Income changes do not influence political involvement in panel data from six countries

The income gradient in political participation is a widely accepted stylized fact. Based on nine panel datasets from six countries, this research note asks whether income changes trigger short-term effects on political involvement. Irrespective of indicator, specification, and method (hybrid random effects models, fixed effects models with lags and leads, and error correction models), there are few significant short-term effects of income changes. In conjunction with earlier research, this finding suggests that the income gradient in political participation is likely to reflect stable differences between rich and poor voters emerging early in the life course.     

THE EFFECTIVENESS OF RELATIONAL CONTRACTING IN A TEMPORARY PUBLIC ORGANIZATION: INTENSIVE COLLABORATION BETWEEN AN ENGLISH LOCAL AUTHORITY AND PRIVATE CONTRACTORS

This article evaluates the factors that shaped the effectiveness of three strategic contracts pursued with private firms by a local authority in the English West Midlands. The contracts generated highly political outputs that supported the council’s defence of the core interests of local residents. The analysis explores the form taken by the contracts; the mechanisms that delivered and integrated them; and the wider structural factors that helped to secure apparently benign contractual outputs. The evaluative yardsticks used to support the analysis were: relationality; flexibility; and performativity. The article argues that relationality is crucial in determining quality in temporary, project‐based organizations. Relationality yields flexibility and effective performance, based on mutual regard and loyalty. The case study highlights the need to explore perceptual gaps between the parties; the importance of the time‐path of relationality; the significance of ‘value residuals’ in incentivizing substantive loyalty; and the potential contribution of zones of flexibility to performance.     

Music Education Advances Through Sino-Foreign Exchanges

MUSIC education in China and the West may differ in approach, but when combined are complementary in outcome.     

DOES PUBLIC ACCOUNTABILITY WORK? AN ASSESSMENT TOOL

In recent years, there has been a drive to strengthen existing public accountability arrangements and to design new ones. This prompts the question whether accountability arrangements actually work. In the existing literature, both accountability ‘deficits’ and ‘overloads’ are alleged to exist. However, owing to the lack of a cogent yardstick, the debate tends to be impressionistic and event‐driven. In this article we develop an instrument for systematically assessing public accountability arrangements, drawing on three different normative perspectives. In the democratic perspective, accountability arrangements should effectively link government actions to the ‘democratic chain of delegation’. In the constitutional perspective, it is essential that accountability arrangements prevent or uncover abuses of public authority. In the learning perspective, accountability is a tool to make governments effective in delivering on their promises. We demonstrate the use of our multicriteria assessment tool in an analysis of a new accountability arrangement: the boards of oversight of agencies.