Economic theory and government technology policy

Recent federal proposals and program experiments aimed at improving the innovative performance of American industry have been based on an inappropriate analytic framework. The neoclassical microeconomic analysis upon which these proposals are based emphasizes the undersupply of R & D. However, a more crucial problem in this context is the utilization of complex research results by firms and industries with low levels of in-house research expertise. This problem is a central concern of an alternative approach to the analysis of innovation, termed the information processing framework. This analytic approach, which receives empirical support from an examination of previous cooperative research programs in the United States and Great Britain and an analysis of independent consulting firms' operations, suggests that cooperative or extramural research does not function effectively as a substitute for in-house research. Public policies to encourage innovation should be attentive to the distribution, as well as the supply, of R & D.     

Organizational reform within government: accountability and policy management

The article considers, from a United Kingdom perspective, the ways in which relations between Government Departments and Agencies are organized to ensure clarity of roles and effective accountability; and also looks at the ongoing need for effective policy management at the centre of Government. It describes the progress of the Next Steps programme, examining its successes and perceived weaknesses. In particular, it rehearses the debate running in the UK on the question of Ministerial accountability, and considers the distinctions between responsibility and accountability, and between policy matters and operations. (© 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.)     

Divided government and US federal rulemaking

Despite paying a great deal of attention to the effects of divided government on legislative outputs, scholars of American politics have surprisingly ignored the potential impact of divided government on bureaucratic regulatory outputs. In this article we argue that divided government should reduce the volume of federal agency rulemaking. We test this hypothesis against a data set covering 21,000 rules from 1983 to 2005. Our study is one of the first to analyze the determinants of federal bureaucratic rulemaking activity across such a long period of time. Our results demonstrate that during periods of divided government, agencies issue fewer rules and fewer substantively significant rules than they do during periods of unified government. These findings suggest that divided government impedes agency rulemaking.     

The checks and balances of party federalism: German federal government in a divided legislature

In this study, we assess the potential for policy change of the German government of Helmut Kohl after unification combining party positions with formal bicameral settings in a spatial model of legislative action. We distinguish between two policy areas and two types of legislation, mandatory and non–mandatory legislation imposing either a symmetric or asymmetric power distribution between both German chambers. In order to identify German legislators' party positions in different policy areas, we use data from ECPR Party Manifesto research covering the period from German unification in 1990 to the end of the government of Helmut Kohl in 1998. We find that the federal government of Helmut Kohl had a policy leadership position until April 1991 with no procedural differences, but the gridlock danger for governmental proposals was higher on the societal than the economic dimension. Afterwards, the government's potential for policy change was considerably determined by the type of legislation, independently from the policy dimension. At the end of the Kohl era, the governmental policy leadership position was limited to policies that left even the opposition majority of German states better off. The procedural settings mattered greatly on the economic dimension, and the danger of gridlock on societal policy was smaller only for non–mandatory legislation.     

The checks and balances of party federalism: German federal government in a divided legislature

Abstract In this study, we assess the potential for policy change of the German government of Helmut Kohl after unification combining party positions with formal bicameral settings in a spatial model of legislative action. We distinguish between two policy areas and two types of legislation, mandatory and non–mandatory legislation imposing either a symmetric or asymmetric power distribution between both German chambers. In order to identify German legislators' party positions in different policy areas, we use data from ECPR Party Manifesto research covering the period from German unification in 1990 to the end of the government of Helmut Kohl in 1998. We find that the federal government of Helmut Kohl had a policy leadership position until April 1991 with no procedural differences, but the gridlock danger for governmental proposals was higher on the societal than the economic dimension. Afterwards, the government's potential for policy change was considerably determined by the type of legislation, independently from the policy dimension. At the end of the Kohl era, the governmental policy leadership position was limited to policies that left even the opposition majority of German states better off. The procedural settings mattered greatly on the economic dimension, and the danger of gridlock on societal policy was smaller only for non–mandatory legislation.     

Controlling federal expenditures in the national school lunch program: The relationship between changes in household eligibility and federal policy

Under the assumption of widespread fraud and abuse, procedures were implemented in the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) in 1981 to detect and deter misreporting by applicants for subsidized meal benefits. We, however, find that the incidence of fraud is actually small relative to normal temporal variation in income and household composition that leads to legitimate changes in eligibility for benefits. It is estimated that each month about 3 percent of all households approved for meal benefits have changes sufficiently large to alter their benefit status. Further, the amount of misreporting at the time of application, estimated to be 4.8 percent, is far smaller than previously assumed. Instead of focusing on the static problem of deterring initial applicant misreporting, the policy problem is now a dynamic one that includes how (or whether) to deal with normal changes in income and household size.     

The New Public Administration: management innovations in government

Over the last two decades there have been some fundamental changes in the working of government which have resulted in major and visible management innovations in the organizational structures and systems of government aimed at delivering greater efficiency, and more responsive and flexible public services. The innovations have led to the ‘New Public Administration’. This article identifies the innovations in thinking about the role and functioning of government; about service users; about administrative structures and about staff. The article also discusses the strategies and actions employed in the new synergy between the public and private sectors, as well as the reforms in financial planning and control systems. In conclusion, the broad objectives of these reforms have been to shift emphasis from developing plans to developing key strategic areas; to shift emphasis from inward-looking systems to developing partnerships; to shift emphasis from inputs and processes to outputs and outcomes; and to shift emphasis towards managing diversity within a unified public service. Finally, managerial pragmatism and political conviction are highlighted as essential to motivating management innovation in government. (© 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.)     

Market imperfections,government imperfections,and policy mixes: policy innovations in Singapore

Proper roles for government and market in addressing policy problems may be assessed by considering the duality between market imperfections and government imperfections. The potential of government interventions or market mechanisms as core policy instruments can be eroded by fundamental deficiencies deeply rooted in either government or market as social institutions. The impacts of such deficiencies are much more extensive than postulated by the existing theories. Analysis here, based on policy innovations in land transport and health care in Singapore, suggests how policy mixes might become the norm of response for addressing policy problems found in a range of sectors. The analytical framework presented may help to distinguish among different policy mixes according to their effectiveness, but also provides some useful guiding principles for policy design.     

奥巴马政府对华政策展望

奥巴马执政初期仍将会延续布什政府的对华友好政策，但在对华贸易逆差、人民币汇率和人权等问题上可能与中国发生摩擦和分歧。随着时间的推移，奥巴马在这些问题上将逐渐回归灵活和务实的政策。鉴于美国内忧外患的困境及中国综合国力的提升，奥巴马的“非敌非友”对华战略定位将会被逐渐扬弃，其对华政策也将目趋理性和现实，并致力于发展美中战略性伙伴关系。     

Analytical debates and policy learning: analysis and change in the federal bureaucracy

One of the primary agents of change within federal organizations is the policy analyst. This is so because analysts are formally charged with critiquing existing policies and the organizations that implement them, and with proposing new policies and implementation procedures. But it is often forgotten by both proponents and critics of policy analysis that analysts themselves work within — are are responsive to — an organizational context. This paper provides an attempt to view analysis as a process that initiates and responds to policy change, and that is constrained by the organizational context within which analysis takes place. A set of cases, drawn from energy policy at the federal level, are used to illustrate that process.     

Small parties: From party pledges to government policy

When estimating a party's capacity for goal co-ordination, scholars need not only consider contextual constraints but also the party's properties, since these directly affect its strategic choices. For small parties which are crucial in virtually all multi-party systems the co-ordination of votes, office and policy is much more difficult than for numerically strong actors. Since the conceptual tools to assess the weight of small coalition partners – weight defined as the capacity to defend and realise core policy commitments – and to systematise intra-coalitional processes in general are absent, this article proposes a typology to account for small parties' weight. This typology is defined by the two criteria of ‘qualified pivotality’ and ‘centrality’, each of which is assumed to create a particular set of strategic advantages. Based on the latter, the approach allows small parties' impact to be compared, first, with reference to their positions within the respective parliamentary party system, and, second, with reference to the type of coalition that is likely to be formed. Based on the separate but parallel assessment of ‘formation weight’ and ‘coalition weight’, the typology reveals under which conditions the same properties of a small party may be advantageous during the coalition formation process, but disadvantageous during the subsequent period of coalition government.     

Local government reform in Jamaica and Trinidad: a policy dilemma

Issues of local governance have dominated Caribbean policy agenda for the past two decades, prompting considerable thought and action on local government reform by scholars, local government practitioners and policy makers, alike. No reforms have been as ubiquitous as those of local government. Permitted by an international reformist agenda, local government reform policy is linked positively to efforts to redress incapacities of public management and administration. This article examines conceptual and empirical issues relating to implementation of local government reform in two Caribbean countries, Jamaica and Trinidad. It analyses how the vision for local governance is articulated through specific reform taxonomies and argues that, although local government reform is normatively a policy aimed at fundamental changes in intergovernmental relations, in Jamaica and Trinidad reform has led merely to adjustments in the internal administration of local government. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Market forces and private sector processes in government policy: The job training partnership act

This article examines those provisions of the Job Training Partnership Act designed to introduce the presumed efficiency of marketlike forces and incentives into federal employment and training programs. First, the JTPA replaced the administrative system used in earlier training programs (which emphasized detailed federal control and monitoring of the programs at the local level) with a system that, in effect, set a price for a prescribed level of performance and reduced oversight of the training process. Second, the Act gave people in private business some control over programs at the local level. According to available data, JTPA program performance is no different in local areas with a strong private-sector involvement than in areas where that involvement is weak and passive. The performance standards have had an effect, although the relationship between the standards and the goals of the JTPA is ambiguous at best. The article outlines the limitations of a market-oriented system for the administration of public policy.     

Uneven local implementation of federal policy after disaster: Policy conflict and goal ambiguity

As climate change continues to increase both the frequency and intensity of environmental hazards and disasters, the need for a cohesive national mitigation policy grows. As the environmental federalism scholarship indicates, the inherent tension in federal, state, and local policy implementation highlights that despite a national need, environmental quality is a local public good. To complicate matters, there is disagreement about the optimal level of decision-making regarding the adoption and implementation of environmental policy. This study addresses this gap by considering the role of policy ambiguity and conflict in policy implementation. The analysis relies on primary qualitative data collected from open-ended interviews with 22 local government officials in 12 municipalities following Hurricane Harvey. Through the lens of policy ambiguity and conflict, we find confirmatory support for the idea that policies with less ambiguous goals are more likely to be implemented. Furthermore, we find that policy conflict arises when local governments perceive there is little for the community to gain by implementing the federal program. Thus, the level of protection afforded to citizens varies greatly between communities and is influenced heavily by politics. This research supports the Ambiguity-Conflict Model of policy implementation, an oft-cited but rarely tested theoretical framework for assessing the intergovernmental politics of policy implementation. It also demonstrates the barriers to local implementation of federal environmental policy in a nested system of government.     

The Interface management frontier: Modernizing local government. Part three

At the beginning of the 21st Century, local government faces the major challenge of restructuring and managing a new interface with its social, economic, and political environment. The devolution of public tasks to society requires a redefinition of the role of local government. The shift from producing to guaranteeing the remaining services requires at least the adoption of best practices from private-sector strategic marketing, production, and purchasing management. The restructuring of local government for customer satisfaction and decentralized decision-making requires careful attention to the demands of democratic political control, as well as to legitimate public interests that may not be included in the customer-satisfaction model. Thus, public management of local government cannot be content with internal modernization, but must redefine its relationships with its environment.