Bridging the donor-decentralization gap: Rethinking incentives and institutional impacts in control-oriented bureaucracies

Some important studies suggest that the organizational imperatives of donor agencies explain the tendency of foreign aid to reinforce institutional centralization rather than to support the development of decentralized institutions in recipient countries. This article shows that certain design features of two decentralized USAID projects completed in Peru during the 1980s facilitated achieving donor objectives, decentralized institutional development, and national-level reforms favoring decentralization. Analysis of this experience reveals that these design features reduced the costs and increased the benefits of decentralized implementation for the donor, while allowing synergies between implementation and institution building to be exploited. Indeed, in the context of Peru’s highly centralized, control-oriented public sector, bypass mechanisms traditionally used by donors to expedite implementation and insulate projects from uncertainty also generally enhanced the development of decentralized institutions. The lessons distilled in this case study have broad relevance since the sorts of administrative obstacles encountered by USAID in Peru—excessive centralization, disbursement bottlenecks, and onerous bureaucratic controls—are all too frequently found in other developing countries. Gregory D. Schmidt is an associate professor of political science at Northern Illinois University and an associate ofSeguimiento, Análisis y Evaluación Para el Desarrollo (SASE), a Peruvian nongovernmental organization specializing in grassroots development. He is the author of a book and various journal articles on development issues, and of a forthcoming book on the 1990 Peruvian presidential election.     

Conducting Research on Counties in the 21st Century: A New Agenda and Database Considerations

Given local, regional, national, and global events of the last few years and the ever-increasing service roles and expectations of county governments, American counties warrant greater scholarly attention. To guide researchers, the research agenda published in this journal 15 years ago has been refined and expanded. This 11-point agenda includes fiscal capacity and responsibility; the role of structure, politics, and political participation; intergovernmental relations and networking; professionalism; service delivery; environmental issues; population changes; managing conflict and promoting integration; terrorism and security; information technology; and economic development. In addition, five database concerns and needs that pose significant challenges to researchers are identified and presented for consideration.     

The "Race Card" Revisited: Assessing Racial Priming in Policy Contests

In The Race Card (2001), Mendelberg finds support for her theory that implicit racial appeals, but not explicit ones, prime racial resentment in opinion formation. She argues that citizens reject explicit appeals, rendering them ineffective, because they violate widespread egalitarian norms. Mendelberg's innovative research, however, suffers from several limitations. We remedy these deficiencies using two randomized experiments with over 6,300 respondents. We confirm that individuals do tend to reject explicit appeals outright, but find that implicit appeals are no more effective than explicit ones in priming racial resentment in opinion formation. In accounting for the differences between previous research and our own, we show that education moderates both the accessibility of racial predispositions and message acceptance. This suggests that the necessary assumptions of Mendelberg's theory hold only for different and exclusive subsets of the general population.     

Medium‐Chain Acyl‐CoA Dehydrogenase Deficiency in Adulthood: A Potential Diagnosis in a Patient with Mental Status Changes Suspected of Drug Toxicity

Medium‐chain acyl‐CoA dehydrogenase (MCAD) deficiency is a rare but important component of the differential diagnosis for adults with a history of premortem mental status changes and the postmortem finding of hepatic steatosis. This case report describes a 30‐year‐old white man who, following a period of nausea and vomiting, was admitted to the hospital with sudden mental status deterioration followed rapidly by clinical deterioration and death. Treating physicians in this case suspected acute illicit drug toxicity with synthetic cathinones based on social history. Clinicians and medical examiners should be aware that the presentation, signs, and symptoms described may indicate an underlying inborn error of metabolism such as MCAD deficiency and take action accordingly.     

The county perspective on intergovernmental relations and government capacity

This analysis examines the issues of state and federal responsiveness and state and local government capacity from the perspective of county officials. Using data from a national survey of county administrators, elected executives, and commission chairpersons, the study finds that county officials are: (1) very confident of their own capacities to respond to local problems, but not as confident of local fiscal capacities; (2) very concerned about the responsiveness of state governments, particularly state legislatures, to local needs; and (3) not confident of the responsiveness of federal government to local needs either, but desirous of federal fiscal support. The assessments of state responsiveness appear related to state efforts to expand the policy making, taxing, and borrowing authority of their county governments.     

Pay-for-performance in local governments: the views of personnel directors

This article provides new information about the use of pay-for-performance in local governments by presenting findings from a national survey of personnel directors in municipalities and counties. The findings show that most respondents view pay-for- performance as a useful tool, even though it is only used in a minority of local governments. An in-depth analysis of 40 possible benefits and problems showed that PFP benefits are relatively undefined and that users do experience some potentially serious problems, though these problems appear less serious than the existing literature would predict.