How responsible is 'responsive' government?

The work of John Rohr focuses primarily upon the constitutional dimension of the work of public servants, most particularly, but not exclusively, career civil servants employed in central government. In stressing public service ethics as a form of constitutional practice Rohr's aim is to help reinforce the legitimate role of career public servants in government and to remind practising public bureaucrats (and academics and politicians) of the nobility of the 'administrative vocation' of state service, a somewhat daunting task in today's political climate. In this article I examine Rohr's work to see what ethical light it might throw upon recent and ongoing political attempts to make the British public administration more 'responsive'. I do so, first, by outlining the main themes of Rohr's work and their location within the US constitutional tradition. I then proceed to discuss the extent to which they translate into other constitutional contexts. Finally, I attempt to put Rohr's work to use in discussing aspects of civil service reform in Britain under recent Conservative administrations and that of the present New Labour government.     

Radical Protestantism and doux commerce: the trials and tribulations of Nantucket's Quaker whaling community

Abstract

This paper discusses the complex relationship between morals and markets and uses the case of Nantucket as an illustration. I argue that it was a specific Protestant work ethic promoted by Quakerism that facilitated the rise of Nantucket to become the capital of the American whaling fleet for more than a century. However, I also argue that the same morals and values that helped to give birth to the Quaker whaling empire contributed significantly to the downfall of the Quaker community, decades before whaling in general got into crisis. In more general terms this paper attempts to be a historical case study that illustrates the complexities of Albert O. Hirschman's doux commerce argument and particularly the way the Protestant spirit fits into Hirschman's explanation.     

‘Flexicurity’ as a policy strategy: the implications for gender equality

Abstract

The ‘flexicurity’ strategy reached the top of the European Union's policy agenda in the mid-2000s. The strategy assumes an adult worker model family and aims to promote better, as well as more, jobs and to ensure that policies should further both flexibility in the labour market and security for workers. The article explores, first, the meaning of internal and external flexibility, and of employment-based security and the different implications for men and women. While the policy documents assume that flexicurity will increase gender equality, the mechanisms have not been specified. In fact, as the article shows, women are often more ‘flexible’ workers than men, particularly regarding their contractual arrangements and hours of employment. However, they tend not to be economically autonomous and, we argue, the supply-side policies advocated on the security side of the flexicurity matrix are insufficient to improve their position, which is strongly related to the gendered divisions of paid and unpaid work.     

The Cultural Logic of Work: Explaining Labour Deployment and Piece-Rate Contracts in Matar Taluka,Gujarat - Parts 1 and 2

This two-part essay seeks to explain why group-based and individual piecework arrangements have become the modal form of payment for a variety of agricultural tasks in central Gujarat, India. Part 1 of the essay reviews New Institutional Economics (NIE) and Marxist Political Economy (MPE) approaches to the labour process, and claims that while the 'efficiency' and 'disciplinary' considerations emphasized by NIE and MPE in their explanations of contractual change are important influences on the labour process, specific institutional outcomes depend heavily on the cultural realities of actors' practices. Part 2 challenges the epistemological assumptions of NIE and MPE narratives, specifically that agents with stable identities perform actions with fixed meanings. Instead, the recent surge in piecework employment must be viewed as part of an ongoing tussle between the dominant Lewa Patel caste and the subordinate Baraiya/Koli caste to alter their relative standings in the social order. Their unceasing attempts to reinvent their group identities have involved shifting understandings of 'work' - with direct implications for labour contracts. As a corrective to NIE and MPE, the essay proposes a semiotic approach to the labour process that bundles the notions of 'social regulation' and 'self-regulation' into the concept of 'work governmentality'.     

The Relationship Between State Government Performance and State Quality of Life

Abstract

This article examines the relationship between government performance and quality of life in the American states. We contend that the management capacity of state governments should have direct, tangible impacts on the overall social and economic well‐being of state citizenry. In order to test this idea, we examine the influence of state management capacity (using the 1999 Government Performance Project grades), alongside other economic and political variables, on two prominent measures of state quality of life—The Morgan Quitno “Most Livable State” Index and State Policy Reports' (SPP) “Camelot Index.” We find that both state economic conditions and governmental policy priorities have significant impacts on state performance levels. But, our results clearly indicate that the management capacity of state governments also contributes directly to improving the overall quality of life for state citizens.     

Everyday Fixers as Local Heroes: A Case Study of Vital Interaction in Urban Governance

This article exemplifies the importance of viable coalitions in processes of neighbourhood development and local governance. Elaborating on the notion of the ‘everyday maker’, discovered in Danish local politics by Bang and Sörensen, this article further explores the characteristics and conditions of organising capacity, using the case of the Neighbourhood Development Corporation in the Dutch city of The Hague as a paradigmatic case. This case shows that individual actors, ‘everyday fixers’ or ‘local heroes’, can make a real difference in local politics if they are well connected to a supportive structure and if they are sensitive to the logic of the situation at hand. Context matters, sometimes impedes, but smart individuals can also make it work.     

Water Privatization in Spain

Abstract

Water management in Spain is submitted to a non‐uniform geographical and seasonal distribution of water resources. The non‐uniform distribution of resources is worsened by the non‐uniform allocation of demand (mainly irrigation and urban). Because that, water supply, aquifers, and wetlands are driven to a high risk. Even though, there are examples of good water management, as is shown for the private industrial productivity of used water. Spain has a very long tradition in public water management (first water law in 1879) at different levels from ministry to municipalities, including users communities. A lot of these organisations are anchored in very old ways of doing, given private sector the opportunity to enter and grow up. A survey about it is presented. In the management of urban water, there are different organisations involved: central administration; autonomic, regional and metropolitan authorities; urban water suppliers and the sanitation authority. The recently approved changes in the former Spanish Water Law, limiting water rights and introducing water market, the new and expected Hydrological National Plan and the European Framework Directive, reinforce the opportunities of the private sector to enter, giving financial resources, technological advances and quick answers to new social concepts in water managerial procedures. We can observe how the Spanish administration uses private water suppliers' front desks to collect taxes and to supply capital to invest in infrastructures and water technology. The question that needs to be addressed is the nature and the impact of the privatisation process in Spain. The unrealistic water urban services price in Spain has been studied and it is presented and evaluated by regions, presenting a deficit to be covered in the future and been a significant gross value of the future business, which invite private sector to participate in. To give a general scope over the evolution of the roll played by the private and public sector, the case of Catalonia, the more evolved autonomous region of Spain in water management, is presented as an example of the future for the rest of the country.     

Managing the Public Sector in Hong Kong: Trends and Adjustments

Public sector management in Hong Kong was initially designed to rule the territory as a British colony. A number of changes took place in the last quarter century before Hong Kong's reintegration with China and the nature of public sector management has transformed over this period. An overview of administrative principles and practices and an analysis of changes reveal trends that were influenced by both local and international factors. The framework of traditional public administration in the territory adapted effectively to embrace the principles of new public management without much difficulty. The global economic crisis compelled the government to revise its strategies to expand public spending and adopt a further reduced role in the provision of public services. New social, economic and political challenges are driving Hong Kong to adjust to the changing circumstances and trends, and four noticeable shifts can be identified. They include shifts from an administrative to a political executive, from job cuts to job creation, from financial restraint to increased spending, and from public to private sector provision of public services. The trends are driven by local and international forces as well as the progress of democratization and political awareness in Hong Kong.     

Armenian Refugees and Displaced Persons and the Birth of Armenian Social Work

Abstract

This article explores the historical and recent patterns of Armenian emigration and immigration and the impact that the population shifts have had and are having. The interconnections between peoples' homeland and new land and the intersection among institutions in the homeland and new land are illustrated. The development of social work as a profession along with a variety of non-governmental organizations in Armenia developed through a unique collaboration between a school of social work in the United States and the major university in Armenia is discussed and illustrated.     

Strengthening the Link

Abstract

Through exploration of definitional issues and current migration realities, this article discusses ways in which emphasis on the international dimensions of social work with immigrants and refugees offers opportunities to improve practice and to enhance the relevance of international social work to the profession. The international character of present day migration is illustrated through discussion of the transnational family and the economic and other relationships that tie immigrants to their countries of origin. The paper concludes with recommendations for increased cross-national professional collaboration.