Authoritarian responsiveness: Online consultation with “issue publics” in China

In recent years, public consultation has become a standard feature of policymaking in authoritarian regimes. While previous studies found evidence of government responsiveness to citizens' demands, they did not measure responsiveness in terms of real policy change. This article presents the first systematic analysis of Chinese central government policy responsiveness to consultative input. In 2008, the Chinese government unveiled a blueprint for health‐care reform, inviting the public to post their opinions online. Having collected 27,899 online comments, the government subsequently published a revised draft. This article analyzes a random sample of 2% of this corpus of comments, assessing the effect of comments on revisions while controlling for both media content and bureaucratic preferences. The findings demonstrate that public comments have an impact upon policy revisions and suggest that the Chinese government is more responsive to street‐level implementers than to other social groups.     

Rural Adjustment Schemes: Juggling Politics,Welfare and Markets

The Commonwealth government has offered support to farmers in the form of structural or business adjustment‐type schemes since the Loan (Farmers Debt Adjustment) Acts of 1935–1971. Since 1971, a series of more comprehensive rural reconstruction/adjustment schemes with a range of objectives from debt alleviation to encouraging some exits from agricultural industries, has been in place. While having little direct impact on the structure of these industries, the various schemes have been politically important and an indicator of how core values relating to agricultural production and rural life have changed. A review of the schemes shows an increasing focus on improving farm productivity and sustainability, accompanied by a discourse emphasising the need to promote the ‘farm business’, rather than to protect the ‘family farm’. On the other hand, governments have also used these schemes to deliver ‘welfare’ outputs.     

An empirical analysis of municipal efficiency and local resident satisfaction by council type in Victorian local government

Although a voluminous empirical literature has examined local government efficiency, much less attention has focused on municipal effectiveness and almost no effort has been directed at the relationship between efficiency and effectiveness. In this paper, we seek to add to the latter nascent literature by investigating the relationship between operational efficiency and local resident satisfaction for three different municipal categories (metropolitan, regional, and rural councils) in the Victorian local government system over the period 2014–2015 to 2017–2018 using data envelopment analysis and an advanced regression model. We find that although a strong relationship exists between efficiency and satisfaction for metropolitan and regional councils, the same is not true of rural councils.     

统筹城乡发展与地方政府——基于浙江省长兴县的研究

统筹城乡发展、建设新农村是全面贯彻落实科学发展观、构建和谐社会的重要内容和途径。其中,政府必须扮演关键性的角色,而在各级政府中,县级政府又负有最直接的责任。浙江省长兴县统筹城乡发展、建设新农村的基本经验是:政府必须承担统筹城乡发展、建设新农村的主要责任,通过建立领导机制、政府体制创新等有效地整合资源、制订规划、组织实施;政府必须在建设农村基础设施、治理和保护农村自然环境、建立健全医疗、养老等农民社会保障体系、支持农业生产、发展教育事业等方面发挥关键性作用;政府必须尊重市场规律,重视社会力量,尊重农民的主体地位、首创精神和权利,形成政府、企业、社会三者之间互补、合作的良好格局,合力解决实际进程中的困难;政府必须因地制宜,因时制宜,制订并实施基于当地现实、适应当地现实、全面、渐进解决当地现实问题的公共政策。     

Understanding political risk in investment planning

In 1982, the Congress authorized $11 billion to modernize the nation's air traffic control system—one of the largest infrastructure investments since the building of the interstate highway system. Although this investment appears to offer a large and robust return, the economic results depend strongly on productivity gains through system consolidation. It is uncertain what balance the Congress will strike between the long-term, widely shared benefits of greater productivity and the immediate job losses from system consolidation. This risk can be included in the calculus of expected return through Monte Carlo analysis. When this is done, the expected return drops very close to the 10% hurdle rate that the government often uses for such projects. This method of integrating political risk can be applied to any investment, public or private, for which political action joins the customary economic and technical uncertainties in affecting the outcome.     

The role of donors: how to combine sector programme support with devolution? A comment from a practitioner to James Wunsch: ‘decentralization,local governance and “recentralization” in Africa’

In commenting on ‘Decentralization, Local Governance and ‘Recentralization’ in Africa’ (Wunsch, 2001 ), this article concurs with the general thesis of Wunsch that the actual implementation as distinct from the rhetoric of decentralization in Africa has featured lingering central retention of power and resources and that genuine local control over important services and investments remains elusive. However, there is evidence that this is not invariably the case and that donors may have decisive roles to play in encouraging local assertiveness in the medium term in providing leverage for change through budget support and technical assistance to civic education, training local councillors, monitoring local government elections and encouraging local government associations to put to the test the national commitment to genuine local governance. These roles include helping to ensure the transparency of central transfers and, as in Uganda and Malawi for example, assisting with the development of intermediary fiscal mechanisms in this regard. Learning from such promising experiences will be vital in nurturing the longer term optimism heralded by Wunsch. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Managing for Legitimacy: Agency Governance in Its “Deep” Constitutional Context

Recent literature on bureaucratic structure has gone further than studying discretions given to bureaucrats in policy making, and much attention is now paid to understanding how bureaucratic agencies are managed. This article proposes that the way in which executive governments manage their agencies varies according to their constitutional setting and that this relationship is driven by considerations of the executive's governing legitimacy. Inspired by Charles Tilly (1984), the authors compare patterns of agency governance in Hong Kong and Ireland, in particular, configurations of assigned decision‐making autonomies and control mechanisms. This comparison shows that in governing their agencies, the elected government of Ireland's parliamentary democracy pays more attention to input (i.e., democratic) legitimacy, while the executive government of Hong Kong's administrative state favors output (i.e., performance) legitimacy. These different forms of autonomy and control mechanism reflect different constitutional models of how political executives acquire and sustain their governing legitimacy.     

Public sector efficiency: An international comparison

We compute public sector performance (PSP) and public sector efficiency (PSE) indicators, comprising a composite and seven sub-indicators, for 23 industrialised countries. The first four sub-indicators are “opportunity” indicators that take into account administrative, education and health outcomes and the quality of public infrastructure and that support the rule of law and a level playing-field in a market economy. Three other indicators reflect the standard “Musgravian” tasks for government: allocation, distribution and stabilisation. The input and output efficiency of public sectors across countries is then measured via a non-parametric production frontier technique. The study finds significant differences in PSP and PSE, which suggests a large potential for expenditure savings in many countries.     

E‐government and public service quality in Ghana

This article contributes to the growing discourse on the potential of e‐government to transform the operations of public sector institutions, thereby improving public services. It does so by conceptualizing public service quality into efficiency, economy (cost reduction), customer satisfaction, and service accessibility and draws on qualitative data from the Ghanaian narrative for illustration. As previous studies have demonstrated, this study also affirms the potential of e‐government in improving public services delivery by increasing efficiency, reducing the cost of operations, expanding access to services, and achieving customer satisfaction. Yet, there remains a repertoire of challenges such as weak ICT infrastructure especially in towns and villages, incessant power outages and illiteracy, which are drawbacks to fully harnessing the benefits of e‐government in Ghana. The study recommends that these challenges should feature prominently in e‐government policies to increase the chances of solving them.     

Are bureaucrats efficient? An application to the provision of AFDC

The question on how bureaucrats behave in the provision of a public service has been the subject of a considerable amount of research, most of which has been largely theoretical and inconclusive, especially on the issue of efficiency. This paper builds a bureaucratic theoretical model and provides empirical evidence by examining the workings of a government bureau, supplying a public service, namely Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), at the state level. It builds and estimates a generalized short run cost function that allows for systematic relative price inefficiency and does not require cost minimization subject to market prices as a maintained hypothesis. The model tests cost minimization as a testable special case. The estimating procedure allows us to test for a number of other features of the technology that are of interest such as productivity growth, marginal costs, returns to scale, technical change, and factor demands.     

“Modernizing Government”: Mapping Global Public Policy Networks

Public sector reform is a key policy area, driven by global public policy networks. Research on these networks has been inductive, highlighting organizations like the Organisation for Economic Co‐operation and Development (OECD). This article examines “virtual policy networks” (VPNs) on the Web. Using IssueCrawler, we conduct a hyperlink analysis that permits us to map seven VPNs. The first network mapped the hyperlinks of 91 organizations identified through inductive methods. The hypothesis that the virtual network would include all actors identified in the inductive approach was refuted. The other six networks focused on: market mechanisms, open government, performance, public employment, reform, and restructuring. Among the findings, the U.S. government is prominent in the first three, while international organizations dominate the others. VPN rankings show that the World Bank dominates the OECD. When the inductive research is blended with the VPN research, the OECD's prominence increases, and we see the importance of market mechanisms and reform VPNs as pillars of globalization.     

Does international monetary aid help or hinder Somalia's social economic revival?

Somalia government has been accused of lacking transparency and proper accounting systems. This study investigates international monetary aid in Somalia's social and economic revival. A purposely chosen sample of Somalis living in Kenya (N = 204) was used. Approximately 59.4% disagreed that the lives of a great number of Somali people have improved, while 65.2% acknowledged that there was lack of integrity and expertise in the management of foreign aids. Finally, the study suggests that the key to success of monetary aid in Somalia largely depends on; developing good financial infrastructure based on modern information technology and telecommunication, the establishment of strong financial institutions with good financial and aid policies, and enhanced transparency and rigorous accountability of Somalia government officials. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

农村剩余劳动力转移过程中政府间利益博弈探析

我国农村剩余劳动力转移是一项政府主导的社会系统工程。在当前农村劳动力转移过程中,面临着三种棘手的政府间利益博弈问题,即政府部门间利益博弈、中央与地方政府间利益博弈和劳动力输出地政府与输入地政府间利益博弈。这些利益博弈问题,增加了政府做好农村劳动力转移的工作难度,阻碍着我国农村劳动力转移就业的整体进程,应妥善加以解决。     

中国劳动力市场演化与政府行为

劳动力市场培育是中国改革的核心问题之一.中国经济改革是在城乡隔绝的特殊背景下展开的.旧体制下,城市国有部门人浮于事,大锅饭、铁饭碗造成效率低下;农村劳动力被禁锢在土地上,隔离在国家工业化进程之外,大量农村剩余劳动力不能及时转移到非农产业,造成极大浪费和损失.劳动力市场改革基于城市"治懒"、农村"治贫"的目标展开.逐步把国有部门职工推向市场,同时逐步改善农村劳动力的配置效率,渐进式改革、逐步释放被压抑的生产力,这是中国经济持续高速增长的根本动力.劳动力市场培育也是城乡劳动者权利的双向调整和逐步接近的过程.改革已取得了很大进展,但城乡劳动者的平等权利尚未实现.名义权利与实际权利的差异是当前最突出的问题.这种权利差异对经济社会协调发展造成威胁.增长、稳定、公平是左右政府改革行为的三大变量.劳动力市场上的权利不平等已成为经济持续增长和社会稳定的巨大障碍.贯彻新发展观,构建和谐社会正在使政策导向发生改变.     

A distributional theory of government growth

This article presents a closed form solution for time-consistent taxation and public spending in a dynamic game between government and median voter. Extending Meltzer and Richard’s static analysis of government size the article offers a theory of growth of government. At low stages of economic development the median voter, identified as a relatively poor worker, prefers to have no or only small redistributive taxation in order to foster savings. Through this channel he expects improvements of his labor productivity and wage. At higher stages of development, however, when capital is relatively abundant and prospects of further labor productivity gains through capital accumulation are smaller, the incentive to tax and redistribute income rises. Yet, in line with previous work on growth and infrastructure spending the median voter prefers a constant share of productive public spending at all times. Hence, government growth is solely driven by an expanding welfare state.     

Infrastructure and the Vision Thing

Australia faces a transport infrastructure problem requiring complex policy formulation and imaginative problem solving. In opposition, Kevin Rudd committed to improving the nation's infrastructure and addressing the ‘infrastructure bottlenecks’. This task is made more urgent by the Reserve Bank's concern that the infrastructure restraints are causing inflationary pressure. In the short term however, increased Commonwealth infrastructure expenditure would add to the pressure on interest rates. Consequently, the Commonwealth must work with industry and the states on improving operational efficiency in the short term, while planning for infrastructure investments in the longer term. With the political limitations of federalism, a shortage of skilled policy advice, and ministerial inexperience, the Rudd government must set a broad agenda to guide all infrastructure stakeholders.     

我国农村人力资本投资的制约因素与对策分析

加大人力资本投资力度,充分发挥农村人力资本的资源优势是我国解决“三农”问题、建设社会主义新农村的一大重要举措。而由于农村居民人均收入低、城市优先发展策略、农村人力资本投资收益率低下、农村劳动力在城市的非正规就业等原因,严重阻碍了农村人力资本的投资行为。故而,笔者建议:政府应加大对农村义务教育投资力度,大力发展农村职业技术教育,提高农村人口的整体文化水平;大力发展农村合作医疗事业;形成城乡统一的劳动力市场,提高农村人力资本投资回报率,从而提高农村人口的整体素质,变人口压力为人力资源优势。     

社会主义新农村建设中的政府能力——公共产品的视角

社会主义新农村建设是我国现代化的一个关键环节.从一定意义上说,社会主义新农村的建设过程就是农村公共产品供给效率的改善及供给结构的优化过程.从公共产品的视角出发,有利于深入探讨社会主义新农村建设中政府能力的本质、问题与成因,政府与乡村自组织的关系等重要方面.我们认为,政府是农村公共产品的主要责任者,政府供给农村公共产品的程度与质量是政府能力的重要表现;农民的自组织化是提高农村公共产品供给效率及促进基层民主发展的内在要求;厘清政府与乡村自组织的关系是社会主义新农村建设的应有之义.推进社会主义新农村建设,要求政府既能够承担农村公共产品的供给责任,又能够在公共产品供给中处理好与乡村自组织的关系,为此,应当划分好政府在农村公共产品供给中的责任;改革乡村治理结构,提升基层政府的能力;培育农村自治组织,提高农村公共产品的供给效率;处理好政府与农村自组织的关系,促进农村基层民主的发展.     

农村公共品供给效率实证研究

运用公共服务满意度理论对农村公共品供给效率进行评价研究。研究认为,效率既是主体行为结果的投入产生的比较效果,又是一个对于主体行为而言的相对概念。农村公共品供给效果,既包括物质性效果,也包括精神效果,即公共品受众的感觉效果。在农村公共品供给效率评价中,从农民主体而言,只有农民认为有用的公共品,才是有效率的。相反,即使政府反复认定有用并强制去供给的公共品,当农民认为没有用时,农民依然感觉它是无效率的。利用126个乡(镇)农户对农村公共品供给效率"满意度"评价(CSI)抽样调查数据,运用CSI-Probit回归模型对农户的农村公共品供给效率"满意度"及其影响因素进行了实证分析,得出:当CSI值处于同一类型的市(州)时,其影响因素表现出明显的共性特征。总体而言,CSI的主要影响来自农民受教育年限、医疗可及性、农民收入水平、农户有效灌溉面积率、农户距乡镇政府的距离、农林技术站服务次数以及被调查者年龄等因素。     

“Capacity‐building” in global Internet governance: The long‐term outcomes of “multistakeholderism”

“Capacity building” is a catch phrase from the UN development discourse. In recent years, it has entered the global Internet governance (IG) arena. At World Summit of the Information Society (WSIS 2003), “capacity building” was identified as a key public policy issue. It is proposed in this study that ‘capacity building’ be defined in a different manner – as the principal outcome of the experimental multistakeholder (MSH) process in global IG. The open and inclusive process of stakeholder deliberation leads to accumulation of intellectual capital, development of relational infrastructure for the domain (epistemic community), and emergence of common global consciousness. When cast as a capacity‐building process, MSH collaboration at global Internet governance arenas exhibits long‐term and large‐scale intangible outcomes. This study contributes to the understanding of the capacity‐building potential of MSH collaboration in IG. By employing concepts from International Relations and Organizational Learning, the author develops a model of tangible and intangible outcomes of MSH collaboration. This unique model can be used for studying the effects in other stakeholder venues of governing global resources and processes.