Multiple Institutional Embeddedness in Europe: The Case of Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish Government Officials

The questions posed in the current study are (1) whether, and (2) how, participation within Commission expert committees and Council working parties of the European Union (EU) affects the coordination behaviour of the participants. Based on organizational theory arguments, the coordination role of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is arguably weakened by institutional dynamics existing within Commission expert committees. The opposite is argued to be the case within Council working parties. Empirically, this study is based on 160 questionnaires and 47 face-to-face interviews with Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish domestic government officials attending EU committees. Secondly, this study also includes answers from 49 officials at the permanent representation to the EU of these three Scandinavian countries. Being excluded from attending Council working parties, Norwegian civil servants participating within Commission expert committees are shown to coordinate considerably less with the foreign ministry than their Danish and Swedish counterparts. Notwithstanding these observations, this study also reveals how the coordination behaviour evoked by national civil servants reflects their domestic institutional affiliations. In addition to showing how EU committees affect coordination behaviour among the participants, the current analysis also shows how responses to integration requirements are filtered – and even conditioned – by a prior state of affairs at the domestic level of governance.     

Reinventing Government: The Case of National Service

When Bill Clinton embraced national service as one of his administration's priorities, he took a step forward on two of his key initiatives. Not only was national service a new initiative in its own right, but Clinton also held it up as a model of his efforts to reinvent government. It would be an exemplar of government that is catalytic, competitive, decentralized, and results oriented. This case study examines the theory and reality of reinvention. The Corporation for National Service and its programs have come under fire for being more political than catalytic, being simultaneously too centralized and too decentralized, and pursuing too many unclear goals. This article seeks to identify discontinuities between the rhetoric and the reality of reinvention in this instance and draw lessons for public-sector reform.     

State Structure and Variations in Corporatism: The Swedish Case*

The question addressed in this article is: Why are some countries more corporatist than others? It is argued that neither pure micro-, nor pure macro-explanations can account for the great variation in the degree of corporatism (however measured) among western countries. Instead, an institutional variant is put forward, where the structure of the state at the time of the formation of working-class organizations is taken as the main independent variable. It has been shown that the development of collaborative or confrontational labor movements was decided by the reaction of the existing political elites to the demands from the working class in the pre-World War I period. Where suffrage came late, and where the class system was rigid. a radical/revolutionary orientation would dominate the working-class movement, hindering corporatist arrangements, and vice versa. The problem with this argument is that it does not fit the Swedish case. Although democracy was introduced comparatively late and although the class system was rigid, Sweden has been considered the nearly ideal-typical case of corporatism. It is argued that the deviant Swedish case can be explained by the specific structure of the pre-democratic Swedish state - centralized, but not closed; bureaucratic and professional but not especially authoritarian; differentiated but not without central coordination of policy.     

Local Government in Transformation: The Case of Constitutional Reform in Yugoslavia

The previous communal system in Yugoslavia (since 1955) did not prove viable. Owing to its great size (nearly 500 km² and more than 40,000 inhabitants), municipality in this period didn't affirm itself as a real community. Having many abilities in developmental planning, it was at the same time dependent on the state in the spheres of finance and normative regulations. The difference between the sphere of local government (LG) and state politics was substantially blurred.
Given the changing social conditions (introduction of market economy, political pluralism and the forms of parliamentarian democracy), the need for repeated establishment of the system of local government based on the altered position of citizens in the political system becomes evident. In this environment it is necessary to reestimate the experiences of LG in particular Yugoslav regions (republics) before World War II, and simultaneously, take selectively into account the experiences and development in other developed European countries.
This article compares the constitutional regulations of LG among particular Yugoslav republics, and between them and the characteristic orientations in other European countries, enlightening it with the aspect of actual processes and demands of centralization and decentralization, regionalism, moving the regulation of communal and other everyday needs closer to the people in LG, all in the sense of post-behavioristic trends of the "bottom-up" approach to the processes of decision-making.     

Variations in Organizational Participation in Government: The Case of Denmark*

The main purpose of this article is to refine, modify, and elaborate some central propositions and assumptions in the scholarly debate on corporatism or corporate pluralism. The empirical base is a data archive containing information on practically all interest groups in Denmark. Hypotheses are formulated and tested concerning variations in direct representation and participation of interest groups in public policy-making across (a) types of interest groups, (b) organizational resources, (c) organizational structures, and{d) political issue areas. Contrary to prevailing propositions in the literature on corporatism, the Danish case shows that corporate structures and practices go hand in hand with a system of interest groups characterized by myriads of interest groups, and an overall, rather decentralized structure.     

Globalisation, Marketisation and Power: The Swedish Case of Institutional Change

Globalisation is often thought to threaten the autonomy of national policymaking and generous welfare policies. This article examines two decades of policy change in Sweden, often viewed as a prime example of a fully fledged welfare state. The analysis is focused on reforms within the welfare sector, which is compared with three other important areas – credit markets, the labour market, and infrastructure policy. These areas can all be seen as crucial aspects of the Swedish social democratic model.  The findings can be summarised in three parts. First, seeing the credit–market deregulation as the first phase of the internationalisation of capital in Sweden lends some support to the idea of globalisation as the result of political decisions rather than a structural change caused by technical change. Second, during the last two decades, there have been signs of marketisation of the Swedish public sector. However, this analysis does not give support to the simple hypothesis of globalisation. There are quite large variations both between and within policy areas, variations that are not easily related to international integration. Third, marketisation involves a shift in political power. An overall effect is that the government has lost some of its former direct influence. However, behind the façade of the invisible market we find the same actors as before influencing policy. Globalisation can have tremendous effects on power. Whether or not this will be the case is first and foremost the result of political decisions and individual desires.     

The Substitution Approach To Intergovernmental Relations: The Case Of OSHA

Federal legislation of the last two decades has substantiallyreduced state autonomy in dealing with many regulatory issues.Participation in the implementation of these federal programsmay, however, enable states to exert some leverage over policyoutcomes. Variations in state leverage no doubt exist from oneintergovernmental grant program to the next. Substitution authoritymay be one variable accounting for this variation. Under a substitutionapproach, a federal agency cannot only sever the flow of fundsto a grantee; it can also step in and operate a program if statesfail to meet expectations or choose not to participate. Thisarticle generates more basic propositions about the substitutionapproach by analyzing its implementation under the OccupationalSafety and Health Act of 1970. The article examines the roleplayed by substitution authority in motivating the OccupationalSafety and Health Administration (OSHA) to adopt an aggressiveposture toward the states. The article then assesses whetherOSHA's aggressiveness prompted state grantees to exert considerableeffort on behalf of program goals. Finally, the implicationsof current reform proposals, which call for a sorting out offunctions between the states and the federal government, receiveattention.     

Managing Intergovernmental Relations in Australia: The Case of Agricultural Policy Cooperation

In June 2004, the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) announced changes to the guidelines and protocols of some 40 ministerial councils and intergovernmental fora which comprise the web of intergovernmental consultative arrangements. This article examines the impact of the guidelines on the operation of the oldest of the sectoral ministerial councils, those relating to agriculture. The COAG guidelines aim to increase the strategic focus of the councils. However, in the case of agricultural policy there appears to have been a centralising of policy control, both within state governments and towards the Commonwealth, which undermines that objective and leaves the ministerial councils focusing on the more technical issues which they are more effective at addressing.     

Bureaucracy Versus Markets in Hospital Care: The Dutch Case

In this paper we analyze the bureaucratic negotiation processthat is implied by the budgeting system applied in Dutchhospital care. This system is based on centralized pricesetting while simultaneously allowing for decentralizednegotiations on volumes. We apply a variant of the bureaucracytheory, according to which the bureaucratic agency (in ourcase the joint hospitals) are not allowed to pricediscriminate, but will receive a flat price per unit ofoutput. We find that central price setting, where the insurercannot exploit its information on hospital costs, leads to asuboptimal supply of hospital care.     

"New Managerialism" in Swedish Local Government

This article examines initiatives for organizational reform in Swedish local government. The analysis investigates these initiatives in the context of reform efforts found in many modern democracies, with particular reference to the development of "new managerialism". An empirical analysis of local government reform decisions is presented in order to determine the principal objectives and direction of reform initiatives. The analysis reveals that management objectives are emphasized most, followed by economic objectives and then public interest objectives. The implications of these findings for future developments in Swedish local government are discussed.     

Accountability via Performance Measurement: The Case of Child Protection Services

Since the 1980s child protection agencies have been subject to enormous scrutiny about perceived poor performance. Concerns are expressed about the capacity of services to cope with demand, the quality of practice, out‐of‐home care standards, and poor outcomes for children. Enter performance measurement. Using quantitative data to monitor effectiveness and efficiency, performance measurement promises improved resource management and accountability. This article discusses national, Victorian and Queensland child protection performance measurement regimes. It examines the extent to which performance measurement is used to promote accountability, as well as the indirect role of performance measurement in communicating policy intent. It suggests performance measurement is under‐utilised in child protection, but could be enhanced to contribute to better outcomes for children and families.     

Industrial Relations and Public Sector Reform: The Victorian Case

Few anticipated the radical program of public sector reform introduced by the Kennett government. A commitment to downsizing, markets and privatisation has transformed employment relations in the Victorian public sector. Familiar institutions have disappeared, major employment areas have been restructured, and jurisdiction for much public sector industrial relations has been transferred to the Commonwealth. Despite some industrial unrest, and occasional successes, public sector unions have been unable to fend off this ideological assault on traditional patterns of public sector employment.     

State-Local Relations in Policy Implementation: The Case of Highway Transportation in Iowa

This article examines relationships between state agencies andlocal communities, using survey and interview data from a casestudy of the Iowa Department of Transportation. It argues thatthese relationships often parallel the agency-clientele relationshipsobserved by public administration scholars. The agency derivessimilar benefits from local government support as from privateclientele support, namely, an independent power base that helpsto preserve its flow of resources and its administrative autonomy.IDOT possesses formidable political resources in the breadthand intensity of its clientele, but the key to IDOT's successis the skillful utilization of those resources through an administrativestrategy stressing the development of widely accepted technicaldecision-criteria and an administrative style emphasizing accessibility,responsiveness, and flexibility. A survey of mayors and localbusiness leaders shows that this strategy has generated widespreadpositive perceptions of the department among these clientelegroups.     

The Importance of Trust in Government for Public Administration: The Case of Zoning

Many scholars argue that citizens with higher levels of political trust are more likely to grant bureaucratic discretion to public administrators than citizens with lower levels of trust. Trust, therefore, can relieve the tension between managerial flexibility and political accountability in the modern administrative state. Unfortunately, there is little empirical evidence showing that trust is actually associated with citizens' willingness to cede policy-making power to government. This article tests theories about political trust and citizen competence using the case of zoning. Trust in local government is found to be an important predictor of support for zoning, but trust in state government and trust in national government have no effect. These findings suggest that trust affects policy choice and helps determine how much power citizens grant to local administrators.     

An Employment Union for Europe? The Role of the Swedish Government

The Swedish Government's proposal for an 'Employment Union' to offset the potential increases in unemployment caused by moves towards Economic and Monetary Union, has put the problem of unemployment at the top of the agenda of the current Intergovernmental Conference. Domestic political pressures coupled with a belief that the EU offers the potential for a solution to this problem, were key factors behind the decision to table an amendment. Forging links with other European social democratic parties to generate support for the proposal, the Swedish Social Democrats need the proposal to succeed for both domestic political ends and to safeguard the future of the European project.     

The Myth of Chinese Exceptionalism: The Case of Welfare Transition in a Globalized Economy

China’s social welfare system in the past three decades has undergone a fundamental transformation. This process is part of a general movement occurring in the developing world in the new context of globalization. Globalization has produced a structural change of preferences among major social actors with regards to social protection, which in turn induces the governments to adopt a balanced and inclusive approach of social protection that is compatible to market competition and continuous development. What distinguishes China in achieving this objective is the combination of the government’s commitment to openness and its strategic policy adjustment that, working together, induce the vested interests from the public sector to accept the new institutions in a timely manner so that the welfare programs assist the economy in exploring the opportunities offered by the international market.