Promoting the Utilization of Performance Measures in Public Organizations: An Empirical Study of Factors Affecting Adoption and Implementation

Despite its appeal for improving government, many state and local governments have not developed performance-measurement systems, and even fewer use these systems to improve decision making. This study examines the factors that affect the utilization of performance measurement, based on the results of a national survey of state and local government officials. The goals of the study were to provide better information on the patterns of usage of performance measurement and to use this information to develop an elaborated model of the factors presumed to affect utilization. Using distinctions from the policy and evaluation literature, hypotheses were tested and confirmed: Policy adoption is driven more heavily by factors from rational and technocratic theory, whereas actual implementation is influenced by factors addressed by political and cultural considerations.     

Civil society perspectives on EU–ASIA free trade agreements

This paper focuses on the positions taken by civil society organisations that actively campaign on trade policies. Trade campaigners oppose the neo-liberal approach to trade and development and advocate a much more gradual and prudent approach to trade liberalisation. They stress that trade liberalisation will only lead to sustainable development if it respects environmental and social concerns, including the gender dimension of trade; if trade liberalisation is properly owned, prepared and sequenced; adapted to the institutional and economic needs and capacities of the countries and people involved, and accompanied by all necessary flanking measures. Trade campaigners stress the need to maintain policy space and the necessary governance instruments to react to changing circumstances and address social and environmental concerns. They denounce the lack of information, consultation and participation provided by governments in trade policy formulation and negotiations and they campaign to raise awareness and create more room for debate and participation. This article builds on a paper presented on 19-20 June 2008 at an UNU-CRIS Work Shop in Bruges on “Deep Integration and North-South Free Trade Agreements. EU Strategy for a Global Economy”.

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The role of ECB communication in guiding markets

Public Choice - Economists and central bankers nowadays believe that forward guidance has become more important in a world in which key interest rates have hit their effective lower bounds (ELB)....     

Automated processing of forensic casework samples using robotic workstations equipped with nondisposable tips: contamination prevention

An automated process has been developed for the analysis of forensic casework samples using TECAN Genesis RSP 150/8 or Freedom EVO liquid handling workstations equipped exclusively with nondisposable tips. Robot tip cleaning routines have been incorporated strategically within the DNA extraction process as well as at the end of each session. Alternative options were examined for cleaning the tips and different strategies were employed to verify cross-contamination. A 2% sodium hypochlorite wash (1/5th dilution of the 10.8% commercial bleach stock) proved to be the best overall approach for preventing cross-contamination of samples processed using our automated protocol. The bleach wash steps do not adversely impact the short tandem repeat (STR) profiles developed from DNA extracted robotically and allow for major cost savings through the implementation of fixed tips. We have demonstrated that robotic workstations equipped with fixed pipette tips can be used with confidence with properly designed tip washing routines to process casework samples using an adapted magnetic bead extraction protocol.     

The concept of forensic emergency medicine as illustrated by an unusual complication of pulmonary artery catheterization

Forensic pathologists are regularly confronted with emergency and invasive medical procedures performed on critically ill or traumatized patients. Basic knowledge of such procedures and their possible complications is therefore mandatory in medico-legal practice. In this article, we describe a very unusual complication of pulmonary artery catheterization: through-and-through perforation of the carotid artery, initially without hemodynamic consequence. Death resulted from an aggravation of the preexisting cerebral edema (secondary to a craniocerebral trauma). The misplacement of the pulmonary artery catheter was clinically missed because the guidewire was initially deflected on the cervical spine towards the subclavian vein where the catheter--by chance--entered the circulatory system and followed its normal route further. The forensic importance of leaving all invasive medical devices in situ on a deceased person when a medico-legal autopsy is to be expected and the mutual interaction between emergency and forensic medicine (forensic emergency medicine) are discussed.     

Why are the French so different from the Germans? Underpricing of IPOs on the Euro New Markets

We study the underpricing of firms listed on the two largest EuroNM stock exchanges, the Neuer Markt of Germany and the Nouveau Marché of France. We find that the high underpricing in these two markets – contrary to the evidence on the US – is not driven by insiders’ selling behaviour. However, the large underpricing is caused by the high degree of riskiness of the issuing firms and by the partial adjustment phenomenon of offer prices to compensate institutional investors for the truthful revelation of their demand for the shares. For France, lock-up agreements act as substitutes to underpricing, but not so for Germany. We also explore the reasons for the large difference in underpricing between the German and the French IPOs: German firms are more underpriced because they are riskier, have larger price revisions, have less stringent VC lock-up contracts, and go public mostly during the hot issue period when the general level of underpricing in all IPO markets is substantially higher.     

Gaining new insights by going local: determinants of coalition formation in mixed democratic polities

We develop a simple spatial model suggesting that Members of Parliament strive for the inclusion of the head of state’s party in coalitions formed in mixed democratic polities, and that parliamentary parties try to assemble coalitions that minimize the ideological distance to the head of state. We identify the German local level of government as functionally equivalent to a parliamentary setting, such that the directly elected mayor has competencies similar to a president in a mixed national polity. Our findings show that the party affiliation of the head of state is a key factor considered by party members in the legislature when forming coalitions: coalitions in the legislature are more likely to form if they include the party of the head of the executive branch. Furthermore, the policy preferences of the head of the executive branch matter for the legislators’ behavior in the coalition formation process: the smaller the ideological distance between the position of a coalition and the position of the head of state, the more likely a coalition is to be formed.     

Local Fiscal Distress: Measurement and Prediction

During and after the Great Recession, many local governments were compelled to declare fiscal emergencies, lay off workers, and cut services while others weathered the recession without needing to take such actions. In this paper, we construct an action‐based measure of fiscal distress using comprehensive annual financial reports, budgets, and media coverage and then use it as a dependent variable to model fiscal distress as a function of past financial performance and socio‐economic environment. The empirical models show the relative importance of fiscal reserves, debt, and revenue composition in predicting local fiscal distress.     

Great expectations: the effect of democratic ideals on political trust in European democracies

While in the older literature, low levels of political trust were routinely interpreted as a lack of support for democracy, more recently authors have claimed that the value pattern of critical citizens is a hallmark for a mature and stable democratic system. In this paper we assess the empirical validity of this claim, by relying on the relative deprivation literature highlighting the relation between expectation and frustration. The 2012 wave of the European Social Survey included an extensive battery measuring democratic ideals, and using latent class analysis we identify a group with high ideals on how a democracy should function. Multilevel regression analysis shows that strong democratic ideals are associated with lower levels of political trust, and most strongly so in countries with low quality of government. We close with observations on how rising democratic ideals could be a cause for the occurrence of a new group of ‘critical citizens’.