European Union Decision Making: the Role of Sub-national Authorities

This article assesses how and to what extent sub-national authorities (SNAs) are represented in EU decision making. In particular, we compare the European goals and strategies of British sub-national authorities with those of their counterparts in Germany. Our central argument is that SNAs starting from very different positions face many of the same challenges and problems, even if their domestic constitutional positions remain the most important determinant of their influence at the EU level. Influence in EU decision making derives largely from effective coalition building, both with other like-minded actors but also, inevitably in the case of sub-national authorities, with central governments. Our case study highlights the enormous diversity of relationships between central governments and 'their' SNAs across the Union. It thus encourages scepticism about the feasibility of a 'Europe of the Regions'.     

Political Science Research on China: Making the Most of Diversity

This article aims at stimulating debate on the future development of political science research in and on China by bringing into clearer view the diversity of social science research in the West. It argues that far from monolithic, political science is itself engaged in a broad controversy on common goals and shared standards. Secondly, addressing international students of Chinese politics the article observes that we are currently witnessing a transformation of the field as we experience a slight shift toward more quantitative work. However, those China scholars working in a qualitative tradition should not see this as a hostile takeover of the field. Rather they should take this as a stimulating opportunity to employ more refined methodologies from within their own tradition as well as engage in multi-method research. The challenge is to make the most of diversity and to engage in fruitful cross-cultural dialogue based on respect for each other’s viewpoints. Three major divides need to be bridged: between qualitative and quantitative approaches, between political science and area studies as well as between Chinese and Western scholars.     

Remaking Australia's Economic Policy: Economic Policy Decision-Makers During the Hawke and Keating Labor Governments

This paper reports on interviews with 93 members of strategically located institutional elites and nominated influentials. It examines the sources of economic ideas in economic policy and studies a select number of key economic policy decisions made during the Labor governments of Hawke and Keating. It will argue that the economic liberalisation carried out during the Labor government reflected the influence of a range of individuals and institutions, depending on the economic decision in question, while a variety of domestic and internationally based institutions and individuals contributed ideas to economic policy-making. It will reject Pusey's (1991) belief that the central agencies (ie Treasury, the Department of Finance and the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet) were necessarily the major influence in economic policy and show that other individuals and institutions, including cabinet and particular ministers, ministerial offices, the ACTU and other government departments, were also important. It will discuss further how economic policy is made in Australia.     

Making the Harder Yards: Environmental Policy Integration in Australia

Solutions to environmental problems such as climate change, biodiversity loss, and land and water resource degradation require long term integration of economic, social and environmental policies. This poses challenges to specialised, hierarchical public administration systems. The study reported here examined strategies, structures and processes to enable environmental policy integration in six Australian states and territories, and some federal arrangements. The study found that the most prominent success factors, barriers and gaps that affect environmental policy integration relate to leadership, long term embedding of environmental policy integration and implementation capacity. Factors deserving further research and policy attention include leadership, cultural change and capacity building; embedding sustainability in structures and processes; development of a long term evidence based approach; strengthening decentralised implementation arrangements; and evaluation of policy integration initiatives.     

Breaking the Boundary: Pro-poor Policies and Electoral Outcomes in Brazilian Sub-national Governments

The article explores the role of state-led and of centre-led pro-poor policies in the electoral shift of state elections in the state of Bahia, in Brazil's Northeast. It analyses a pro-poor policy sponsored by a traditional party which has ruled the state for several decades during both the military and the democratic regimes. The article investigates the causes of the party's defeat in 2006 and its replacement by a non-traditional party. The argument is that the defeat of the traditional party and the victory of a non-traditional one can be explained as the result of the state's main pro-poor policy that has always created dependency between voters and sub-national politicians. Centre-led pro-poor policies introduced in the late 1990s, in contrast, have universal or clear targets, eliminating the intermediation of sub-national political brokers.     

Havel versus Klaus: Public Policy Making in the Czech Republic

In Central and Eastern Europe, we can observe and analyze an ongoing social experiment euphemized as the process of the transformation of totalitarian countries with centrally planned economies into democratic countries with market economies. This article offers an analysis of what has been happening in the Czech Republic in this regard. Attention is given to the impact of political philosophies (those represented by names of Václav Havel and Václav Klaus) upon legal and institutional changes. Key terms for better understanding of these processes are the free market, civil society, civic sector, and participation of citizens in public affairs. Channels, developmental threats, and opportunities for public policy formation and implementation are studied as well.     

Economic Globalization and Policy Choices: Singapore

This article analyzes the effects of economic globalization on public policy in Singapore, which has the worlds most globalized economy. It finds that contrary to the assumption of muck of the literature on the subject, it is the state, rather than systemic imperatives, that has played the most decisive role in shaping the form and scope of the economy's globalization. Its examination of the effects of globalization on policy choices in three broad areas—economic development, national security, and social development—in Singapore shows that globalization has not only constrained policy choices, but expanded them as well. The case study suggests that we need to ascribe greater centrality to the agency of the state in the globalization process and develop a more nuanced conception of the opportunities it affords and the constraints it imposes.     

试论公安政策制定的法治化

公安政策作为调整社会公共安全关系的手段,其背后蕴藏的是社会公安价值的分配,继而意味着对社会组织及公民的安全利益分配。其制定过程必然要求多方参与、科学民主。而要保障其政策目的的实现就必须借助法的手段,实现公安政策制定的法治化。     

政策制定中的电子参与:质量、满意度和效率

电子参与的广泛应用,给提高政策质量与合法性带来了机遇,但也带来了不确定性和挑战。本文重点探讨以下几个关键问题:如何促进理性参与,提升电子参与的质量;如何对参与中浮现的各方利益加以协调,使参与者满意并实现各方利益的共赢;如何科学筹划与管理,降低政府信息处理成本和社会参与成本,提高电子参与效率。     

公共政策的合法性:基于制定程序的视角

公共政策的制定程序为政策主体设置了决策步骤与职业规范,为政策实体提供了技术支撑与制度保障。立足合法性的基本含义,程序的合法性首先体现为程序之于实体合法性的基础与保障功能。其次,合法性赋予公众价值主体与评判主体的地位,要求政策程序遵循科学性、民主性的价值标准,以实现公众的权利诉求。再次,政策的技术与制度程序在各自层面遵循科学性、民主性的标准,也对程序乃至实体的合法性产生积极影响。     

Nonpunctuated and Sweeping Policy Change: Bhutan Tobacco Policy Making from 1991 to 2009

This paper examines policy outputs associated with the 2004 Bhutan antitobacco law, including 2009 amendments, to determine if the law is congruent with punctuated equilibrium or social policy realism theories of policy change. There was no direct and sudden tobacco policy output change in Bhutan due to a shock to the policy system contrary to what punctuated equilibrium theory would predict. Rather, policy change was sweeping but nonpunctuated. This paper reconfirms prior findings of social policy realism theory that various and complex policy output patterns occur due to a mixture of contingent and complex factors. Under social policy realism, a complex interplay of factors drive policy with the state, corporate actors, and interest groups, and the market often playing a primary role. These complex policy outputs have a direct impact on society and the natural environment reflected in government policy output actions or inactions.     

Civic Engagement and Public Policy Making in America

Larry N. Gerston, Public Policymaking in a Democratic Society: A Guide to Civic Engagement
Thomas A. Birkland, An Introduction to the Policy Process: Theories, Concepts, and Models of Public Policy Making
Mark E. Rushefsky, Public Policy in the United States: At the Dawn of the Twenty-First Century     

Decentralization and Fiscal Discipline in Sub-national Governments: Evidence from the Swiss Federal System

This article analyses the relationship between decentralizationand the extent of fiscal discipline in the Swiss cantons between1984 and 2000. From a theoretical point of view, decentralizationand federalism can be associated with both an expansive anda dampening effect on government debt. On the one hand, decentralizedstructures have been argued to lead to a reduction of debt dueto inherent competition between the member states and the multitudeof veto positions which restrict public intervention. On theother hand, decentralization has been claimed to contributeto an increase of public debt as it involves expensive functionaland organizational duplications as well as cost-intensive, oftendebt-financed, compromise solutions between a large number ofactors that operate in an uncoordinated and contradictory way.Our empirical results show that in periods of prosperous economicdevelopment, the architecture of state structure has no impacton debt. However, the degree of decentralization influencesdebt in economically poor times: In phases of economic recession,administratively decentralized cantons implement a more economicalbudgetary policy than centralized Swiss member states.     

Strategy and Partnership in Local Economic Development: A Case Study in Local Economic Strategy Making

The development of a strategic response to local economic change has been of crucial importance to local authorities in the U.K. throughout the 1980s. This paper investigates the processes of strategy formulation and implementation in the city of Norwich. It raises a range of issues with regard to the potential effects of cooperation between the public and private sectors at the strategic level. The adoption of economic development as a strategic policy area has brought into question a number of relationships both within and between local public authorities, and is of fundamental importance to the character of public/private relations.