Australian Federalism Confronts Globalisation: A New Challenge at the Centenary

Globalisation poses a special challenge for federal systems of government. Despite administrative reforms, Australia has not fully confronted crucial questions regarding the role of states and territories when international issues overlap areas of subnational government authority. This challenge emerged with controversies over environmental regulations, import quarantines and Aboriginal policies. Initial reforms focused mainly on treaty approval processes, leaving broader policy questions largely unexamined. Subnational governments sometimes react protectively when facing dislocation threats from global forces; conversely, they can carry out constituency representation and education functions in ways that promote Australia's competitiveness and counter public distrust of globalisation. Federalism's new challenge is to devise political processes that foster positive state and territorial participation in Australia's response to globalisation.     

Reforming the Conventions Regarding Parliamentary Scrutiny of Ministerial Actions

Parliamentary scrutiny of government ministers is limited by the convention that one house of parliament cannot compel a member of the other house to appear before it. This convention limits the Senate's capacity to examine ministers who are members of the House of Representatives. It has its origins in UK parliamentary practice, and is given alleged legal force in Australia by virtue of section 49 of Australia's constitution. That section effectively says that Australia's current parliamentary powers, privileges and immunities are those of the UK House of Commons in 1901.
However analysis of UK practice prior to the twentieth century reveals a surprising picture. Far from protecting members of one house from the other house's inquiries, it would seem that invitations issued by one chamber to a member of the other were never refused, an element of 'custom and practice' now conveniently overlooked. Furthermore, the purpose of the powers had nothing to do with protecting ministers. On the contrary, their origins He in a desire to ensure the strength of parliamentary accountability. If modern Australian practice is to be true to historical House of Commons practice, consideration should be given to ensuring that each chamber does have guaranteed access to ministers of the other house.     

Why National Competition Policy?

Strategies to enhance Australia's international competitiveness need to embrace reform of key infrastructure service industries, reform of the regulatory environment, industrial relations reform and taxation reform. Key aspects of this reform agenda can only be addressed through a shared commitment by all levels of government. Ownership of the public utilities responsible for the nation's key infrastructure networks and services is divided among commonwealth, state and territory (and local) governments. Achieving a substantial lift in the productivity of these industries and ensuring the emergence of truly national infrastructure networks relies on agreement by all governments to public utility reform and the removal of barriers to cross-border competition. Moreover, the regulation of industries, occupations and businesses is primarily the responsibility of state and territory governments, hence regulatory reform also requires a cooperative approach by all governments.
While most jurisdictions have taken some steps to reform public utilities and to deregulate certain product markets, to date reform has been piecemeal. A more systematic approach to removal of impediments to competition across the board is likely to be necessary to lift the overall competitiveness of the Australian economy. The agreement by the commonwealth and all states and territories to implement the National Competition Policy (NCP) not only provides the necessary shared commitment to reform across the board, it also provides the rewards and sanctions needed to sustain that commitment in the face of certain resistance from vested interests.     

THE PRIVATISATION OF HUMAN SERVICES IN AUSTRALIA: HAS IT HAPPENED?

Abstract: The privatisation of Australia's public services has been one of the major challenges facing public administration since the early 1980s. Its enthusiastic proponents and their equally fervent opponents have generated considerable controversy. Yet its impact may have been exaggerated. A number of writers have deplored its spread in Australia's human services. Yet their evidence for privatisation does not stand scrutiny. As well, if privatisation had occurred, it would have had an impact upon the flow of public finance and that should be reflected in public finance data. An examination of that data provides almost no support for the claim that the 1980s saw significant privatisation of Australia's human services.
The current debate on privatisation … indicates a movement to return social welfare provision to sectors or systems other than government (ACOSS 1989 p.6).
The re-emergence of the voluntary sector has been facilitated by public policies designed to transfer responsibility for welfare services from the government to the non-government sector (Baldock 1990, p. 109).
with the more systematic transfer of services to the non-governmental sector (Baldock 1990, p. 113).
over the past two decades … a number of functions such as service delivery and management have been transferred from the state in a way that in most terms amounts to privatisation (NCOSS 1989, p.2).
This rebirth of the non-government sector can arguably be seen as a privatisation of the welfare state (NCOSS 1989, p.22).
Human services in New South Wales have been and continue to be the subject of a wide range of reviews intended to produce changes which fit under the general rubric of "privatisation" (Evatt Research Centre 1989, p.208).
The moves towards privatisation, if they are to continue, will have serious long term consequences (Graycar & Jamrozik 1989, p.296).     

Die Dividende der Demokratie: Politische Herrschaft und gesamtwirtschaftliche Produktivität

In social sciences exists a broad consensus about the impact of political institutions on economic development. There is dissent, however, about the influence of democratic order on economic performance. Based on arguments from economic institutionalism, this paper argues that democracy has a significant and positive impact on productivity growth. In contrast to autocratic order, democratic systems can be interpreted as a competition-friendly regulation of a natural monopoly, which results in comparatively high productivity gains. This hypothesis is tested for a sample of 81 countries for the 1975–2000 period. Different regression models provide empirical support for the assumption that increasing levels of democracy produce a productivity dividend.     

传统社会主义国家发展生产力的基本模式研究

传统的社会主义国家发展生产力的基本模式具有独特性,由于把马克思主义的基本结论作为建设社会主义的基本前提,因此,它们通过建立社会主义生产关系来推动生产力的发展。这种用既定的生产关系推动生产力发展的模式,既有对经典社会主义基本理论的坚持,也包含了根据国情探索落后国家发展生产力的新途径。实践证明,由于新的生产关系是生产力发展的前提而不是结果,生产关系大大超越了生产力水平,其结果就是传统社会主义国家的生产力长期得不到有效发展。所以,现存的社会主义国家必须改革传统的生产力发展模式,根据现实的生产力状况建立相应的生产关系,遵循生产力与生产关系矛盾运动规律。     

Costing Constitutional Change: Estimating the Cost of Five Variations on Australia's Federal System

Australia's system of government is by far the most centralised of the four 'classic' federations, hosting extremely centralised states, exceptionally weak local governments, and little of the substantive decentralisation and subsidiarity often presumed to derive from a federal structure. Five variations on the present structure are examined to estimate the costs of improved decentralisation, including New States models as traditionally advocated, Regional States models based on the ACT combined state–local prototype, and a National–Local model comprising a strengthened national government and local governments in essentially their present form. 1 Results indicate that the Regional States or National–Local models could deliver greater decentralisation while saving over $20 billion per annum compared to the present system. Generally, the analysis suggests that coherent modelling of alternative government structures may be more feasible than previously thought.     

Performance measurement in Australian water utilities. Current state and future directions

Ensuring universal and affordable water supply is a central objective of government. An efficient water supply sector plays a primary role in ensuring this objective is met. Scale economies and capital-intensive immobile assets means monopoly emerges as the dominant organizational form, and when combined with an essential character, a strong case exists for economic and technical regulation. Yet diversity in water service provider scale means economic regulation, which is costly, is not always viable. A comprehensive performance monitoring and reporting regime for water service providers is thus crucial. It is crucial for oversight of unregulated entities, and for regulated entities in generating competition by comparison. In this article, we undertake an expansive literature review and summarize approaches to performance measurement by the water industry. Academic literature reveals researchers have centered their approach using comprehensive methods such as data envelopment analysis and stochastic frontier analysis. With the exception of the Victorian Essential Services Commission, the Australian Industry persists with partial indicators. Given water and sewerage price increases of more than 100% in real terms from 2005 to 2014, we find a strong case for implementing advanced methods to address the task of providing a holistic picture of utility performance.     

Unequal access to human rights: the categories of noncitizenship

Abstract

International human rights law consists of a body of basic rights and principles that States are to enforce with respect to every person within their borders. The unfortunate reality, however, is that many States are incapable of ensuring the rights of everyone, and in some instances simply do not wish to do so. Accordingly, citizenship serves as an acknowledgment by a State that the status holder is entitled to a higher degree of protection. Conversely, noncitizens may enjoy less rights than citizens, and certain categories of noncitizens frequently find themselves outside of the State’s protection entirely. This article outlines many of the rights that international law directs should be enjoyed by every human being, the factors that contribute to unequal enjoyment of these rights, and the categories of noncitizen associated with the mediated allocation of basic human rights.     

Polarized embrace: South Korean media coverage of human rights, 1990–2016

Past studies of human rights discourse have centralized civil and political rights over other types of rights, and have thus yielded a biased understanding of how human rights have evolved. This scholarship has also neglected the role of the political slant of reporting agencies in framing topics and issues covering human rights. This study offers new theoretical and analytical solutions to such limits by analyzing a newly compiled data corpus comprising 101,689 South Korean newspaper articles—both right- and left-leaning—referencing the term “human rights.” The analysis of the data led us to reach three conclusions. First, South Korean media coverage demonstrates that human rights as a cultural symbol expanded tremendously in the country during the 1990s and 2000s. Second, there was an a significant degree of shift among multiple categories and topics of human rights during 26 years of that period. Initially, civil and political rights dominated, but then gradually receded as economic, social, cultural, and social minority rights moved to the forefront. Third, we found substantial variation in categories and topics of attention between conservative and progressive news sources; that is, progressive news sources allocated substantially more discussion to diverse categories and topics than their conservative counterparts. These core findings lend support to imagery of a polarized embrace in which human rights are diffused yet in a highly polarized manner.     

Implementing price cops in telecommunications

Over the past few years, price caps have replaced rate-of-return regulation in many sectors of telecommunications. This article focuses on the key implementation issues raised in the Federal Communications Commission's formulation of price cap plans for AT&T and the local telephone exchange carriers. Specifically, it discusses company cost changes over time and the formulas employed to track costs; the multiplicity of prices and the structure of regulations designed to cap them; and the inevitability of errors in the long run and the disincentives likely to result from efforts to correct such errors. It concludes with an evaluation of the performance of these price cap plans, noting how the resolution of these various issues has affected plan success.     

Least-Cost Planning and Electricity Industry Reform in Australia

Least-Cost Planning played a key role in the development of the energy efficiency and renewable energy industries in the USA. It has not been widely used elsewhere, largely due to differences in other nations' regulatory environments and the emergence of competitive markets as the dominant paradigm for electricity planning. Least-Cost Planning, however, may offer valuable insights for creating regulatory frameworks for competitive electricity markets. This paper examines some lessons which may be extracted from an analysis of the Least-Cost Planning experience in the USA and suggests how these lessons might prove beneficial in guiding Australia's electricity industry reform. This analysis demonstrates how market-based reforms may be flawed if they ignore the history of previous reform processes.     

Constituency campaigning in parliamentary systems with preferential voting: Is there a paradox?

This paper sets out to show whether constituency campaign effects exist, particularly in the context of a preferential electoral system such as Australia's. Data from the 1993 Australian Election Study suggest that, despite the best efforts of the candidates, local campaigning has a very limited impact on the vote. The paper considers a range of possible explanations for this limited impact: displacement, MPs' perceptions of their role, sources of campaign information, the importance of party labels in Australia, party discipline. It concludes with an explanation for the apparent paradox of why candidates bother campaigning when it does not make a difference to their vote.     

THE OLD AND NEW GUARDS: A FACTOR IN THE LIBERALISATION OF AUSTRALIA'S RESTRICTIVE IMMIGRATION POLICY*

Abstract: Prior to the second world war, the White Australia policy had been secure as the foundation stone of Australia's immigration policy. In the post-war period, however, the policy came under increased critical scrutiny. The result was the gradual liberalisation of Australia's restrictive immigration policy. There are many factors which can be held accountable for the dismantling of the White Australia policy. A certain factor was the rise of a new educated professional generation in the post-war period. Their new positions in an expanding middle management environment enforced a desire to be well informed and responsible. As a consequence, the new generation found defects in national policy and the most visible was White Australia. This new generation called for a re-evaluation of, and alternatives to, the policy through the formation of public organisations and through their increasing power in Australian decision-making bodies, especially the public service and the major political parties.     

Performance Management in the Public Sector

There has been a great deal of work undertaken on employee performance management with the Australian Public Service (APS) over the last 4 years. The objective has been to focus upon achieving high performance rather than merely preventing poor performance. This refocus was adopted to reflect the increasing complexity of the work, a rise in the need for knowledge work, and escalations in the speed and frequency of change; all this within a context requiring a reduction in costs while still meeting the growing expectations of the public and government. This pair of papers reflects on where employee performance management has got to as a result of the work. Dr. Damian West from the Australian Public Service Commission identifies the continuing importance of effective employee performance management to the APS and public sectors more widely. He highlights the progress that has been made so far, demonstrating the importance of implementation of the process. He suggests that, now that a framework for assessing the potential for employee performance management processes has been established, accountability of the system implementation and adoption will become paramount. Professor Deborah Blackman, whilst echoing the real progress that has been made, suggests that for real improvement in performance management outcomes there needs to be a fundamental shift in thinking; not in terms of the processes or of ensuring compliance, but rather that organizations undertaking performance management need to be much clear as to the strategic direction such a process is going to support. She suggests that there has been too much emphasis on having a system and not enough on determining what such a system is for. When the papers are combined, it can be seen that much progress has been made in terms of the reorientation towards high performance and how to support organizations to work towards this. The next step, for there to be real outcome improvements, is for organizations to be more overt in determining what high performance will look like in their context, then clarifying that to all those involved in developing performance management so that accountabilities at all levels can be agreed, supported, and effective.     

Public Management and Administration: a Need for Evolution

Recently, British public management has relied too much on private sector approaches suited to market‐facing situations, to the detriment of systems based on a realistic estimate of the special nature of public business, and its needs for economy and co‐ordination. Accountability processes have suffered from over‐simplification (targetry) and from a gross multiplication of mechanisms focusing on individual error, as opposed to ensuring intelligent assessment of business results. There has been an over‐emphasis on management of inputs and outputs, as opposed to systems gearing the result‐producing mechanisms to means for policy formation and co‐ordination of effort. We need now to re‐think and define properly the systems whereby ministers are advised, account is rendered, resources are allocated and effort is co‐ordinated—and the qualifications of the relevant actors. Suggestions are made to these ends.     

Railway Dreaming: Lessons for Economic Regulators from Aboriginal Resource Management Lore

Railway reform in the past decade has seen the introduction of mandated third party access to track in a number of jurisdictions. This article argues that third party access changes the property rights associated with railway track, rendering it a common pool resource. As such, it is useful to ask whether the literature on the governance of common pool resources could inform the economic regulation of railways. This article suggests that it might, and draws some lessons from the common pool resource governance mechanisms traditionally used by Australia's Aborigines in managing their land that may have application within the context of the railways.     

State of the Arts and Innovation: Before and After the Review of the National Innovation System

This article examines the relationship between the arts and national innovation policy in Australia, pivoting around the  Venturous Australia  report released in September 2008 as part of the Review of the National Innovation System (RNIS). This came at a time of optimism that the arts sector would be included in Australia's federal innovation policy. However, despite the report's broad vision for innovation and specific commentary on the arts, the more ambitious hopes of arts sector advocates remained unfulfilled. This article examines the entwining discourses of creativity and innovation which emerged globally and in Australia prior to the RNIS, before analysing  Venturous Australia  in terms of the arts and the ongoing science-and-technology bias to innovation policy. It ends by considering why sector-led policy research and lobbying has to date proved unsuccessful and then suggests what public policy development is now needed.     

Modelling the determinants of electronic tax filing services’ continuance usage intention

The success of electronic filing services largely depends on their continuance usage. This study examines the factors affecting the continuance usage intention of the online tax filing services in Mauritius. An integrated model comprising Trust Theory and Information System Success Model (ISSM) is applied to assess the continuance usage behaviour of e-filing systems. The model has been extended by adding two additional variables: Perceived Usefulness and Perceived Risk. The model was tested using a sample of 315 users of e-filing services in Mauritius. A structural equation modelling technique using partial least square structural equation modelling verified the hypotheses. The results reveal that the continuance usage intention of an electronic tax filing system is influenced by Perceived Usefulness, User Satisfaction, and Service Quality. However, Perceived Risk does not influence the continuance usage intention of e-filing systems since the importance of Perceived Risk diminishes as trust in the e-service provider increases. The theoretical and practical implications derived from the findings of this study are also discussed. This paper makes several contributions to the literature on electronic tax filing systems.     

eGovernment

Abstract

This article gives an overview of policies and progress on eGovernment in Europe. Propelled by the implementation of the eEurope 2002 Action Plan, collaborative R&D work and the establishment of trans-European telematic networks between EU national administrations, eGovernment applications have developed dramatically in Europe. However, the first achievements will not fulfil their promises if further challenges are not addressed by the decision makers at all levels of government. Top-level leadership and commitment is necessary to deepen eGovernment, not least for the change management needed for reorganisation of government back offices. The transfer of eBusiness practices into the public sector can help to achieve increased productivity and inclusion, by ensuring access for all to government eServices. The Brussels eGovernment Conference in November 2001 highlighted both the quality of existing eGovernment applications and the potential of European cooperation. European administrations are setting new standards as a basis for further progress.