Evaluating development policies and programmes in the third world

The issues and methodologies of programme evaluation have largely been developed within the North American context of an open and competitive political process. The policy cycle in Third World nations, especially authoritarian regimes, is a closed system with little consultation with affected target groups, suppression of criticism of government officials and policies, and a severe weakness in policy implementation. Third World governments prefer evaluation methods such as cost-benefit analysis which will not undermine fragile regimes by indicating problems in the policy formulation and implementation process. However, the most useful form of evaluation is implementation analysis, which can pinpoint the reasons why policies succeed or fail.     

Political Party Trends in 1985: The continuing But Constrained Advance of the National Party

In 1985 the national party organizations continued to expandtheir spheres of activity into state and local politics. Bothparties made preparations for extensive involvement in the 1986state legislative elections. The Republican National Committeeinitiated programs to aid county party organizations, to induceDemocratic state legislators to join the GOP, and to encourageDemocratic voters to switch their party registration. The nationalDemocratic party continued to assert authority over state partiesas it engaged in the quadrennial practice of rules reform. Incontrast to the past, the 1985 reform process resulted in nosignificant rules changes and in little intra-party skirmishing.Both parties, however, were forced to recognize the limits ofnational party influence in state and local politics.     

The challenge ahead: the state agenda for the coming years

The mid-1990s promise to be extremely challenging years as state leaders and institutions struggle to bring accountability and predictability back into their political systems. Faced with continuing budgets troubles, increasing demands for services and a shift of responsibility from the federal to the state level, the American states will be hard pressed to satisfy constituent needs or improve state services. However, the tough times may result in long-term improvement in state government, as administrators streamline agencies, legislators trim inefficient or redundant programs and state leaders generally seek new and cost effective solutions to social and economic problems.     

The rule of law and citizenship in central India: post-colonial dilemmas

This article argues that the ‘rule of law’ has become a central goal in popular struggles the world over, and it is citizenship struggles which infuse the rule of law with substantive, as against a thin procedural, meaning. This is especially true in post-colonial societies like India, with a tradition of inherited colonial law designed for subject-hood rather than citizenship, growing inequality which affects both the enactment and interpretation of law, and the violation of law by those who are meant to protect it. Demanding implementation of existing laws, breaking laws that are patently unjust whether through armed struggle or non-violent social movements, or seeking to change laws in favour of new and more democratic laws, are all major avenues by means of which people express their aspirations as citizens. However, law's mutually constitutive relation with social practice means that people enter into political and legal negotiations already constituted as certain kinds of legal subjects, which constrains their imagination in certain ways.     

Decentralization: The latest fashion in development administration?

There has been a resurgence of interest in decentralization, but decentralization is now somewhat differently conceived from the way it was in the 1960s. With somewhat different objectives, decentralization also take different forms and this calls into question the value of the well established categories of devolution and deconcentration.     

Blood donors,development and modernisation: configurations of biological sociality and citizenship in post-colonial Singapore

This article examines the governmental apparatus organised around Singapore's Blood Transfusion Service (SBTS) and the knowledge, experts and techniques associated with transfusion medicine. I term this apparatus, which was in place in the Singapore from its first steps towards political independence in 1959 until 1990, ‘Singapore's haemato-logic assemblage’. Drawing on the work of Foucault, the article explores how this assemblage overflowed into and reconfigured understandings of biological sociality and citizenship in post-colonial Singapore. More specifically, it argues that, in the 30 years following independence, this assemblage brought into being a new figure of the biological citizen by creating a sphere of possibilities for Singaporeans to think and act accordingly. This new figure of the citizen is ‘the blood donor’. Articulated around the SBTS and the knowledge and techniques of transfusion medicine, this donor is a Singaporean who gives blood to save the lives of fellow citizens and participates, thereby, in the development and modernisation of the newly independent nation. To substantiate this argument, the article shows how the haemato-logic assemblage helped to realise this new figure of the citizen by creating – through narratives, statistics, spaces and rewarding schemes – a sphere of possibilities in which Singaporeans could think and act as blood donors.     

Organizational implications of information technology in third world countries

The effective implementation of IT initiatives within organizations depends on its degree of acceptance at the national level and its rate of absorption within the focal organization. This paper focuses on the latter by addressing the key issues influencing the capacity of organizations to successfully implement IT initiatives. The various issues are investigated based on a case study approach using examples from Tanzania, and organized into a systems framework by considering the role of the psycho-social, the technical, the structural, the goal and the managerial systems in turn. The conclusion highlights the need of appropriate education if the full benefits of IT are to be harvested.     

关于21世纪前期中国第三世界战略的基本思考

冷战结束以来的第三世界的分裂和分化使中国在第三世界大体一致的总体利益受到弱化 ,中国在第三世界的利益更加显著地表现为层次性和区域性的分布 ,从地缘政治以及地缘经济的角度考量它们与中国国家利益的关切 ,基本上可以界定为三个轻重缓急各不相同的战略层次 :核心区域、重点区域以及一般重点区域。中国国家利益的这种分布和特点规定了中国针对不同区域的地区战略应在以往第三世界总体战略上进行侧重点各不相同的创新性取舍。     

The maturing of development administration

This article traces the evolution of the concepts underlying development administration since its origin as a distinct subdiscipline in the early 1960s. It relates the main thrusts in development administration to changing theories and approaches to economic and social development, especially the appropriate functions of the state, the implications of modernization, and the capabilities of people outside the modern core in urban centres. Seven major themes have emerged during the past decade. Their acceptance among academics and practitioners has produced a more sophisticated, realistic and useful appreciation of the relationships of public administration to development. Though this bodes well for the future, an unsolved problem is the continuing intellectual hegemony of Western concepts and practices, despite an impressive number of highly trained Third World scholars and well-established Third World institutions operating in this field. There is evidence that the ongoing search for effective indigenous management practices will greatly enrich development administration as a field of inquiry and of practice.     

National Investment Planning and equity policy in developing countries: The challenge of decentralized administration

The impact of national economic planning in developing countries over the past three decades has been severely limited. Little evidence supports the contention that it has either directly improved investment decisions for stimulating economic growth or significantly affected development policymaking. Constraints on implementing national planning in Asia include weaknesses of political and administrative support for national plans, deficiencies in their content, difficulties of relating plan priorities to investment decisionmaking, ineffectiveness or inappropriateness of comprehensive planning methods and techniques, and inadequate administrative capacity to implement and evaluate multisectoral investment strategies. Changes in Asian development policy toward growth with equity imply the need for more decentralized methods and arrangements for planning, creation of a stronger relationship between policy planning and program implementation, and diffusion of administrative capacity among a wide variety of public and private institutions to generate, formulate and implement investment policies and projects.     

西方公共行政学范式演进的新视角--从"行政国"到"管理国"

传统的公共行政范式遭到了外部环境越来越严重的挑战 ,新的管理途径 (managerialapproach)应运而生并迅即扩展至各国公共部门改革之中。有学者认为 ,公共管理是对原有公共行政模式弊端的一种“扬弃” ,并必将取代传统的公共行政途径。     

中国第三方物流的发展现状及策略

研究了第三方物流在现代物流系统中表现出的主要特征和对现代物流发展的主要作用，通过分析第三方物流的国内外发展现状，结合中国目前实际的发展现状及面临的问题，总结了第三方物流在中国的发展趋势及开展第三方物流的策略。