Meritocracy and the Singapore Political System

The separation of implementation from policy has been diffused as ‘agencification’ around the world. It is considered an organisational reform based on new public management (NPM). The semi-autonomous public organisations executing policy are set up and are given a greater flexibility in operations in exchange for strengthening accountability for results. The central government of Japan also adopted the organisational reform in which agencies were called independent administrative institutions (IAIs). The reform intends not only to make the public service more transparent but to improve efficiency and quality of services through separating the implementing functions from the policy units, ministries and departments. It is assumed that flexibility in operations and result orientation would improve organisational performance through a feedback instrument of evaluating results into the budget other than an incentive mechanism. This article investigates whether the intended objectives have been accomplished. The specific focus is on the impacts on the budgetary system in terms of performance. The analysis shows that in Japanese agencies, ex-post performance information has not been fed into the budget process. Also the actual outcomes are explained by an incremental funding system, technical problems in measurement of results (performance measurement) and bureaucratic motivation through adopting a principal agent model.     

Forms of Communication between Large-scale Farms and Local Administrative Authorities in Russian Villages: About Benefactors and Sponsors

This article investigates the forms of communication emerging between local administrative authorities and large-scale agricultural enterprises with regard to public service provision in two Russian villages. Using a systems theory approach and conceptualising Soviet society as an organisational society, privatisation and local government reform may be observed as attempts to disentangle former collective farms and local authorities and adjust them to the logics of functional differentiation. Empirical evidence from a former kolkhoz and an agro-holding shows that both react to the contradiction between global transformation imperatives and local expectations, using a specific combination of formality and informality as a condition of their reproduction in the villages.     

Does intermunicipal cooperation increase efficiency? A conditional metafrontier approach for the Hessian wastewater sector

ABSTRACT

This paper analyses the relationship between intermunicipal cooperation and efficiency of public service provision. Organisational arrangements of public service production, including self-provision, joint provision or contracting, affect incentives and internal transaction costs. Hence, cooperation gains from scale effects need to be balanced against technical inefficiencies. We analyse relative efficiency of wastewater disposal for German municipalities. We employ a conditional analysis in conjunction with a metafrontier approach to calculate relative efficiency measures and technology gap ratios controlling for organisational arrangements and further environmental variables. Jointly providing municipalities and contractor municipalities exhibit lower technical efficiency than self-providing and contracting municipalities. As confirmed by previous research, scale effects from cooperation and contracting apply to small municipalities primarily.     

NEW FORMS OF ADMINISTRATIVE LAW IN THE AGE OF THIRD‐PARTY GOVERNMENT

This article explores the democratic values underlying public services when they are outsourced. Building on Rosenbloom and Piotrowski's (2005a, 2005b) framework, we examine whether and how administrative law norms – that serve as central democratic governance and accountability mechanisms in the administrative state – are extended to the new (private) frontline service providers. Through a study of the regulation of the privatized welfare‐to‐work programme in Wisconsin, we find that new forms of administrative law are evolving in third‐party government. These forms differ from administrative law as it usually applies to public agencies in several important aspects. The findings highlight the active role of legislative and administrative mechanisms in the promotion of these new forms of administrative law; and they shed light on the transformations that administrative law norms undergo in the age of third‐party government.     

Personnel management and productivity reform: Taming the civil service in Great Britain and the United States

This paper examines recent efforts to improve public sector productivity through reform of personnel systems and processes in Great Britain and the United States. Productivity efforts in both countries have been stimulated by and implemented in highly politicized environments. They have been attempts to secure the values of not only economy and efficiency, but also executive leadership and political responsiveness. The implications of these productivity reforms for the performance and character of the public service have been only dimly understood.     

Personnel management and productivity reform: Taming the civil service in Great Britain and the United States

This paper examines recent efforts to improve public sector productivity through reform of personnel systems and processes in Great Britain and the United States. Productivity efforts in both countries have been stimulated by and implemented in highly politicized environments. They have been attempts to secure the values of not only economy and efficiency but also executive leadership and political responsiveness. The implica-tions of these productivity reforms for the performance and character of the public service have been only dimly understood.     

Public Administration Reform and Its Implications for Foreign Petroleum Companies in Kazakhstan

Since 2000, Kazakhstan has followed the New Public Management reform trajectory in modernizing its public sector and public service delivery. This article employs an actor-centered perspective to examine the effects of the public administration reform and its implications for foreign petroleum companies in Kazakhstan. The study builds on primary sources in the form of 81 semi-structured interviews with public servants, representatives of foreign petroleum companies and experts. The main conclusion is that the reform effects are ambiguous. Despite some success in greater efficiency of public services, many weaknesses remain, with highly varying implications for foreign petroleum companies.     

EXIT AND VOICE IN LOCAL GOVERNMENT RECONSIDERED: A ‘CHOICE REVOLUTION’?

Market‐based public management reform has introduced customer choice among competing providers of public services. Choice entails exit, an option which Albert Hirschman famously reserved for the market, while voice is the key mode of communication in political life. Based on elite and mass surveys, the article studies how exit is perceived by citizens and local political and administrative leaders in Norway and Sweden, and how the two strategic options relate to each other. Citizens are more positive towards customer choice and exit than are leaders, albeit with some variation across different public service sectors. Political and administrative leaders are positive towards customer choice models as a strategy to empower clients but more critical in terms of the potential loss of accountability and control that contracting out services may entail.     

Recent Administrative and Managerial Practices and Public Service Motivation: Evidence from Seoul City Government,South Korea

This study aims to investigate the impact of recent administrative and managerial practices of public organizations on public service motivation. Using data from a survey of 1840 civil servants in Seoul City Government, this research uses hierarchical linear modeling to empirically assess the aforementioned associations. The results show that recent administrative and managerial practices have both positive and negatives on public service motivation. At the end of the study, the administrative and managerial implications of the study are also discussed in light of these results.     

Linking anticorruption threats,performance pay,administrative outputs,and policy outcomes in China

Little is known about the effects of two prominent public sector reforms—anticorruption efforts and high‐powered incentive systems—on the accomplishment of policy goals in the absence of the rule of law and in the presence of an extrinsic incentive to take advantage of corruption to achieve performance targets. This study explores how performance rewards and anticorruption efforts jointly affect administrative outputs and policy outcomes. We examine China's air pollution control policy with province‐level panel data. The analysis shows that performance rewards prompt administrative outputs that are linked to the incentive structure. Anticorruption activities have small significant, positive effects on those outputs only prior to the inception of high‐powered rewards, but have no significant effect on policy outcomes, regardless of the measure. The introduction of performance incentives contributes to the achievement of policy outcomes only when their measurement is subject to government manipulation.     

Culturally and Linguistically Competent Public Services in an Era of English-Only Laws

The concern this study addressed centered around the challenges of delivering culturally and linguistically competent public services to limited English proficiency (LEP) persons in an era marked by growth of English-only measures in the U.S. The article argued that restrictions on public service delivery to LEP communities are laden with negative effects that include impairment of the nation's obligations in international law. It applauded the attempt, evident by Executive Order No. 13166, to address the restrictions, but assessed that order as inadequate. Suggestions for improved access to public service delivery for LEP populations contained in this article include (1) enlarging the scope of Executive Order 13166 beyond access to language services, and (2) upgrading it into an act of Congress.     

City management,public administration and the American enlightenment

As the cost and size of government continues to escalate, there is a growing concern over increasing the efficiency and effectiveness in the delivery of public services. Productivity bargaining as one tool has Cained the attention of a small but growing number of public officials who see this technique as one rational method of resolving the conflicting pressures generated by the demand for government services on the one hand and limited resources on the other. The experience of one large metropolitan area with productivity bargaining is reviewed at some length.     

TRANSFORMING NEW ZEALAND'S PUBLIC SECTOR: LABOUR'S QUEST FOR IMPROVED EFFICIENCY AND ACCOUNTABILITY

Since its election in July 1984 the fourth Labour government in New Zealand has embarked upon the most radical and systematic reorganization of the state sector since the creation of a unified, non-partisan, career-oriented service in 1912. The reforms include the commercialization of many of the goods and services provided by state agencies, the turning of public trading enterprises into corporations, major administrative changes and the overhauling of state pay-fixing arrangements. This article examines the theoretical assumptions underpinning Labour's strategy and assesses the extent to which the new arrangements are likely to achieve their intended purpose of improving the efficiency, flexibility and accountability of the public sector.     

The Relationship between the Leadership Effectiveness and Emotional Competence of Managers in the Public Sector

This article reports on the perceived relationship between leadership effectiveness and the emotional competencies of managers in the public sector, and the impact of this relationship on service delivery. In the light of continual protests over government’s poor service delivery to the public, doubts are raised about the leadership effectiveness of public officials. Research has identified the leadership effectiveness of managers in the public service as crucial for quality service delivery. Industrial psychologists have also identified leadership effectiveness and emotional competencies as important ingredients for success in organizations. This is due to the facts that effectiveness and efficiency can be attained only if an appropriate leadership style and manager’s emotional competencies or abilities are in place. Findings from the research indicate that currently managers in the public sector possess insufficient emotional competencies to subdue emotional outbursts and achieve effective leadership. Based on the findings and the literature, the conclusion is that it is imperative for managers of public entities to acquire effective leadership skills and become emotionally competent. Relevant training and interventions, and a comprehensive management recruitment process, should be put in place.     

STEERING PUBLIC EXPENDITURE WITH DEFECTIVE MAPS

Governments control public expenditure on definitions different from those of General Government Expenditure, the national accounts aggregate. After a prolonged period of relatively stable definitions for its public expenditure control aggregate, the UK government has recently revised this twice, substituting the New Planning Total for the Old Planning Total in 1990 and then moving in 1993 to the New Control Total. This article evaluates the justifications offered for these revisions and evaluates alternative explanations. The search for presentational gains and recourse to definitional change as an escape from problems feature prominently among the latter. Moreover, the fundamental ongoing changes in the form of public service delivery have major implications for the articulation of delivery agencies with public expenditure planning. There has been a marked loss of information and of transparency, notably with regard to forward information about function and economic category. Data continuity has been broken, and year-on-year changes to cash plans cannot be properly analysed. Transferring expenditure away from general government to where it is‘out of reach’in the expectation of efficiency gains further complicates monitoring. The channels of public accountability are blocked, in part by information overload and in part by information suppression. The existing arrangements, whether by accident or design, confer enormous discretion upon UK government through control of information flows.     

台湾地方基层行政管理体制变迁及影响分析

传统西方分权理论中的“奥茨定理”认为,权力向基层政府下放,有助于改善公共服务。然而在台湾都市化进程中,2010年台湾部分县市合并升格为直辖市,以此同时,原有的乡镇政府改为从属于市（直辖市）的区,基层政府的权力出现向县市一级政府集中的现象。在对台湾基层政府体制沿革历史梳理基础上,作者通过实地调研,对这一基层行政体制调整的动因、特点、内容及影响进行了分析。本研究发现,台湾都市化进程中,基层政府权力向上集中有利于提升行政效率和公共服务规模效益的需求,得到广泛社会认同,但同时,也导致国民党对基层的控制有所减弱,对台湾的政治生态具有深远影响。     

ADMINISTRATIVE REFORM – GENERAL PRINCIPLES AND THE AUSTRALIAN EXPERIENCE

Failure to understand the political nature of administrative reform and to develop a political strategy to overcome resistance lies behind the failure of many reform attempts. The prerequisites of reform include political will, time, resources, an ongoing institution promoting change, and a strategy which concentrates on the implementation stage when resistance is strongest. Such a strategy must use the principal levers of change, including legislation, which directly affect administrative behaviour. In Australia in the 1970s administrative reform proceeded only slowly with the exception of changes in some States and the introduction of a new body of Federal administrative law. A better reform strategy in the past two years has resulted in extensive legislative change at the Federal level including greater ministerial control over certain senior appointments, open public competition for the top one per cent of civil service jobs, affirmative action and industrial democracy. There has thus been a further shift towards a unique Australian model of public administration.     

Farm productivity and rural poverty in India

Armed with new data, we return to an old question from the pages of this journal: to what extent do India's rural poor share in agricultural growth? Combining data from 24 household sample surveys spanning 35 years with other sources, we estimate a model of the joint determination of consumption‐poverty measures, agricultural wages, and food prices. We find that higher farm productivity brought both absolute and relative gains to poor rural households. A large share of the gains was via wages and prices, though these effects took time. The benefits to the poor were not confined to those near the poverty line.     

Exploring the Relationship between Operational and Financial Indicators: The Case of Water and Sewer Utilities

ABSTRACT

There is debate in the literature on whether or not general management principles are applicable to the study and practice of public administration. This research responds by exploring how local officials manage the performance of public services with private good characteristics, where general management principles could be embraced for service delivery. The relationship between operational and financial indicators is explored within the functional areas of water and sewer, with the hypothesis that operational outcomes impact financial outcomes similar to private enterprises. Because the findings do not support this hypothesis, the authors conclude that general management principles may not be applicable to all forms of administration given that public cannot be removed from the management of public services even with private good characteristics.     

Making government efficient: How much waste can be cut from public programs?

The public administrator should be concerned with waste due to implementing programs inefficiently, not with waste due to implementing the wrong programs. Based upon a synthesis of efficiency studies using frontier analysis, the mean inefficiency of public programs is estimated at five percent. Efficiency gains beyond this level ordinarily require advances in technology, or changes in what constitutes best practice. While greater efficiency is a desirable goal, efficiency gains achieved through forced spending reductions need to be weighed against possible concomitant reductions in a program's quality of service, benefit to society, and cost-effectiveness. An efficiency analysis of an emergency medical service program illustrates the sort of information required to identify improvements in efficiency within this broader context.