Accrual Budgeting: Accounting Treatment of Key Public Sector Items and Implications for Fiscal Policy

Budgeting in accrual terms is one of the most controversial issues in public sector accounting. In this paper, we analyze the accounting treatment of problematic elements of the financial statements when introducing accrual budgeting, and discuss the effects of the analyzed accounting alternatives on fiscal policy. We focus on three pioneer countries in the implementation of accrual budgeting and accounting: the United Kingdom, Sweden, and New Zealand. The accounting standards of the International Public Sector Accounting Standards Board, the European System of Accounts, and the Government Finance Statistics Manual of the International Monetary Fund are taken as benchmarks.     

In the Eye of the Storm? Societal Aging and the Future of Public‐Service Reform

One of the principal motivations for the reinvention of many central governments over the last two decades is the need to deal with chronic budget deficits. As budget surpluses reappeared at the end of the 1990s, the pressure to restructure seemed to ease in some countries. However, observers suggested the relief was only temporary, and aging populations would soon put more stress on government budgets, creating a need for further retrenchment. This article assesses the vulnerability of three central governments—the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States—to aging-related fiscal stress. Because of institutional differences, the U.S. government is likely to be hit hardest by this demographic change. This may imply that public-sector reform will take a different path in the United States than it will in the United Kingdom or Canada.     

Governing austerity in the United Kingdom: anticipatory fiscal consolidation as a variety of austerity governance

This paper analyses the logic underpinning austerity governance in the United Kingdom. Taking the UK’s relative fiscal and monetary policy autonomy as a starting point, the paper unpacks and analyses how the United Kingdom has charted a successful course between the imperatives of social stability and market credibility. At the heart of this ‘success’ is a fundamentally anticipatory governing logic. Fiscal consolidation was justified and enacted as a pre-emptive and preventative intervention in order to anticipate an indebted and thus disciplined future. Contrary to conventional wisdom, then, UK austerity is not necessarily geared only towards swingeing spending cuts, because the direction of travel towards an imagined debt- and deficit-free future is just as important as reaching the destination itself under the logic of anticipatory fiscal consolidation.     

Policy convergence and policy feedback: Agricultural finance policies in a globalizing era

Abstract In a comparative study of five countries: Australia, Canada, the Republic of Ireland, the UK, and the USA, this article examines the degree of convergence of agricultural credit policy content, policy instruments, and policy outcomes on a market liberal model. It shows that all five countries have moved toward market liberal policy arrangements over the past quarter century of globalizing and domestic fiscal pressures, but important differences in policy remain. The Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom move further toward a market liberal model than do Australia, Canada, and the USA. The distinct national paths taken to market liberalism give rise to policy feedback that hastens or retards the adoption of a fully market liberal system. Historical choices of policy instruments and path dependence help account for continuing policy divergence.     

From doves to hawks: A spatial analysis of voting in the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England

This article examines the making of monetary policy in the United Kingdom between 1997 and 2008 by analysing voting behaviour in the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC). It provides a new set of measures for the monetary policy preferences of individual MPC members by estimating a Bayesian item response model. The article demonstrates the usefulness of these measures by comparing the ideal points of outgoing MPC members with their successors and by looking at changes over time in the median ideal point on the MPC. The analysis indicates that the British Government has been able to move the position of the median voter on the MPC through its appointments to the Committee. This highlights the importance of central bank appointments for monetary policy.     

Policy Convergence in Banking: a Comparative Study

The relationship between global economic integration and policy convergence in banking is examined in five countries: Canada, France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States. Focusing upon policy styles and modes of policy-making, considerable convergence in membership of policy communities and some convergence in the organization of state agencies is found. When it comes to policy networks, there is more limited convergence on a corporatist mode of policy-making in banking. Policy style may not be as responsive to international economic changes as policy goals, policy content, and policy instruments.     

The influence of federalism on fiscal policy making

Abstract. This article attempts to refine the statement that federal states face difficulties in fiscal policy making because of the territorial division of powers by comparing two federal countries, Canada and Germany. These two countries differ in terms of their type of federalism: Canada displaying a power-separation system and Germany corresponding to a power-sharing type. According to the authors, the territorial factor influences fiscal policy making through the distribution of taxing and spending powers as well as through patterns of intergovernmental relations. The use of fiscal policy instruments and the likely effects on conflict and cooperation in those two countries is discussed with empirical evidence. The authors come to the conclusion that federalism is indeed a constraint on fiscal policy making, but that the two types of power division face different obstacles and deal differently with fiscal problems. In the power-separation system of Canada, the federal government has encompassing competencies to use fiscal policy instruments unilaterally and without restraint, but faces a lack of concerted action with the provinces which reduces its scope of action in fiscal policy making. In the power-sharing system in Germany, concerted action facilitates macroeconomic stabilisation strategies but the compulsory negotiation system distorts the use of fiscal policy instruments by distributive bargaining.     

Race,prejudice and attitudes toward redistribution: A comparative experimental approach

Past work suggests that support for welfare in the United States is heavily influenced by citizens' racial attitudes. Indeed, the idea that many Americans think of welfare recipients as poor Blacks (and especially as poor Black women) has been a common explanation for Americans’ lukewarm support for redistribution. This article draws on a new online survey experiment conducted with national samples in the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada, designed to extend research on how racialised portrayals of policy beneficiaries affect attitudes toward redistribution. A series of innovative survey vignettes has been designed that experimentally manipulate the ethno‐racial background of beneficiaries for various redistributive programmes. The findings provide, for the first time, cross‐national, cross‐domain and cross‐ethno‐racial extensions of the American literature on the impact of racial cues on support for redistributive policy. The results also demonstrate that race clearly matters for policy support, although its impact varies by context and by the racial group under consideration.     

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.)     

Policy convergence and policy feedback: Agricultural finance policies in a globalizing era

In a comparative study of five countries: Australia, Canada, the Republic of Ireland, the UK, and the USA, this article examines the degree of convergence of agricultural credit policy content, policy instruments, and policy outcomes on a market liberal model. It shows that all five countries have moved toward market liberal policy arrangements over the past quarter century of globalizing and domestic fiscal pressures, but important differences in policy remain. The Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom move further toward a market liberal model than do Australia, Canada, and the USA. The distinct national paths taken to market liberalism give rise to policy feedback that hastens or retards the adoption of a fully market liberal system. Historical choices of policy instruments and path dependence help account for continuing policy divergence.     

Brain Politics: Aspects of Administration in the Comparative Issue Definition of Autism-Related Policy

The construction of public problems has a lasting influence on implementation in a given policy subsystem. National and sociopolitical contexts influence issue definition differently across nations. However, the degree to which nation-specific issue definition takes place has been insufficiently explored. In recent years, the growing incidence of autism has led to a quest for causal factors. One hypothesis posits that the use of mercury in vaccines may be a culprit. This paper examines the definition of the mercury and autism issue in Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Insights into the comparative elements of issue definition are suggested by the case. These insights are of particular importance to administrators, as agencies are deeply involved as objects and actors in the process of issue definition and are often responsible for implementing new and redefined policies.     

Responsibility to Be Enthusiastic? Public Servants and the Public Face of “Promiscuous Partisanship”

Contemporary public service leaders are no longer the anonymous mandarins of Westminster folklore. Whether giving public speeches to outside organizations or communicating directly with the media, senior public servants are emerging from anonymity to become public actors in their own right. This article undertakes a comparative study across four Westminster jurisdictions—Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom—to examine the formal rules and guidelines that apply to public servants when making public statements in their official capacity. Drawing on the late Peter Aucoin's notion of “promiscuous partisanship,” the article argues that public servants are expected to demonstrate a new level of enthusiasm when explaining or justifying government policy to the public. This has implications for the extent to which nonpartisanship can continue to effectively function within Westminster systems.     

Transformation or Bureaucratization? The changing role of community representation in local strategic partnerships in England

Abstract

The debate about the need to build social capital and to engage local communities in public policy has become a central issue in many advanced liberal societies and developing countries. In many countries new forms of governance have emerged out of a growing realization that representative democracy by itself is no longer sufficient. One of the most significant public policy trends in the United Kingdom has been the involvement of community organizations and their members in the delivery of national policy, mediated through local systems of governance and management. One such policy area is urban regeneration. Central Government now requires local authorities in England to set up Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) to bring together stakeholders who can prepare Community Strategies and deliver social and economic programmes which target areas of deprivation. This paper reviews the key institutional processes which must be addressed, such as representation, accountability and transformation. It then investigates three very different examples of LSPs based on interviews with key representatives. The paper concludes that political commitments to community engagement in civil society are always mediated through existing institutional arrangements. Thus attempts to change deep-seated political structures and power relationships require a commitment to increase representation as well as to transform the practices and repertoires of deliberation and action.     

CUTBACK MANAGEMENT IN CANADA*

Abstract: Although since 1975 the Government of Canada has been successful in containing its expenditure growth — partly as a result of the demands for value for money in government and the political implications of the large deficit — the drive for efficiency and economy has a long history. The Budget reforms of the 1970s (such as MBO, PPB and OPMS) have been joined at the Federal level by a new Policy and Expenditure Management System based on resource "envelopes". This involves the preparation of a five-year fiscal plan setting out projected revenue and total expenditure with a division of expenditure into ten "envelopes" for ten policy sectors. Expenditure priorities are determined by the Priorities and Planning Committee chaired by the Prime Minister, and five Cabinet Committees are responsible for managing the various policy sectors within the funds available. The intention is that "X-budgets", or across-the-board percentage cuts which were the earlier means of cutting back, will be replaced by the more sophisticated "envelope" system. In various ways all Provincial governments — even resource-rich Alberta — have also cutback their expenditures. Ontario has used two blunt instruments in its cutbacks; an arbitrary growth target below the level of inflation and the limitation of public service manpower through the device of "person-years". The lesson from Ontario's experience is the importance of political will in cutback management.     

Explaining institutional amnesia in government

This article explains why different government agencies experience variations in organizational memory loss. It first explains institutional amnesia theoretically by expanding the formal‐institutional view of organizational memory to include agential and structural‐contextual properties, revealing a broader range of novel explanations for amnesia. Institutional amnesia is then explained empirically through an international analysis of memory loss in four Westminster systems (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom). This analysis, which principally relies on 100 interviews with ministers, policy officials, and public‐sector leaders across the four countries, leads to the introduction of four explanations for amnesia, relating to: organizational churn, absorptive capacity, strategic‐instrumental decision making, and historical storytelling.     

Departmental Secretaries in Canada and the United Kingdom1

This report examines the formal processes by which appointments and terminations of departmental secretaries are undertaken in Canada and the United Kingdom. It is based on the reviews of official procedures in those countries and the literature on the subject. The report takes into account the practices which have prevailed in recent decades and related conditions of employment for deputy ministers in Canada and permanent secretaries in the United Kingdom. The main purpose of the report is to serve as a companion piece to the study by Patrick Weller and John Wanna of Australian departmental secretaries. It should be noted that these countries operate within a shared tradition, but that there are differences between them. For example, the Canadian tradition has not maintained the separation of the political and civil service careers to the same extent as the United Kingdom, although the latter has in the past relied on an elite socialisation process for both politicians and civil servants based on the education system.     

The Impact of Public Funding on Contemporary Visual Arts

Public policy for supporting the visual arts has historically followed different traditions in France and the United Kingdom. In an environment of fiscal austerity that impacts upon public funding as well as private patronage, and given the tensions between artistic freedom on the one hand, and market constraints on the other, this article examines how these two traditions of financing artists has influenced the direction of the work itself. A brief historical presentation of the two forms of public support and their evolution in recent decades provides a framework for understanding government attitudes and policies on both sides of the Channel. A closer examination of selected artists, chosen here for their representativeness and their international renown, is used to illustrate the changing nature of public support for visual art creation.     

Can ministries of health support primary health care? Some suggestions for structural reorganization and planning

Patrick Vaughan is Reader in health care epidemiology, Gill Walt is Lecturer in health policy and Anne Mills is Lecturer in health economics, at the Evaluation and Planning Centre for Health Care, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Gower Street, London WC1, United Kingdom. A previous version of this paper was prepared for the Commonwealth Secretariat, London, for the Conference of Commonwealth Health Ministers held in Ottawa, Canada, in October 1983.     

Between Detachment and Responsiveness: Civil Servants in Europe and North America

The article shows that civil servants who believe that the long-term interest of society is best served by their detached policy advice to policy-makers also hold on to their opinion more than any other actor involved in policy development. However, more civil servants currently emphasise responsiveness, at the expense of detached analysis, owing to increased exposure to international consultancy and forums. As a consequence, the attitude of civil servants in developing public policy is more likely to be indistinguishable from that of actors who have political functions, without significant variation from country to country. Evidence supporting this argument is provided by an analysis of the results of a survey first conducted in 2006 and repeated in 2008. The two waves of the survey drew responses from civil servants, interest group representatives and non-governmental experts who contribute to biotechnology policy development in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France and the European Union.     

Implementing Fiscal Decentralization: A Case Study of a Regional Tax Agency in Italy

As a measure to enhance the fiscal autonomy of the region, in 2006 the Regional Government of Sardinia in Italy decided to establish a tax agency for managing regional taxes on holiday houses and boat and aircraft transit. Based on interviews conducted with the tax agency director and staff, this article traces the trajectory and outcome of events included in the implementation of this part of the regional government's fiscal policy. Drawing from this case, this article theorizes the process of implementing fiscal decentralization by addressing the issue of how fiscal policy decisions affect the management of tax agencies in the start‐up stage. Social mechanisms of learning, brokerage, and actor certification provide important linkages between fiscal policy choices and organizational change. On the whole, the research argument made in this article further contributes to institutionalist and processualist research trends in current research on organization studies and public management.