With Strings Attached? Improving the Administration of Central State Financed Investment Projects in the PRC

This article takes a new look at the institutional core of China's economic planning—the State Development and Planning Commission (SDPC, 1998–2003)—focusing on its role in approving and fundraising for major capital investment projects. The primary objective of this inquiry is to identify changes in the network structure and procedures of inter-agency relations and central planners’ interactions with national legislators, which have produced a diversity of ‘organizational microclimates’ that shape the coherence of the national economic bureaucracy and central–local fiscal relations. Based on interviews of high-level officials and case studies of investment projects in energy, information technology, and transport sectors, it is argued that administrative reforms aiming to improve SDPC's regulatory capacity have been predicated on a concerted effort by key agencies and ministries under the State Council to reduce the window of opportunity for local and industrial interests to politicize capital allocation decisions. This finding suggests caution in interpreting contemporary China through the comparative lenses of a developmental state, a regulatory state, or a fiscal federalist system.     

Decisionism and action: changing perspectives in organization theory

The neglect of moral discourse in mainstream organization theory during the past four decades may be attributed to the dominance of the “decision,” popularized by Herbert Simon, as the field's primary unit of analysis. Underwritten by an epistemology derived from the logical positivists’ analytical distinction between value and fact, the idea of decision has come to be uncritically accepted as a morally neutral and empirically self-evident beginning point for organizational analysis. The ethnomethodological writings of Harold Garfinkel, coupled with insights from contemporary philosophy of language, radically challenge the value-fact distinction, pointing to an epistemology of everyday life in which value and fact are initially fused. The inherent fusion of value and fact provides the basis for an alternative epistemology for organization theory—termed the “action” or “process” perspective—which fundamentally alters the empirical understanding of organizational life and, consistent with the writings of Mary Parker Follett, enables the recovery of organization theory's moral center.

Commenting on the effects of technology on modern consciousness, Manfred Stanley has noted that:

Of all the upheavals of history and culture, it is difficult to imagine any of greater scope than the decline and fall not of some one vision of the good, but of the good itself. The rise of the notion that there is no such phenomenon as the good in the objective nature of things must be the most ironic anticlimax possible to centuries of bitter conflict between those who felt themselves empowered to define it.⁽¹⁾

For Stanley, the problem is not technology as such, but “technicism”: the implicit, even unconscious, belief that the humanly possible is synonymous with the technologically available. In technicist consciousness, technology is no longer a means for attaining the good, because “means” presupposes a prior moral or practical end in whose service that means is applied. Should any conception of the good be embraced at all, he argues, it ironically can merely be an artifact of what has been made available by technology.

Technicism has become the predominant attribute of modern consciousness, producing what William Barrett, speaking in a slightly different context, calls “the illusion of technique.”⁽²⁾

In the collective infatuation with technology, Barrett argues,

... we have come to regard it [technology] as the source for the discovery of human meaning. The tragic consequence of this is the inevitable alienation of man from himself and his estrangement from others. The irony of technicism to which Stanley alluded earlier may be summarized as a reversal of a familiar aphorism—invention has now become the mother of necessity—albeit one devoid of moral content.

Stanley sees the rise of technicism as concomitant with the emergence of liberal society, whose institutions have achieved coherence and legitimacy explainable in terms of three themes that have dominated Western thought since the seventeenth century. The first is the general desanctification or secularization of the political economy exemplified ... in the transformation of human skills and the earth itself into objective commodity resources for commercial production.⁽³⁾ The second theme is the ascendancy of the market principle as the chief basis of socioeconomic organization, wherein interests are privately held by individuals rather than shared by communities or other larger collectivities. Finally, there is the theme of pluralistic representation in political decision making, where the expression of individual (and group) interest is tolerated in the hope of achieving a balance among them.

Taken together these themes have produced a pervasive sense of nihilism in Western society insofar as they seem to exclude the possibility “of grounding collective standards of value priorities in anything more transcendent than the simplest shared utilities like power, wealth, and the security of one's immediate personal circumstances.”⁽⁴⁾

The consequence of the three themes of liberal society, profoundly abetted by technicist consciousness, is nothing less than the loss “of a sense of common human community in the West”⁽⁵⁾and also of the moral possibility of a common, transcendent good.     

The Ambivalent Relations Between Bureaucracy and Public Innovation: The Case of the Successful Failure of Dial Police

Building on a growing body of literature on public innovation and the rediscovery of bureaucracy, this article explores the relations between innovation and bureaucracy. A framework for studying innovation in a bureaucratic context is developed and its relevance assessed through a case study of the successful implementation but failed diffusion of an innovation project. The case study demonstrates how a bureaucratic context represents not only barriers to innovation but also a number of complex drivers. The outline of these ambivalent relations is used to tease out the Janus face of the new spirit of innovation in public administration.     

Bureaucratic Perceptions to the Politics–Bureaucracy Relations in Bangladesh: A Moral Dilemma in between Political Neutrality and Responsiveness

Irrespective of the systems of government, a major question is: what are the views and perceptions of the bureaucrats about politics–bureaucracy relations? Aiming to address this problem, in this article an attempt has been made to undertake an empirical study of bureaucracy in Bangladesh. The study reveals that as a post-colonial structure, government bureaucracy is an essential and integral part of the administration in Bangladesh but the bureaucracies are always in a dilemma regarding their relationship with the political leaderships. The relationship between politicians and bureaucrats is neither normatively dichotomous with political neutrality nor abundantly cohesive or responsive to the political leaderships according to the perceptions of bureaucracy. Moreover, bureaucracy in Bangladesh is suffering from a moral puzzle between political neutrality and political responsiveness even though the bureaucrats are still in a dominant position in some cases.     

Science,technology, and public administration: the government-university nexus

The relations between governments and universities, particularly with respect to science and technology, is traced from the agricultural period and the land-grant era to the research and development era involving particularly the fields of medicine and defense, to the modern era which is lacking a coherent national policy.

Among the institutional relations that are critical to science, technology, and public administration, those involving government-university linkages stand out. In the past, there have been two major eras of government/university relations: the land-grant era and the federal mission agency era. More recently, a third era has emerged—what we call the new federalist era. The first period featured a decentralized institutional model focused on a single economic sector: agriculture. The second was characterized by a more centralized federally dominated approach. This third era is still evolving. Its primary ingredients include university ties with many segments of industry. And government includes that as well as federal agency roles.

During the land-grant era, dating from 1862, a large number of universities, devoted initially to problems of agriculture and the mechanical arts, were created. The era was characterized by a research system involving a federal agency, state government, universities, and an industry of individuals with little or no research capability. It was a highly decentralized system, responsive to multiple needs throughout the country, with a heavy emphasis on technology transfer. It gave the initial impetus to the university in fashioning an applied role. Whatever else may be said about this system—good or bad—it certainly made the American agricultural industry more productive.

In the federal mission agency era, dating from World War II, federal agencies spent vast sums to pursue national goals in defense, space, energy, and other fields by creating programs supporting universities. On the expectation there would eventually be practical payoffs, federal agencies supported basic research largely on the universities’ terms. States were not involved in any significant degree. Industry was, of course, very much a part of this system, but in the case of defense and space, it was primarily as developers of technology for government rather than users of technology for civilian goals.

This system worked unevenly. The greatest continuity was the Department of Defense (DOD) as a sponsor of research and development, including research in universities. That is what was seen as a problem in the era of Vietnam. For many critics, it is a problem today, with Star Wars merely the most dramatic example of a too close university involvement with DOD.

There were discontinuities in most of the areas of federal mission agency support. At the time of Minnowbrook I, the desire was to redeploy science and technology to other mission areas that would improve the human condition. The process was difficult, as various domestic agencies had problems establishing and maintaining relations with science and technology. In the 1980s, most of the civilian programs were cut back and the energy program was slated to be eliminated altogether.

Today, the United States research system, and thus the government-university partnership, is in a new-federalist era of science and technology. Here, the federal government, state governments, industry, and universities cooperate and collide as each tries to make the most of several new technologies now emerging with a perceived high economic potential. Meanwhile, the university-DOD relationship has been rebuilt after a decade of rupture. In an environment of increasing global competition, the old institutional models are giving way to novel arrangements.

What has happened is that a new mission—a new problem or opportunity—has become more salient in the 1980s. This is the mission of economic development and competitiveness. Economic competitiveness is a broad and diffuse mission. The juxtaposition of this mission with science and technology is because a good part of this competition is expected to be waged on the frontier of new technology. Japan, in particular, has made technological leadership in the cluster of fields cited above a national imperative, and other nations are following suit.⁽¹⁾

No federal mission agency is clearly identified with, much less in charge of, a mission. Indeed, the mission has not been officially proclaimed but exists only as a rallying cry. The question to be resolved is whether the present scattered response is enough, or if a more comprehensive national policy should be established. If established, should a new federal mission agency be set in motion to lead the assault—perhaps one modeled after the Japanese MITI? If so, how would it relate to the other players? Given the role of the states in particular, it would seem that a cooperative model drawing on federal and state resources might be designed.     

Representative bureaucracy,international organizations and public service bargains

Academic interest in the administrative aspects of international organizations is on the rise. Yet, an issue that has received little attention is bureaucratic representation—the extent to which international bureaucracies are representative of the polity that they serve. The article theorizes the rationales for and forms of representative bureaucracy in international organizations by combining insights from the representative bureaucracy literature with the ‘public service bargains’ framework. It argues that bureaucratic representation is highly relevant in international organizations, given the diverse polity these organizations serve and their precarious legitimacy. It distinguishes three types of representational ‘bargains’ between international organizations and those they serve, centred on power, equal opportunities and diversity, and discusses under which conditions each type of bargain is likely to be struck. The argument contributes to discussions about representative bureaucracy in international organizations and to broader theoretical debates about international public administration.     

Reconciling public administration and democracy: the role of the responsible administrator

This article considers whether the individual responsibilities of bureaucratic officials provide a useful means for reconciling the tension between democracy and bureaucracy. Three questions central to the proper definition of bureaucratic responsibility are examined: (1) What is the relation of bureaucratic responsibility to the view that proper bureaucratic conduct is essentially a matter of ethics and morality? (2) If the appeal to moral values does not ordinarily offer an acceptable guide to proper bureaucratic conduct, upon what principles does a theory of bureaucratic responsibility rest? (3) What issues arise in putting responsibility into practice within a complex organizational setting? The article concludes that a democratic, process-based conception offers the most useful way of thinking about the responsibilities of bureaucratic officials.

The tension between democracy and bureaucracy has bedeviled public administration. However one defines democracy, its core demand for responsiveness (to higher political authorities, the public, client groups, or whatever the presumed agent of democratic rule) does not neatly square with notions of effective organization of the policy process and efficient delivery of goods and services, which are central to the definition of bureaucracy. Responsiveness need not guarantee efficiency, while bureaucratic effectiveness and efficiency often belie democratic control.

This tension between democracy and bureaucracy persists, but that it is the individual administrator who directly experiences the tension is especially important as a guide toward a resolution of this conflict. Since divergence is central to this tension between democracy and bureaucracy, speculation about the responsibilities of bureaucratic officials—their individual places within the bureaucracy, particularly the administrator's thoughts, choices, and actions—provides fruitful terrain for resolving the question of bureaucracy's place within a democratic system of rule.

Three questions need to be addressed if one accepts the premise that individual responsibility is central to locating the place of bureaucracy in a democratic order. First, what is unique about bureaucratic responsibility, especially in contrast to the view that these are largely ethical problems that can be resolved by appeal to moral values? Second, if dilemmas of bureaucratic conduct are by and large not resolvable through appeal to moral values, upon what other principles does a theory of bureaucratic responsibility rest? Third, what issues arise in putting responsibility into practice, especially within a complex organizational setting? This list of questions is not meant to be exhaustive but only a starting point for discussion.     

A representative bureaucracy perspective on workforce composition in international organizations: The case of the United Nations Secretariat

This article provides a representative bureaucracy perspective on staff composition in international organizations (IOs). Contrary to previous studies in international relations, I argue that staff composition is not only driven by power but international organizations are also concerned with bureaucratic representation. Therefore, I examine one potential barrier and one driver to passive representation, namely the available local labour pool and political representation. The empirical analysis is based on an original database of human resources statistics in the United Nations Secretariat which allows for a differentiation between staff categories. The resulting regression analyses suggest that headquarters locations, political representation and diplomacy are the main determinants of member states’ representation, but these determinants vary in strength depending on the staff categories. This article contributes to the study of staff composition in IOs by examining additional determinants and to the recent discussions on representative bureaucracy at the international level.     

The origins of bureaucracy: an anthropological perspective

Many decades have passed since the first appearance of Max Weber's seminal study, in Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft , of the origins and characteristics of bureaucracy. His analysis was, naturally, dependent on the existing knowledge of his day; but the growth and maturity of archaeology and anthropology as academic disciplines have shed much new light on the historical and social contexts in which bureaucratic organizations emerged. This article, using Sumerian civilization as a case in point, summarizes much of what we now know about the conditions under which bureaucracy first originated and flourished. In so doing, it identifies several major human developmental and social transformations—the hominid revolution, the agrarian revolution, and the urban revolution—which played vital roles in the evolution and expansion of the bureaucratic form of organization.     

Globalization, Neoliberalism and the Exercise of Human Agency

Globalization as a development model is generally now regarded as the sine qua non for development policy with little room for alternative theorising on capitalist development. Neoliberalism, as the supporting ideology of globalization, inflates the social significance of the market and mystifies human relations. It therefore, gives a distorted view of reality, how people are living and their agential capacity to improve their lives. Critical to human agency is it the way it is exercised—does it reduce inequality or does it exacerbate inequality? How is this human agency exercised by different groups of people? The paper provides a discussion on the relationship between neoliberal ideology, globalization and the exercise of human agency. It examines the social reality of globalization and neoliberalism and how this affects the agential capacity of human beings to direct their development, as individuals, communities and as nations.     

Democratization and bureaucratic restructuring in Taiwan

Taiwan has been moving toward democracy, with a dramatic transition taking place in the past decade. Critical to this transition is a restructuring of the relationship between the state bureaucracy and society. This study focuses on democratization's effect on Taiwan's bureaucracy. In particular, it seeks to examine such aspects of bureaucratic transformation as bureaucratic decisionmaking, legislative-bureaucratic politics, interest group-bureaucratic relations, the expansion of local autonomy, and civil service reform. This study finds that the bureaucratic state is facing a great challenge from political, legislative, and societal forces. The old type of insulated bureaucratic planning and decision making is no longer possible, the bureaucracy is losing its KMT patrons, and bureaucrats are finding themselves answerable to political pressure, legislative oversight, and interest group lobbying. While the bureaucracy has lost its previous level of discretion in terms of macro-management and the formulation of developmental policies, the bureaucratic state has not withered away. Qingshan Tan is Associate Professor of Chinese and East Asian politics and Director of the International Relations Program in the Department of Political Science at Cleveland State University. His recent publications are on issues of democratization in Taiwan and China.     

Budgeting the work force: Influences,elements, disclosure strategies,and roles

Work force budgeting is a comprehensive view of allocating resources recognizing that expenses flow from the use and remuneration of organizational members. The purpose of this essay is to: examine the influences and elements of work force budgeting; enhance the disclosure of such choices; and, isolate the tension in fiscal oversight of personnel decisions. It is incumbent upon managers to acquire, deploy, and control human resources in the production of public goods and services. An humane and ethical bureaucracy has to meet tests of efficiency and effectiveness. This essay supports the proposition that service delivery goals should guide budget decisions instead of simply having decisions premised upon adding up the cost of existing staffing patterns.     

Intellectuals,International Relations and the Constant Emergency

In this essay, I return to Hans Morgenthau's and Hannah Arendt's writings on the Vietnam war and US foreign policy, which explored questions of bureaucracy, technology, emergency. On one level the essays they wrote illustrate the extent to which the discipline of International Relations (IR) has now caught up with the analyses of politics and war that they were developing in the 1960s and 1970s. We begin to see how lines of thought in Morgenthau's writing connect directly with the work of a younger generation of scholars interested in the work of intellectuals like Giorgio Agamben on the dangers of a security-obsessed politics in a ‘state of emergency’ or ‘state of exception’, or how Arendt's and Morgenthau's work on bureaucracy and war is explored in contemporary work; from a pedagogical perspective, drawing out these connections creates the possibility of a different, potentially more subversive, way of introducing students to the discipline of ir.     

State,bureaucracy and change in India

The article discusses the nature of the Indian state and of the Indian bureaucracy. During the 1980s, it was widely believed that the Indian bureaucracy constituted a dominant class and that this dominance is the root cause of economic stagnation. When confronted with empirical evidence, this assertion seems less convincing. The complex picture that emerges of the Indian state does not totally contradict the dominant view. This complexity points to a need for a more elaborated theoretical understanding of the role of the state and of the public bureaucracy. The article concludes by sketching the outlines of such a possible revised theoretical framework.     

In the Shadow of the Ombudsman: Civil Society and the Struggle for an Independent Human Rights Institution in St Petersburg,Russia

Abstract

National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) have become hallmarks of good governance and democracy. Although many countries have an NHRI, it remains unclear how they operate on the regional level in political systems where democracy malfunctions and human rights are under pressure. Drawing on interviews, this essay examines how Russian nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) established a shadow Ombudsman—the Human Rights Council (HRC)—to protest against the appointment of an Ombudsman in St Petersburg and put pressure on authorities to inaugurate a new and independent Ombudsman. Although we would expect relations between the Ombudsman and NGOs to deteriorate when civil society is under pressure, this essay finds that political repression and the persona of the current Ombudsman, Alexander Shishlov, have brought civil society and the Ombudsman closer together.     

Marshall Dimock on leadership: Keeping the human element alive in large institutions

Marshall Dimock sought and found unity of life in human values. He accepted increasingly big businesses and governments as inevitable, but he found growing bureaucratization hostile to humanity and vitality within organizations and unresponsive to customers and citizens. He looked to leadership as an antidote to bureaucracy. Dimock supported vigorous leadership by individuals in key roles, but he consistently espoused high-involvement of people in leader-ship throughout organanizations and society generally.     

STREET‐LEVEL BUREAUCRACY AND PUBLIC ACCOUNTABILITY

The concept of ‘street‐level bureaucracy’ was coined by Michael Lipsky (1980) as the common denominator for what would become a scholarly theme. Since then his stress on the relative autonomy of professionals has been complemented by the insight that they are working in a micro‐network of relations, in varying contexts. The conception of ‘governance’ adds a particular aspect to this: the multi‐dimensional character of a policy system as a nested sequence of decisions. Combining these views casts a different perspective on the ways street‐level bureaucrats are held accountable. In this article some axiomatic assumptions are drawn from the existing literature on the theme of street‐level bureaucracy and on the conception of governance. Acknowledging variety, and arguing for contextualized research, this results in a rethinking of the issue of accountability at the street level.     

Edgy Amity along the Mekong: Thai-Lao Relations in a Transforming Regional Equilibrium

Abstract

In 1994, the opening of the Friendship Bridge commenced an apparent thawing of ties between Thailand and Lao People's Democratic Republic (PDR). Out of deep socio-historical antagonisms and Cold War acrimony, the two countries seemed suited now for amity. But amity has continued to be edgy. Meanwhile, other countries in the region—China and Vietnam—vie for influence with Thailand over Lao. Amidst a rapidly integrating Mekong market and changing regional equilibrium, this study seeks answers to the following questions: What are the most significant Thai-Lao state security interests and how do they mesh with human security—especially in relation to economic interests? Why do Thailand and Lao currently appear to be highlighting economic ties to the detriment of military preparedness and human security? How is the shifting equilibrium in the Mekong Region shaping the future of Thai-Lao relations? The study hypothesizes that despite tensions, in an age of enhanced state-market linkages, Thailand and Lao prioritize economic collaboration over military and human security considerations.     

Colony of genes,genes of the colony: diversity,difference and divide

In this article we propose an ideal typology of reactions to genomics—the study (in complex transnational organisational research arrangements) of the genome, the sum total of the genetic material in any particular organism—from the point of view and perspective of communities that find themselves in marginal positions. Genomics is a particularly important part of ‘technoscience’—science mingled with technology. Within genomics the concepts of diversity and difference are paradoxically intermingled. Genetically speaking, the difference between human beings and nature is fading. Homo sapiens, viewed as genetic material, is becoming part and parcel of ‘natural resources’. Diversity is the moral dimension of this perspective. At the same time genomics appears to map, mark and thereby define difference; difference between individuals and between groups of people, but also between healthy and ill, and finally between ‘normal’ and, consequently, ‘abnormal’, deviant. Difference is the moral dimension of this counterpoint. We argue that genomics is an important field of study for Africa. At the same time, however, we discern a potentially dangerous new divide: a genomics divide between Africa and the West. We argue that more research is needed on contextualisation of ‘genomics’.     

DIVERSITY AND DOMINANCE IN THE ARCTIC. ETHNIC RELATIONS IN THE GREENLANDIC BUREAUCRACY

Public bureaucracies are increasingly characterized by employee diversity in terms of ethnicity. Investigating relations between ethnic groups in bureaucracies is therefore important. This article focuses on the particularly interesting case of the Greenlandic administration. Being a former Danish colony, Greenland still recruits bureaucrats from mainland Denmark. These work alongside locally hired employees resulting in an administration with different ethnicities, cultures and languages. The analysis of ethnic relations is based on 28 interviews with bureaucrats of Danish and Greenlandic origin. Even though overall relations are found to be largely harmonious, ethnicity makes a difference. Interviewees describe differences in ethnic traits and behaviour and processes of social categorization. Particularly among Greenlanders, Danes are described as dominant and this dominance is reinforced by co‐variation between ethnicity, language skills and education. Finally, inter‐group relations are found to vary with the numerical balance of ethnic groups in different parts of the bureaucracy.