Threats, institutions and regulation in common pool resources

Can bureaucracies respond to threats marked by both potentially high costs and fundamental uncertainty? Standard guidelines such as maximizing expected value to the society over a period of time may be ineffective; yet, state action is often most demanded for such situations. I argue that the precautionary principle of reserved rationality helps explain the ability of bureaucracies to choose appropriate actions under uncertainty. Such bureaucracies are empowered when there is sufficient informal institutional support for their expertise and the bureaucracy has the discretion to take necessary precautions. I draw historical information from the case of Singapore's regulation of the formerly common pool resource of water catchment areas. This case reveals decision making when it is not clear that the expected-value criterion would support action, as well as the importance of political and institutional support for such action.     

Interministerielle Netzwerke: Formale und informelle Koordinationsstrukturen bei der Vorbereitung der deutschen Verhandlungspositionen zur Regierungskonferenz 1996

How do German ministries manage the preparation of national negotiation positions for EU intergovernmental conference? After a survey of the debate on organizational deficits of the interministerial coordination in Germany, we are consulting decision- and organization-theoretic approaches in IR. Drawing on organizational economics we concretise and supplement these older frameworks. We conceive the management of a governmental organization as a specific aggregation of heterogeneous preferences and information. Applying social network analysis we take into account formal as well as informal aspects of coordination channels. The objective of this article is to make visible the complex structures and processes that constitute foreign policy making, and to provide a preliminary assessment of its efficiency.     

Über die Notwendigkeit und Bestimmung liberaler Bürgertugenden

Numerous sociological studies describe the status of contemporary liberal democracy as frightening. Taking up these investigations, this article asks for the pre-conditions of liberal democracy, particularly for their moral foundations. In contrast to the classic political theory of liberalism, these moral foundations are not assumed to be locked in the institutional order of the state, but in a certain morality of the citizens. The first target of the investigation is to proof that a moral quality of the citizens is a necessary prerequisite for the persistence of a liberal democracy. The second aim of the work is to show how these moral orientations (liberal virtues) should be shaped within each citizen. This is clarified by discussing three liberal thinkers (Charles Larmore, John Rawls, and Ralf Dahrendorf). The so distilled central liberal virtue is formulated as follows: The political convictions of the citizens must be justifiable for everybody, i.e. also to citizens with a different world view. Political convictions and values, which are expressed during the political process and which influence the voting-behaviour, should therefore not rely exclusively on one’s own set of moral values. The work closes with a discussion of the implications of this normative claim.     

Playing with Fire: The Civil Liberties Implications of September 11th

The aftermath of September 11th has seen a worrisome rise in invasive surveillance measures. Both adopted by statute and initiated by agencies, these provisions provide unprecedented powers for government agents to investigate suspects and search individuals, whether they are directly involved in terrorism or not. The prevailing wisdom has been that the American people will accept these restrictions as the natural cost of heightened security, and initial evidence suggests the public has been willing to tolerate greater limits on civil liberties. However, over time such support will erode, leaving in place permanent restrictions on civil liberties that not only will concern Americans, but also may turn them against government officials and civic participation. Thus, contrary to many interpretations of September 11th, this article argues that the policy response has only sown the seeds for greater detachment from and dissatisfaction with government as the public becomes increasingly separated from the workings and operations of public policy.     

Agency, Structure and Causality in Political Science: A Comment on Sibeon

Researchers in political science are devoting increasing attention to the ontological commitments of their theories – that is, to what those theories presuppose about the nature of the political world. This article focuses on a recent contribution to this 'ontological turn' in political science ( Sibeon, 1999 ). Tensions are identified in Sibeon's account of the causal interplay between agency and social structure. It is argued that these tensions can be resolved by reflecting explicitly on ontological issues, in particular the causal efficacy of social structure, using a particular approach to the philosophy of the social sciences known as critical realism. The value of such reflection for the explanatory power of political analysis is highlighted.     

The State of American Federalism, 2001-2002: Resilience in Response to Crisis

The past year has been one of repeated shocks to governmentand the larger society. Terrorist attacks in New York City andWashington, D. C., the burst of the dot.com bubble in the stockmarket, a wave of corporate scandals, and a slowdown in theeconomy posed severe problems for officials of all governmentsin the federal system. The combined effects of the war on terrorismand the economic turmoil forced federal policymakers to createnew agencies and to enact new policies. State and local governmentsalso responded to the multiple shocks with a variety of initiatives,often independent of Washington. Instead of a move toward centralizationthat might have been predicted as a consequence of the seriousshocks, all elements of the American federal system demonstrateda capacity and energy to marshal resources in a time of urgency.     

Who Wants to Work for the Government?

In an era when everyone wants to be a millionaire, governments struggle to attract and retain highly qualified employees, making it more important than ever to understand what attracts people to the public service. Using contingency table analysis and logistic regression on the 1989 and 1998 General Social Surveys, we explore how individuals' demographic characteristics and the importance they place on various job qualities influence their preference for and employment in the public sector. Job security may still be the strongest attraction of government jobs, but high income and the opportunity to be useful to society also attract some Americans to the public service. Minorities, veterans, Democrats, and older Americans preferred public-sector jobs more than whites, nonveterans, Republicans, and younger Americans, who were otherwise similar. Women and college graduates were more likely than comparable men and less-educated respondents to have government jobs, but no more likely to prefer them. Overall, desire for government jobs declined markedly between 1989 and 1998.     

Introduction — Building Local Government

In this and the last issue, the Australian Journal of Public Administration has profiled issues of current importance to Australian local/regional government. Contributors to Building Local Government looked at organisational change, performance measurement, leadership and social–capital–building roles in local government. Future of Regionalism now focuses on local and subnational government generally, in the financial, administrative and constitutional context. A major trigger for this focus is the present inquiry of the Commonwealth House of Representatives Standing Committee on Economics, Finance and Public Administration into the financial position of local government.