Governance,economy, and foreign aid

Much of the current donor discussion of governance takes place outside of a historical or theoretical context. This article locates the governance issue within recent political science, development management, and institutional economics literature. The review focuses on accountability, participation, transparency, and predictability or the rule of law, and includes a discussion of the impact of these variables upon economic performance. It concludes that donors can best assist good governance to develop by helping to foster conditions under which developing societies can push their governments to deliver the accountability, transparency and rule of law that sustainable development requires. Deborah Brautigam is assistant professor in the department of political science at Columbia University. She has written and published on various aspects of foreign aid and development, in particular, on China’s foreign aid program in West Africa. Her current research is on the comparative politics of industrial adjustment in Asia and Africa.     

Cyberdemocracy or Potemkin E-Villages? Electronic Governments in OECD and Post-Communist Countries

Abstract

The dramatic increase in the use of the World Wide Web and the Internet in government may foreshadow important changes in the nature of governance. A number of theorists have posited that the adoption of networked information systems is accompanied by inevitable shifts toward democratic government. Others argue that technologies are secondary factors in changes in levels of democracy or types of governance. Our article examines the openness of cabinet-level websites in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and post-communist countries as a measure of an important aspect of governance that has only recently been operationalized. It provides a brief review of other studies in this field and the directions in which they are heading. The article analyzes the effects of political, cultural, economic, and technical factors on openness of cabinet-level websites in OECD and post-communist countries. The question is whether the level of democracy and cultural legacies affect openness of electronic governments. The study employs statistical analysis of a comparative database of national-level public agency websites that is produced by the Cyberspace Policy Research Group (CyPRG). The dependent variable is based on transparency and interactivity scores and availability of cabinet-level websites. The independent variables include Freedom House and Polity indexes of democracy, historical legacy, religious tradition, and the GDP per capita and number of Internet users per 1,000 people. Regression analysis shows that democracy, historical legacies, level of economic development, and religious tradition affect openness of cabinet-level websites in OECD and post-communist countries. This study demonstrates need to distinguish between cyberdemocracy and “Potemkin e-villages,” that is, window-dressing, in electronic governments.     

The Political Economy of Aid and Governance in Cambodia

The impact of massive aid on development and governance has been studied for a decade with mixed results. Using the results of an elite survey on aid and quality of governance based on Kaufmann et al.'s six dimensions (voice and accountability, political stability, government effectiveness, regulatory quality, rule of law, and control of corruption), this article offers a case-study of Cambodia. The country's challenges in light of high aid dependence and ‘Dutch disease’ in the aid sector are elaborated, and disappointing human development outcomes are examined. Despite more than five billion dollars in aid, infant and child mortality and inequality have worsened. Key informants are overwhelmingly in agreement that, save for political stability, aid has not had a positive impact on governance in Cambodia. The failure on control of corruption shows how hard it is for donors to be tough on a country with extreme poverty. On the basis of what has been accomplished to date, however, aid seems unlikely to be able to deliver large improvements in governance and in many ways may even contribute to its further deterioration.     

Post-Arab Spring: changes and challenges

This paper advances the proposition that post-Arab Spring politics are a product of globalisation’s economic and social liberalisation. The global market and privatisation have fundamentally deconstructed centralised autocratic rule over state and society, while facilitating corruption and selective development, culminating in public outrage. The political order of the Middle East and North Africa since the Arab Spring synthesises globalisation’s dialectic duality, in which economic integration has contributed to the demise of national authoritarianism, inciting communalism and political fragmentation. This paper analyses emerging political trends and challenges based on a comparative analysis of Egypt and Tunisia.     

Tracing connections between comparative politics and globalisation

This article focuses on connections between globalisation and comparative political analysis. Traditionally the latter is concerned with domestic political actors, especially states. Globalisation, on the other hand, emphasises the variable significance of a variety of border-crossing, including transnational, actors. I argue that since the end of the Cold War five key developments—a large number of new countries; widespread political changes, especially in the Third World; global entrenchment of capitalism; increasing regional economic integration; and the growth of transnational civil society—collectively underline the importance of globalisation for comparative political analysis. It is now difficult plausibly to argue that what goes on politically within countries is unaffected by globalisation. The article is structured as follows. First, I trace the traditional (domestic) concerns of comparative political analysis and argue that, because it neglects the impact of globalisation, it is analytically inadequate. Second, I examine four key aspects of globalisation: technological, political, economic and cultural globalisation, and suggest how they influence comparative political analysis. Third, to assess differing views of how globalisation affects domestic politicalÐeconomic terrains, I examine competing arguments of the hyper-globalisationist, globalisation sceptic and structural dependency approaches.     

Measuring Governance in Urban Innovation

Abstract

The international political science literature is ambiguous on the point if the involvement of a plurality of external actors (citizens, economic and social groups, NGOs and CSOs, Universities and experts, different public authorities at the same or at different territorial level, etc.) in governance processes is an end in itself (because it increases democracy) or it is useful in order to achieve better results in the production of public goods.

This article espouses the latter hypothesis and tries to understand if a governance perspective brings about a higher level of innovation in metropolitan areas. In order to test this hypothesis, two metrics are designed: ? In measuring innovation, the ideas are that there are four dimensions in urban innovation (agenda innovation, process innovation, product innovation and innovative communication) and that a metropolitan city has to score high in most of them in order to be considered really innovative.

? As far as governance is concerned, the analytical proposal is that the ideal governance network is at the same time complex (bringing together actors from different territorial levels and from different societal and institutional domains), dense (favouring direct interaction between the actors) and ‘focused’ (showing one or few actors able to act as focal points of the network).

Drawing from a research done in four Italian cities (Turin, Milan, Florence and Naples) through the reconstruction of 120 urban innovation processes, the article illustrates the analytical steps taken and the conclusions that can be reached.     

The Flypaper Effect Revisited: Intergovernmental Grants and Local Governance

Abstract

Local governance arrangements shape the incentives of local actors, which may in turn influence fiscal choices. By emphasizing the role of local government institutions in local fiscal choices, we seek to bridge between median voter and Leviathan models prevalent in the literature. We then offer some preliminary evidence to support this explanation by empirically testing several propositions regarding the flypaper effect in intergovernmental grants. One limitation of the median voter model is that the model does not consider political institutions and their influences on government expenditures. In this study, we attempt to capture the influence of political dynamics in determining public expenditures by considering institutional variables. Test results show that the political institutional variables could be one of the explanation variables for the flypaper effect.     

The Worldwide Governance Indicators: Six,One, or None?

Aggregate indexes of the quality of governance, covering large samples of countries, have become popular in comparative political analysis. Few studies examine the validity or reliability of these indexes. To partially fill this gap, this study uses factor, confirmatory factor and path analysis to test both measurement and causal models of the six Worldwide Governance indicators. They purportedly measure distinct concepts of control of corruption, rule of law, government effectiveness, rule quality, political stability, and voice and accountability. Rather than distinguishing among aspects of the quality of governance, we find that they appear to be measuring the same broad concept.     

Implementing Electronic Notification in Los Angeles: Citizen Participation Politics by Other Means

Abstract

This paper considers whether new information and communication technologies have significant effects on citizen participation by evaluating the development of a major innovation in electronic governance. We analyze the creation of an electronic system in Los Angeles to provide stakeholders a warning of upcoming political decisions and an opportunity to furnish feedback. We evaluate this innovation not only as a technological innovation that affects citizens’ capacity and motivation for participation but also as an alternative institutional means for involving citizens in policy making and public administration. To place this experiment within this larger institutional perspective, we draw upon the lessons of historical reforms aimed to expand citizen participation. We find that although technology does positively affect individuals’ capacity and motivations, technology, by itself, does not overcome the political, institutional, and behavioral impediments that have limited previous participatory reforms.     

Legal Empowerment and Group-Based Inequality

Abstract

Legal empowerment has become widely accepted in development policy circles as an approach to addressing poverty and exclusion. At the same time, it has received relatively little attention from political scientists and sociologists working on overlapping and closely related topics – the rule of law, the functioning of judicial systems, property rights, labour politics, and business and governance, among others. Research on legal empowerment has been largely applied, with clearest grounding in the fields of law and economics. This special issue speaks to this gap with contributions on six core areas of legal empowerment. This article frames the collection. It provides a brief introduction to legal empowerment and advances two broad arguments. First, an ethnic group-focused approach is a useful starting point in considering the impact of legal empowerment and other development interventions. Second, the state via the law contributes to ethnic inequalities in four broad ways – via its written laws, their implementation and actual practice, historical legacies of law and practice, and ethnic hegemony embedded in the system. Thinking about legal empowerment initiatives within this framework provides understanding both of their potential and their limitations.     

South Africa's governance challenges: assessing the South Africa–China mineral case

The past 50 years of Africa's history have been blighted by a lack of good governance, which has hindered economic growth and political stability. The continent continues to maintain weak states which are clearly evident in the persistent corruption, unconstitutional behaviour, inefficiency, waste and unnecessary bureaucracy that remain widely practised. However, owing to emerging markets such as China and India that have promoted foreign direct investment in developing countries, a lot of speculation has arisen regarding the impact of the Forum for Cooperation between Africa and China on continental governance. The speculation tends to focus on whether the multilateral trade agreement between Africa and China will be mutually beneficial, or promote bad governance practices such as corruption. This paper argues that in order for any multilateral agreement to become economically beneficial in Africa, the continental elites must first implement good governance best practices. Furthermore, the onus is on the African states, not their regional or trading partners, to implement economic institutional change.     

The political economy of development: An empirical analysis of the effects of the institutional framework on economic development

Researchers suggest that societies characterized by high levels of political freedom are expected to exhibit significantly higher rates of economic growth than those in which civil liberties and political rights are abridged. In the present study, four sets of national-level data and panel regression analysis are used to examine the relationship between the institutional framework and various measures of economic development. While the results from the full sample support the hypothesis that political freedom enhances economic development, the results obtained from the disaggregated models cast doubts on this conclusion. An important lesson to be learned from the present study is that there is yet no single empirical model of economic development that can be applied to all societies. John Mukum Mbaku, PhD, is professor in the department of economics at Weber State University. He received the Ph.D. degree in economics from the University of Georgia in 1985. His research interests are in public choice, economic development, property rights, and Africa. He has published articles in such journals asPublic Choice, Cato Journal, Applied Economics (UK),Konjunkturpolitik (Germany),International Review of Economics and Business (Italy),Indian Journal of Social Science, Asian and African Studies, Journal of Economic Development, The Review of Black Political Economy. He is associate editor (Africa) ofJournal of Third World Studies. Recent publications include Markets and the economic origins of apartheid in South Africa,Indian Journal of Social Science, vol. 6, no. 2 (1993); Foreign aid and economic growth in Cameroon,Applied Economics (UK), vol. 25, no. 10 (1993); Rent seeking and institutional stability in developing countries, (with Mwangi S. Kimenyi),Public Choice, vol. 77, no. 2 (1993); and Institutional instability and economic growth in sub-Saharan Africa,International Review of Economics and Business (Italy), vol. 40, no. 9 (1993). He is currently researching the determinants of institutional instability in Africa.     

Assessing China's Public Price Hearings: Symbolic Aspects

Abstract

The effectiveness of the public hearing as a participatory instrument has been debated. This paper argues that evaluation of the public hearing could be improved by an interpretive and institutional analysis. Introducing four major recent public hearings, this comparative study assesses the development and use of public hearing in China's governmental price making. It concludes that the public hearing should be viewed as a type of participatory institution. Its effectiveness relies on other institutional factors and on whether it can evoke values of citizenship, due process and deliberation. Constrained by China's political and social institutions, current Chinese price hearings are framed on the basis of consumer rights rather than citizen rights. The public hearing is perhaps the oldest and most widely used technique for citizens to participate in governmental decision making in western countries (Checkoway, B. The politics of public hearing. J. Appl. Behav. Sci. 1981, 17(4), 566–583), but it is not a popular topic theme at present. While the public hearing originally emerged for the purpose of due process in trial‐type or quasi‐judicial rule making, it has become an important citizen participation instrument since the 1960s and 1970s (Ibid. and Cole, R.L.; Caputo, D.A. The public hearing as an effective citizen participation mechanism: a case study of the general revenue sharing program. Am. Polit. Sci. Rev. 1984, 78(2), 404–416), especially to make public policy responsive to those disadvantaged. In contrast, the public hearing was not in place until the late 1990s in China, but it has become a top issue theme since 2000. This paper aims to assess the development and use of public hearings in China from a comparative perspective: is it effective for citizens to participate? If not, will it work in the future? How does the institutional context affect the operation, effectiveness and symbolism of public hearings in China? The paper also sheds lights on how to use interpretive and institutional analysis for the evaluation of public hearings in general.     

Globalisation and Power in Weak States

Both academic literature and popular ideas focus on the ways in which globalisation might be leading to convergence in the ways in which societies are governed. This is misleading. There are marked differentiation processes. Patterns of governance are diverging. These divergences are concentrated in smaller, poorer countries outside the ranks of the oecd and bric/emerging economies category. This article focuses on the ways in which these divergences are driven by changes in sources of government and elite revenues (‘political revenues’). As a result of late 20th century globalisation, fewer governments are funded by broad general taxation, and elites in poor countries face increased incentives to use their power for personal profit rather than the collective good. The emergence of ‘failing’ or ‘weak’ states is not an isolated or random phenomenon, but an aspect of a broader shift in the character of public authority. That understanding has direct implications for the policies employed to combat the problem.     

Westminster No More? Governance,Devolution and Delegation in Scotland

Abstract

Politicians have returned frequently to the need to reform schools to achieve wider objectives of social reform and economic prosperity. Within the UK education systems, however, there have been differing experiences and approaches at both national (Scottish, English, Welsh and Northern Irish) and local levels towards school governance reform. School governance in Scotland remains distinct compared to the rest of the UK, both in terms of the pace of reform and the content. The pace of reform in Scotland has been slower and the content has been shaped to a greater extent by political and professional modes of accountability. This article argues that a new phase in school governance reform is likely to follow the election of the Scottish National Party (SNP) majority government in May 2011. A number of factors both external (international comparison of the school performance; the post 2008 politics of austerity) and internal (changes led by the SNP government to the policy-making process, namely outcomes-based policy-making) have placed debates about school autonomy and school governance on the political agenda.     

Fragility within stability: the state,the clan and political resilience in Somaliland

Abstract

Even in the context of a relatively flourishing state, fragility can be an enduring feature of a political system, particularly in the case of recently established or unrecognised states. This article examines the nature of state-building in a specific context to question the assumption that forms of hybrid governance or pre-existing forms of governance are a necessary evil to be tolerated but which needs ultimately to be overcome during state-building. It does this by adopting the language of resilience and focusing on the case of Somaliland to highlight the role of clan governance as a mechanism of political resilience and as a means of promoting the flexibility required for state-building. Yet, at the same time, the process of state-building often involves formalising governance and limiting the role of traditional social-political forms of governance such as clans, ignoring their role in legitimating and stabilising the political system. However, as this article argues, stability and fragility are inextricably linked; while the clan system has been an important force in stabilising the state, it has also become a pressure point for the state’s latent fragility. By contextualising fragility and stability within the language of resilience, though, this symbiotic relationship can be better analysed.     

Economic transformation through political change? Evidence from Turkey

Turkey recently initiated a political change by replacing its parliamentary model with the presidential governmental system (PGS) to achieve, inter alia, a structural transformation from an efficiency-driven to an innovation-driven model of growth. To investigate the PGS’s potential for mediating such a change, this paper uses four key concepts of institutionalist analysis: systemic governance, credible commitment, institutional fragmentation and institutional traps. In doing so, the paper concludes that the PGS’s potential to unleash a structural transformation towards an innovation-driven and high growth depends on the prospect of its mediating an imperative commitment in political and economic governance. This prospect proves to be weak due to both the PGS’s institutional pillars and the path-dependent dynamics of the country’s trap in efficiency-driven growth that have become embedded under a parliamentary model.     

“Dieselgate:” How Different Approaches to Decentralization,the Role of NGOs,Tort Law and the Regulatory Process Affected Comparative U.S. and European Union Outcomes in the Biggest Scandal in Automotive History

ABSTRACT

The VW diesel emissions scandal (“dieselgate”) recounts how Volkswagen became ensnared in a self-inflicted and staggeringly costly cheating scandal that started in the U.S. and then spread to the European Union. This case study shows how fundamental differences in comparative public administration (CPA) between the U.S. and the European Union (EU) led to different consequences for one of the world’s largest and most highly-regarded European auto manufacturers with respect to four institutional variables: (a) approaches to decentralization, (b) the role of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), (c) civil (tort) law, and (d) regulatory environment.     

HOW LOW CAN YOU GO? RATIONALES AND CHALLENGES FOR NEIGHBOURHOOD GOVERNANCE

Associated with innovation in both democratic practice and service design, neighbourhoods are high on policy agendas across Europe. Drawing upon classic debates about size and devolution, the article identifies four distinct rationales for neighbourhood governance: civic, social, political and economic. In England, the ‘new localism’ agenda gets near to developing a comprehensive case for neighbourhood governance, drawing upon all four rationales. Options for institutional design are explored with reference to four ideal types: (1) neighbourhood empowerment; (2) neighbourhood partnership; (3) neighbourhood government; (4) and neighbourhood management. Key challenges for neighbourhood governance are analysed in terms of capacity, competence, diversity and equity. The article argues that the classic democracy/capacity trade‐off associated with small units needs to be re‐thought in the context of the ‘new governance’ (multi‐level, multi‐actor and e‐enabled). Rather than confronting one big trade‐off, institutional designers face a series of questions about the underlying purposes and priorities of neighbourhood governance.     

Building the Tamil Eelam State: emerging state institutions and forms of governance in LTTE-controlled areas in Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka's civil war has created a political – territorial division between the government of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (ltte), where ltte is engaged in a process of state building within the areas they control. The article examines this state formation with an emphasis on the functions and forms of governance that are embedded in the new state institutions. It is observed that the emerging state formation has a strong focus on external and internal security, with an additional emphasis on social welfare and economic development. In terms of governance, the ltte state apparatus is marked by authoritarian centralisation with few formal mechanisms for democratic representation, but there are also partnership arrangements and institutional experiments that may foster more democratic forms of representation and governance. Hence, resolving the security problem in tandem with political transformations towards democratic governance remain prime challenges for peace building in northeast Sri Lanka.