Mayor vs. manager revisited: an archival approach to comparing efficiency

The efficiency of municipal government is defined as a function of two factors: financial indicators such as per capita spending and taxation, and quality of life. If the financial indicators differ between cities without a corresponding change in quality of life, then the city with the lower value can be said to be better managed. An analysis of data from the County and City Data Book and the Places Rated Almanac found that large cities managed by city managers are more efficient than those managed by mayors. There was no significant difference in efficiency between mayors and managers of small cities; theoretically, mayors of small cities are unable to tax, spend, and borrow in relative anonymity. A cluster analysis of 114 large U.S. cities suggested that they may be classified into one of four categories: (1) Drunken Sailors; (2) High rollers; (3) Prudent Big Boys; and (4) Solvent Citizens.     

Politicization,Bureaucratic Legalism,and Innovative Attitudes in the Public Sector

Previous studies have identified institutional, organizational, and individual factors that promote innovation in public organizations. Yet they have overlooked how the type of public administration—and the type of administrators—is associated with innovative attitudes. Using two large, unique comparative data sets on public bureaucracies and public managers, this article examines how bureaucratic politicization and legalistic features are associated with senior public managers’ attitudes toward innovation in 19 European countries. Results of multilevel analysis indicate that the bureaucratic politicization of an administration and the law background of public managers matter. Public managers working in politicized administrations and those whose education includes a law degree exhibit lower pro-innovation attitudes (i.e., receptiveness to new ideas and creative solutions and change orientation).     

Responses

This essay is a response to the excellent contributions to the double special issue of Law and Philosophy on my book The Ends of Harm. I further defend the Duty View of punishment outlined in the book, responding to criticisms of that view. I also challenge the plausibility of retributivist accounts offered in response to the challenges to that view developed in The Ends of Harm.     

Establishing Likelihood Ratios for Patterned Garment Comparisons from Seam Measurement Data,

It is often challenging to ascribe an objective measure of confidence for identifications based on surveillance imagery from a crime scene. The present work seeks to address this deficiency in the case of garment comparison evidence by developing a quantitative method for establishing a conservative lower bound on the likelihood ratio (LR) for identifications involving patterned garments. The method is based on statistical analysis of pattern offset measurements taken from a sample of garments of the same type (manufacturer, style, and size) as the seized evidence. The developed analysis framework was demonstrated on different types of garments over a range of modeled surveillance imaging scenarios with variable image quality; the lower bounds on the LRs ranged from approximately 10–1 to over 400–1. The statistical model was tested and validated through a large‐scale empirical study involving both simulated and human observer‐performed garment comparisons.