Public Service Motivation Scholarship in Africa: A Systematic Review and Research Agenda

Although several literature reviews have been published on public service motivation (PSM), none of them focused solely on Africa. Adopting a systematic review of the literature, we analyse articles on PSM scholarship in Africa published between 2005 and 2017. We found that authors in African PSM is consistently increasing with their research published in highly ranked peer-reviewed journals. The antecedents and consequences of African PSM are similar to those of Western countries. Finally, respondents of African PSM scholarship are skewed towards “managerist” and students’ perspective. We proposed agenda for African PSM research with four key interest areas.     

西方国家民事诉讼审前准备程序概况与评析

西方国家民事诉讼的发展趋势由偏重开庭审理转为审前准备程序并重 ,体现出法官的职权行使受当事人权利的约束等一些共同特征。审前准备程序的价值在于为当事人拥有积极行使诉讼权利的空间和手段 ,提高诉讼参与性 ,保障诉讼的民主性、公正性和公开性提供基础条件。     

发展中国家对现代海洋法发展的贡献

海洋法是国际法中新兴而又古老的法律部门,在20世纪30年代以前,只有少数国家能够在各个方面利用和开发海洋,因此,海洋法就成了他们掠夺资源、行使海洋霸权的工具。20世纪30年代以后,尤其是二战结束之后,随着广大发展中国家利用和开发海洋的能力和意识的不断增强,提出了许多顺应潮流的海洋法理论。为了使这些理论得以落实,广大发展中国家联合起来同少数发达国家展开了激烈的斗争,从而为现代海洋法的发展做出了重大贡献。     

国外政府公共服务的做法、经验教训与启示

政府公共服务问题是一个历史性和世界性的重要课题 ,也是发挥政府作用、履行政府职能的核心问题。许多国家非常重视这个问题 ,并且采取了一系列的措施 ,从法律上、制度上、政策上、财力投入上予以保证 ,不断提高公共服务的水平和公共产品的质量。借鉴国外政府的做法和经验 ,汲取教训和规避风险 ,对于强化我国政府公共服务职能和建设服务型政府具有积极的意义。     

The World on the Box: International Issues in News and Factual Programmes

A report on factual international programmes shown on UK TV in 2003 reveals that the total of hours broadcast is similar that of previous years. However, there has been a drop in the number of programmes on developing countries, and the definition of 'factual international' covers a misleadingly wide range - including game shows and travel programmes. The amount of developing country coverage on terrestrial TV is the lowest since the measurement began in 1989. Many serious programmes on developing countries are now shown exclusively on the new BBC digital channels. It appears that ITV is no longer fulfilling its public service remit to broadcast programmes covering 'matters of international significance and interest'. The proportion of foreign coverage in television news increased in 2003 across all bulletins, as a result of the Iraq war.     

Risk management for targeting customs controls in developing countries: a risky venture for revenue performance?

Customs authorities in developing countries are often reluctant to forget systematic inspections for fear of risking revenue loss. Such physical inspections however, impede rather than facilitate trade. Control selectivity is therefore a key issue in customs administration reform. This paper shows how a sophisticated risk management method can facilitate trade by automatically and rationally selecting transactions, with the end result of actually enhancing revenue performance. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Crises and unpredictability in developing countries

Developing countries have suffered most of the financial crises in the context of the process of economic and financial globalisation. Both current and previous crises have revealed that unpredictability is a feature common to all the episodes which occurred during the process of globalisation. Although certain alarms went off, any of those external financial crises were actually predicted by the advanced methods in use for prediction and country risk analysis. Taking into consideration the information above, the aim of this paper is to check the ability to foresee external financial crises in developing countries of both the country risk index published by Euromoney and the Credit Ratings variable included therein. We have focused on the external financial crises that took place between 1992 and 2011, that is, in a full globalisation era. The results are negative. It appears that neither the index nor the sovereign ratings are able to reflect early enough the vulnerabilities that arise previously to the setting off the crisis episodes. This leads us to conclude that the existing models of country risk have limits. Thus, it would necessary to develop new instruments to measure this risk, considering uncertainty as an essential feature of the current economic and financial environment.     

Co-creation of Linking Social Capital in ‘Municipality 3.0’

There is great interest in co-creation of welfare production between municipalities and the civil society in the Nordic countries. Using linking social capital as a theoretical point of departure and examining a qualitative case study in Norway, I critically assess the concepts of co-creation and ‘Municipality 3.0’. It is suggested that even in countries with high trust in the authorities, building linking social capital in the shape of interorganizational networks is a complex process fraught with potential barriers related to trust, network building, municipal resources, and statutory laws and regulations. And while outcomes are promising, they are far from certain.     

Preventing Corruption Risk in Legislation: Evidence from Russia,Moldova, and Kazakhstan

ABSTRACT

Corruption risk assessment of draft laws and other normative acts is a relatively new instrument in the anti-corruption strategies implemented by developed nations, countries in transition, and the developing world. In connection with this, any practical experience accumulated in this area presents obvious interest. The analysis of such experience may allow to identify what works and what does not work in introducing the practices of anti-corruption screening of draft laws and other normative acts in various environments and settings, as well as contribute to dissemination of best practices in the countries of the region and elsewhere.

This article seeks to analyze and demonstrate the extent of practical implementation of corruption risk assessment of draft and enacted legislation in three post-communist countries, the problems encountered and solutions identified. Proceeding from this analysis, certain recommendations for practitioners in this field are formulated.     

Making a Place for Alternative Technologies: The Case of Agricultural Bio‐Inputs in Argentina

This article characterizes the ways in which the actors in charge of designing and implementing public policies intervene to promote the emergence of alternatives to problematic technologies. It is based on a case study conducted in Argentina that focuses on initiatives to promote the development of biological agricultural inputs in the context of increasingly controversial chemical inputs. The study spotlights the political, institutional, and semantic efforts made by policy makers and public administrations to ensure these new inputs find their way into organizations and onto their agendas. Their work consists in attenuating the boundaries between chemical and biological inputs, and reducing opposition by creating categories and organizations that downplay potential dissension and highlight the possible coexistence of technological paradigms. Contrary to what the injunctions of technological substitution suggest, we show that putting alternative technologies on the public agenda depends largely on their inclusion in institutional and regulatory infrastructures originally designed for technologies that are likely to decline. More broadly, it relies on the construction of continuity between the two types of technologies.