxing, and borrowing authority of their county governments.     

Waiting for Godot: Sustainable development,international trade and governance in environmental policies

The current environmental crisis calls for a sustainable style of development and draws attention to a new ecological dimension in social life that poses hitherto unforeseen challenges to the social sciences and to the everyday concerns of citizens, governments and private interests. Consequently, it is appropriate to attempt a critical overview of governance issues around the formation and implementation of environmental policies designed under the framework of sustainable development. After a brief introduction on how global perceptions about sustainable development have evolved, this article subsequently focuses attention on the main thrust of the emerging international environmental regime, and the multilateral environmental treaties embodied in it. Specific governance issues pertaining to environmental policies are also critically reviewed, particularly interrelations with the trade regime. The article concludes by spelling out some comments on research issues for the future, with a view to charting the environmental governance agenda lying ahead of us.     

Indispensable,yet Invisible: Drinking water management as a local political issue in Swedish municipalities

ABSTRACT

Local policy-makers’ incentives to address an issue is conditioned by how they perceive public attention. Our study focuses on drinking water management at the municipal level in Sweden. Provisioning and management of drinking water is a responsibility of the local governments. Interviews with local politicians and public administrators in seven municipalities reveal that local policy-makers think that citizens view provisioning of drinking water as a taken for granted service, and also lack knowledge of and interest in drinking water issues. Public attention is further seen as a double-edged sword since engagement in water issues often is a result of problems with water provision. The findings are discussed from a theoretical perspective of the role of agenda-setting in public policy. It is argued that the view of policy-makers of citizens as unengaged negatively affects the incentives to bring drinking water to a prominent place on the local policy agenda.