Theorizing about public expenditure decision-making: (as) if wishes were horses ...

There have been several attempts to compare different approaches to modelling public expenditure decision-making. This paper is an extended comment on one such attempt: Fred Thompson and Richard Williams, A Horse Race Around a Möbius Strip: A Review and a Test of Utility Maximizing and Organizational-Process Models of Public Expenditure Decisions. In a commentary mode, we: (a) examine why tests of the sort that Thompson and Williams offer are neither definitive in choosing between models nor very useful in improving models; (b) outline a more meaningful test procedure; and (c) offer a somewhat more critical view than Thompson and Williams of the utility-maximizing approach to modelling public expenditure decisions.A comment on Fred Thompson and Richard Williams, A Horse Race Around a Möbius Strip: A Review and A Test of Utility-Maximizing and Organizational-Process Models of Public Expenditure Decisions, in this issue of Policy Sciences.     

Performance appraisal in the Maldives public service: challenges and issues

A structured method of evaluating and rewarding the performance of employees in the Maldives public service did not exist before 1996. Personnel decisions, such as employee promotions, were subjective and based merely on the recommendation of the heads of departments. Hence, in 1996, the Government of Maldives introduced a performance appraisal system, based on rewarding employees through the assessment of several factors such as quality of work, job knowledge and performance. The reward came in the form of annual salary increments. In reviewing this system, the article finds that human resource units or divisions within departments now need to be strengthened for the effective implementation of the system; more training has to be provided to public service employees in terms of raising their awareness as to the objectives of the performance appraisal exercise; and the performance appraisal framework needs to be more flexible in differentiating very high performers, at the same time devising a strategy for the improvement of employees who slack in performance. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

It's not only the economy,stupid! Good governance matters in elections

This paper examines the impact of good governance in elections compared to the role of the economy. The latter is considered the key factor in electoral survival, while governance issues are rarely included in politicians' discourse or campaigning strategies. Using the ParlGov data and the ICRG indicators for 160 elections, the analysis shows that good governance matters, but mainly for developing countries. Economic growth is an important electoral topic in most of the elections, but its effect varies systematically across contexts. The impact of each good governance and the economy get weaker as the other worsens, and these conditional effects are moderated by the level of economic development.     

Socialism in France: An appraisal

The Mitterrand Era. Edited by A. DALEY. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1996. Pp.xiv + 285, index, £45.00 (cloth). ISBN 0–333–63265–6.

France during the Socialist Years. Edited by G. RAYMOND. Aldershot: Dartmouth, 1994. Pp.xi + 278, £41.50 (cloth). ISBN 185521–5187.

The Politics of Fun: Cultural Policy and Debate in Contemporary France. Edited by D. LOOSELEY. Oxford: Berg, 1997. Pp.xv + 279, biblio, index. £34.95 (cloth); £14.95 (paper). ISBN 1–85973013–2 and ‐153–8.     

Rapid rural appraisal: Rationale and repertoire

Decision makers need the right information at the right time but in rural development much information generated is too costly and inappropriate. Rapid rural appraisal forms part of the attempt to learn about rural conditions in a cost effective way. Such appraisal involves avoiding the traps of quick and dirty or long and dirty methods and using instead methods that are more cost effective. To do this means ignoring inappropriate professional standards and instead applying a new rigour based on the two principles of optimal ignorance—knowing what it is not worth knowing—and proportionate accuracy—recognising the degree of accuracy required. The article reviews a range of approaches and techniques for rapid rural appraisal that are less rigid and exhaustive than many traditional methods and yet more rigorous in relation to cost and use. Time is emphasized as a critical factor in effective appraisal and rapid rural appraisal methods increase the chance of reducing the bias against the poorer rural people in the promotion of rural development.     

The ethos of sovereignty: A critical appraisal

Taking as its starting point the commonly held claim about the obscurity of the concept of sovereignty, the article first identifies a fundamental paradox between the classical Westphalian notion of state sovereignty and human rights. In the rhetoric of international politics, attempts to establish the responsibility of states to respect human rights and fundamental freedoms within their jurisdictions are often countered with claims referring to the “sovereign equality” of all states and the subsequent principle of non-intervention. The article suggests that in a more contemporary understanding of sovereignty the responsibility of a state to respect human rights and fundamental freedoms is seen as a constituent ingredient of the state itself. The chapter continues to elaborate how this change has come about. The classical notion of sovereignty is illustrated through a reading of Bodin’s Six Books of the Commonwealth (1576). In Bodin’s world, sovereignty is a constitutive element of the state, and the possibility of a multitude of sovereign entities in a global world logically denying the possibility of any “supra-national” normative framework is still a minor consideration. This possibility is only worked out with the emergence of international law. In both classics such as Emmerich de Vattel’s The Law of Nations (1758) and more contemporary treatises such as Lassa Oppenheim’s International Law (1905), state sovereignty has become conditional to recognition by other sovereign states and a subsequent membership in the “family of nations.” The conditional membership in the “family of nations” involves a contradiction: a sovereign state must act in a “dignified” manner, it must use its sovereignty with “restraint” by respecting the human rights and fundamental freedoms of its citizens, i.e., it must employ its sovereignty in a non-sovereign way. This restriction of sovereignty, addressed as “ethical sovereignty,” becomes a constitutive element in a post-Westphalian state and a central ingredient in the contemporary doctrine of humanitarian intervention. The article further criticizes the various uses (and abuses) of “ethical sovereignty” in the regulation of “failing” and “rogue” states and concludes by identifying its general political dangers. Finally, with reference to Jacques Derrida’s Rogues (2003), the article suggests a more radical reappraisal of the concept of sovereignty. It is a fact that sovereignty is a term used without any well-recognised meaning except that of supreme authority. Under these circumstances those who do not want to interfere in a mere scholastic controversy must cling to the facts of life and the practical, though abnormal and illogical, condition of affairs.¹ —Lassa Oppenheim But to invoke the concept of national sovereignty as in itself a decisional factor is to fall back on a word which has an emotive quality lacking meaningful specific content. It is to substitute pride for reason.² —Eli Lauterpacht     

Unity of effort requires unity of object: why industry should not be involved in formulating public health policy

This paper provides a framework for examining the general issue of public health authorities' collaboration with industry. The framework distinguishes between industry involvement in the development of public health policy and the implementation of policy‐driven interventions. A distinction is also made between industries marketing products conducive to good health versus products that impact negatively on public health (e.g. alcohol and energy‐dense, nutrition‐poor food and beverage industries). Drawing on concepts with respect to the effectiveness of military coalitions, it is argued that a common goal (i.e. ‘unity of object’) is a prerequisite for optimal co‐operation (i.e. ‘unity of effort’) between collaborators in any sphere of activity. However, this vital precondition does not exist in the public health arena because the end goals of industry and those of public health are fundamentally different, if not opposed (i.e. profits to owners/shareholders versus the social good). It is argued that because of this fundamental disjunct between industry profit goals and the public good, unity of effort will always be compromised in any form of collaboration with industry, and particularly where public health policies and interventions are designed to negatively impact on product consumption. Hence, while industry can be asked to co‐operate in implementing public health policy initiatives, industry should never be involved in developing policy initiatives. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Analyzing welfare effort: An appraisal of comparative methods

How do we measure and rate the social welfare efforts of nations? Most people consider the U.S. and Japan welfare laggards when compared with European countries. This view derives from a widely used measure of “welfare effort”—direct government outlays for social programs as the percentage of a nation's gross domestic product (GDP). This article challenges several assumptions implicit in the conventional measure and suggests an alternative approach in assessing “welfare effort.” By incorporating indirect tax expenditures and controlling for the differences in tax burdens and social need for welfare spending among countries, the alternative measure (the NET index) not only broadens the conceptual boundaries of welfare effort, but also affords a more meaningful standard for comparative analysis. To illustrate, this study compares the welfare effort levels of ten developed nations measured under several versions of the NET index.     

And the clocks were striking thirteen: The termination of war

Military analysts have focused on the problems of war initiation and conduct while largely ignoring the problem of how to terminate war on acceptable terms. This paper attempts to define the necessary conditions for war termination and proposes a framework for assessing alternative strategies.Deterrence and limited war theories suggest three war termination strategies: (1) attrition of warfighting capabilities; (2) protracted stalemate; and (3) coercive threats of unacceptable damage. A review of recent armed conflicts indicates the limitations on effective pursuit of these strategies and reveals an alternative formulation of the conditions necessary for effective war termination strategies. Based on these notions, current U.S. force posture and force employment doctrines are evaluated in terms of their consistency with war termination requirements. Finally, an agenda of issues related to the development of war termination strategies is proposed.     

Social Security: a financial appraisal for the median voter

Several explanations have been proposed for why voters continue to support unfunded social security systems. Browning (1975) suggests that the extremely large unfunded pension systems of most democracies depend on the existence of a voting majority composed of middle-aged and older people who fail to fully internalize the cost of financing the system. In fact, when voting, economically rational workers consider only their current and future contributions to the system and their expected pension benefits--not their past contributions, which they regard as sunk costs. If, for a majority of voters, the expected continuation return from social security exceeds the return from alternative assets, an unfunded social security system is politically sustainable. This article explores the validity of Browning's proposition by quantifying the returns that U.S. voters in presidential elections from 1964 to 1996 have obtained, or expect to obtain, from Social Security. Did "investments" in Social Security outperform alternative forms of investment, such as mutual funds or pension funds, for a majority of the voters? What can be expected for the future? The U.S. Social Security system redistributes income within age cohorts on the basis of sex, income, and marital status. To account for some of these features, the median voter is represented by a family unit whose members--a husband who accounts for 70 percent of household earnings and a wife who accounts for 30 percent--make joint economic and voting decisions. Thus, retirement and survival benefits paid out to the spouse of an insured worker can be included in the calculation of Social Security returns. Interval estimates of voters' family incomes from the U.S. Census Bureau were used to obtain the median voter's household earnings. The median voter's age is derived from the ages of those who voted in presidential elections, not from the ages of the entire electorate. The median voter's contributions to Social Security are the product of the joint employer/employee Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) tax rate and employee earnings. Data on actual contributions are available for median voters in the 1964 to 1976 elections; Social Security Administration (SSA) estimates are used for future tax rates and average wage growth rates. Data on actual old-age, retirement, and survivor benefits, as well as estimates of future benefits, are also available from SSA. Analysis of ex-post returns from "investing" in Social Security and from a buy-and-hold strategy applied to three alternative assets--the Standard & Poor's Composite Index (S&P), the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), and U.S. government bonds--shows surprising results. In 1964 and 1968, Social Security largely outperformed the other three assets. In 1972, Social Security and the stock market performed almost equally. In 1976, however, the median voter would have been better off in the stock market. The expected returns for median voters in later elections cannot be directly compared with realized returns from alternative assets. However, estimates range from 5.7 percent in 1984 to 7.0 percent in 1996 and thus compare favorably with average returns of 5.6 percent for S&P, 5.3 percent for DJIA, and 2.1 percent for government bonds over the 1964-1996 period. Although these findings must be taken with caution since they compare ex-post returns, they show that, despite a continuous reduction in profitability, Social Security still represents a safe, high-return asset for a majority of families.     

Resilience and robustness in policy design: a critical appraisal

Resilience and robustness are exciting concepts for policy researchers. Their broad use in other disciplines has motivated social scientists and policy researchers to adopt them in analyses. In the present paper, we review definitions of these concepts and the primary theoretical and empirical challenges presented by resilience and robustness as lenses for improving the understanding of policy process and policy design. The results reveal that the two concepts differ in their potential value for public policy analysis. Despite its diffusion and ‘charme’, resilience does not appear to be useful and may be misleading, whereas robustness exhibits great potential with respect to both analysis and design.     

Citizenship under the Ottomans and Kemalists: How the Kurds were excluded

This article examines the relevancy of concepts of citizenship as tools for analysing and comprehending minorities in ethnically complex societies. Taking the Kurds of Turkey as a case study, this article traces the evolution of civil society from the Ottoman empire through to the modern Turkish state, using a human rights‐based definition of citizenship. The changed situation of the Kurds is shown in each epoch and appropriate conclusions are drawn. The complex diversity among the Kurds themselves is also noted. Finally, an assessment is made of the applicability of what could be called Weberian and Neo‐Weberian concepts of citizenship.