Repositioning American Public Administration? Citizen Estrangement,Administrative Reform,and the Disarticulated State

Levels of citizen estrangement from government in the United States have risen rather consistently since the late 1960s and have reached all‐time highs in recent years. Evidence is accumulating in political science research to suggest that public administrative theory may have contributed to this trend since the Progressive Era in the early 1900s. The authors develop this thesis by arguing that administrative theory in the United States has persistently portrayed public managers as “bridge builders” who link an expertise‐challenged citizenry to government in ways that emphasize bureaucratic over democratic administration. Moreover, despite claims of yet another “new” paradigmatic shift for the field, collaborative governance scholarship to date exhibits similar tendencies. To support this argument, the authors assess the common citizen‐marginalizing tendencies of three sets of administrative reforms in American public administration: the progressive, associationalist, and polycentric heritages. They offer counterarguments to this thesis and call for critical self‐reflection by the field and a more empirically robust research agenda on this topic.     

DIFFERING OPINIONS DO NOT SPOIL FRIENDSHIPS: MANAGING PUBLIC–PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP (PPP) INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECTS IN JORDAN

This research investigates the approaches, strategies and challenges facing the management of the implementation phase of public–private partnership (PPP) projects in Jordan. Jordan is a newer but common user of PPPs in the Middle Eastern region, where PPPs not only are of economic strategic importance but also entail significant investment risk given resource scarcity. This research involves semi‐structured interviews with senior managers representing different partnering organisations in two case study organisations in Jordan. The research finds that, despite the management difficulties confronting PPP managers, strategies adopted by them limit the impact of these challenges. The research makes an important theoretical contribution in providing a detailed analysis of effective PPP management approaches in response to difficulties at the implementation phase, which had not been systematically explored in extant PPP research, and broadens PPP research to the Jordanian context. Moreover, the research contributes greater understanding of how partnerships should be effectively managed. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Administrative reform in global perspectives: a symposium

ABSTRACT

This study examines public officials' preferences for different performance measures. Understanding these preferences is important for public officials to reach consensus on performance measurement. It finds that public officials overwhelmingly favor outcome measures, although output measures are more likely to be used in government. Public officials favor the capacities of outcome measures in addressing organizational goals and achievements. Measurement validity is not a major concern to public officials in their selections of performance measures. Finally, public officials favor the use of outcome measures in performance monitoring rather than in resource allocation.     

Administrative reform in modern Iran: an historical analysis

This article discusses administrative reforms in modern Iran in an historical context. Beginning in the mid-19th century, administrative reform became a concern of national policy-makers. A number of reforms have been attempted by the three political systems/regimes of Qajar, Pahlavi, and the Islamic Republic. Additionally, several administrative reforms were carried out, though short-lived, by certain revolutionary and popular governments in Iran. Efforts toward administrative reform are reviewed with an assessment of the positive and negative consequences or implications for the development of public administration in modern Iran. It is also argued that most of the dictated administrative reforms have failed in Iran, and that a culturally sensitive attempt at administrative reform has had a much greater chance to succeed than the traditional top-down approaches. Iran's revolutionary experiences tend to empirically support the validity of the former approach. Finally, further research is suggested on recent administrative reforms in post-revolutionary Iran.     

Can computer forensic tools be trusted in digital investigations?

This paper investigates whether computer forensic tools (CFTs) can extract complete and credible digital evidence from digital crime scenes in the presence of file system anti-forensic (AF) attacks. The study uses a well-established six stage forensic tool testing methodology based on black-box testing principles to carry out experiments that evaluate four leading CFTs for their potential to combat eleven different file system AF attacks. Results suggest that only a few AF attacks are identified by all the evaluated CFTs, while as most of the attacks considered by the study go unnoticed. These AF attacks exploit basic file system features, can be executed using simple tools, and even attack CFTs to accomplish their task. These results imply that evidences collected by CFTs in digital investigations are not complete and credible in the presence of AF attacks. The study suggests that practitioners and academicians should not absolutely rely on CFTs for evidence extraction from a digital crime scene, highlights the implications of doing so, and makes many recommendations in this regard. The study also points towards immediate and aggressive research efforts that are required in the area of computer forensics to address the pitfalls of CFTs.     

Conflict Assessment in Energy Infrastructure Siting: Prospects for Consensus Building in the Northern Pass Transmission Line Project

As energy demand grows rapidly worldwide, power line infrastructure will continue to be a major development planning challenge. This study considers the environmental conflict that has arisen over a transnational transmission line project between Canada and the United States. A qualitative conflict assessment is presented to define the parameters for consensus that could prevent protracted litigation between stakeholders. Proactively designing a process to encourage consensus building during the early development phase remains the most critical determinant of compromise. In this article, we argue that in this case a consensus‐building effort could be feasible if certain design requirements were met, including gaining the participation of key stakeholders, paying attention to trust, and focusing on the issues specific to this transmission line rather than to a larger energy discussion. The research shows that despite potential pitfalls, reaching more widely accepted and ecologically sensitive solutions to environmental conflicts through participatory and collaborative approaches is possible and worth the effort.