政府环境治理工作的公众评价：央地差距与结构性制约

近年来,随着环境问题日益受到社会各界的重视,政府在环境治理工作中的表现正成为公众关注的重点。但是,我们对于目前我国政府环境治理工作公众评价的基本情况和影响因素还知之甚少。基于对中国综合社会调查2013年（CGSS2013）数据的分析,我们发现,我国公众对于中央政府环境治理工作的评价显著高于地方政府,包括受教育程度、收入水平、社会经济地位感知、政治身份、城乡差距和地区差距在内的结构性因素制约着公众对于政府环境治理工作的评价。在对研究发现进行深入讨论的基础上,进一步提炼了研究发现在政策意义上的启示。     

EU Cohesion Policy Implementation and Administrative Capacities: Insights from Italian Regions

In this article we explain Italy’s partial persisting difficulties in EU cohesion policy implementation by focusing on one specific variable: regional administrative capacity. In line with research findings based on the national level (Tosun, 2014 Tosun, J. (2014), Absorption of regional funds. A comparative analysis, Journal of Common Market Studies, Vol.52, No.2, pp.371–387. doi: 10.1111/jcms.12088[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), our working hypothesis is that administrative capacity is the most important explanatory factor of EU cohesion policy implementation also at the regional level. In the article, by adopting a ‘most similar research cases’ design approach, we test the hypothesis with reference to two Italian regions: Campania and Puglia. In addition, we seek to adequately define the concept of ‘administrative capacity’ and operationalize it properly. In the concluding section, we consider the competitive advantage of our definition and operationalization of the notion of administrative capacity also with reference to other policy sectors beyond cohesion policy.     

Liberal equality: political not erinaceous

Ronald Dworkin’s Justice for Hedgehogs defends liberal political morality on the basis of a rich account of dignity as constitutive of living well. This article raises the Rawlsian concern that making political morality dependent on ethics threatens citizens’ political autonomy. Thereafter, it addresses whether the abandonment of (erinaceous) ethical foundations signals the demise of Dworkin’s liberalism and explores the possibility of laundering his conception so as to facilitate a marriage between the political philosophies of Rawls and Dworkin. The article finishes by rebutting some objections Dworkin raises against Rawls’s account of public reason.     

Good governance and differentiated integration: Graded membership in the European Union

The study of European integration has traditionally focused on organisational growth: the deepening and widening of the European Union (EU). By contrast, this article analyses organisational differentiation, a process in which states refuse, or are being refused, full integration but find value in establishing in‐between grades of membership. It describes how the EU's system of graded membership has developed, and it explains the positioning of states in this system. The core countries of the EU set a standard of ‘good governance’. The closer European countries are to this standard, the closer their membership grade is to the core. Some countries fall short of this standard and are refused further integration by the core: their membership grade increases with better governance. Other countries refuse further integration because they outperform the standards of the core countries: their membership grade decreases as governance improves. These conjectures are corroborated in a panel analysis of European countries.     

The Impact of Funding Modalities on the Performance of Indigenous Organisations

Governments’ choice of funding modality can produce powerful incentives for organisations to perform in preferred ways, but it can also divert limited resources, narrow accountability, and undermine capability. Through literature review and interviews, the research explored the international literature on public finance management in developing country contexts, and compared this to case studies of Indigenous organisations. The situation in Australia was found to differ in three ways: (1) performance indicators are imposed, rather than negotiated; (2) few existing public funding modalities reward performance or provide incentives; and (3) funding arrangements do not generally require receiving organisations to be accountable to their constituents. Stability and durability of funding modalities, and clarity in functions and jurisdictional boundaries, were also found to positively influence performance. Further research is required to design new performance frameworks that build around the organisation, rather than the grant, with indicators of governance capability and downward accountability to constituents.     

Institutional Change Through Policy Learning: The Case of the European Commission and Research Policy

Research initiatives to enhance knowledge‐based societies demand regionally coordinated policy approaches. By analyzing the case of the European Commission, Directorate‐General Research and Innovation, this study focuses on examining the cognitive mechanisms that form the foundation for institutional transformations and result in leadership positions in regional governance. Drawing on policy learning theories, the study emphasizes specific mechanisms of institutional change that are often less noticeable but can gradually lead to mobilizing diverse groups of stakeholders. Through historical and empirical data, this study shows the importance of policy learning through communication processes, Open Method of Coordination initiatives, and issue framing in creating a stronger foundation for policy coordination in European research policy since the 2000s.     

Dysfunctional state institutions,trust, and governance in areas of limited statehood

Areas of limited statehood where the state is absent or dysfunctional are rarely ungoverned or ungovernable spaces. The provision of rules and regulations, as well as of public goods and services – governance – does not necessarily depend on the existence of functioning state institutions. How can this be explained? To begin with, we identify functional equivalents to state institutions that fail to govern hierarchically. Moreover, we focus on informal institutions based on trust that are endogenous to areas of limited statehood. Personalized trust among community members enables actors to overcome collective action problems and enhances the legitimacy of governance actors. The main challenge in areas of limited statehood, which are often characterized by social heterogeneity and deep social and cultural cleavages (particularly in post‐conflict societies) is to move to generalized trust beyond the local level and to “imagined communities among strangers,” despite dysfunctional state institutions. We propose two mechanisms: First, the more group‐based identities are constructed in inclusive ways and the more group identities are cross‐cutting and overlapping, the more they lead to and maintain generalized trust. Second, experiences with fair and impartial institutions and governance practices – irrespective of whether state or non‐state – also lead to generalized trust beyond the local level and allow for the upscaling of governance.     

Achilles' heels of governance: Critical capacity deficits and their role in governance failures

This article assesses the usefulness of conceptions of policy capacity for understanding policy and governance outcomes. In order to shed light on this issue, it revisits the concept of governance, derives a model of basic governance types and discusses their capacity pre‐requisites. A model of capacity is developed combining competences over three levels of activities with analysis of resource capabilities at each level. This analysis is then applied to the common modes of governance. While each mode requires all types of capacity if it is to match its theoretically optimal potential, most on‐the‐ground modes do not attain their highest potential. Moreover, each mode has a critical type of capacity which serves as its principle vulnerability; its “Achilles' heel.” Without high levels of the requisite capacity, the governance mode is unlikely to perform as expected. While some hybrid modes can serve to supplement or reinforce each other and bridge capacity gaps, other mixed forms may aggravate single mode issues. Switching between modes or adopting hybrid modes is, therefore, a non‐trivial issue in which considerations of capacity issues in general and Achilles' heel capacities in particular should be a central concern.     

When experimentalist governance meets science‐based regulations; the case of food safety regulations

This paper examines a central regulatory mechanism that shapes food economies. Food safety regulations in the United States rely on a science‐based transnational regulatory system known as Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP), which bears central features of what Sabel and Zeitlin identified as experimentalist governance: a new form of regulation that is flexible, responsive, and involves stakeholders in iterative and direct democratic deliberation. The core theoretical question the paper examines is what the reliance on science means for the promise of an experimentalist policy regime to enable a new form of democratic politics. Based on a case study of the HACCP system implemented by the US Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service since the late 1990s, HACCP's reliance on food science has acted as an effective divider between producers who were able to take advantage of the system's flexibility and others for whom this was challenging. There is clear evidence that HACCP posed a disproportionate burden on small processors and that some of them were unable to adapt to the requirements of the regulatory system. In so far as the HACCP‐based food safety regulations delineated the kind of producer that thrived in the system and contributed to the demise of another set of producers, the regulatory system shaped market outcomes.     

Reign-seeking and the Rise of the Unelected in Thailand

ABSTRACT

This article develops the concept of “reign-seeking” to capture the unprecedented collective action of the Thai professional and official elite prior to the 2014 military coup and the establishment of a military regime. It argues that this phenomenon reflects broad and deep political dynamics, for which the dominant scholarship on authoritarianism and Thai politics cannot adequately explain. The changing incentives of these supposedly non-partisan actors are interwoven with neo-liberal governance reform driven by a desire for depoliticisation and the minimisation of rent-seeking. This idea has been rationalised in Thailand since the promulgation of the 1997 Constitution resulting in the rise of technocratic and judicial bodies designed to discipline elected politicians and political parties. However, such institutional reconfigurations have consolidated the incentive for people considering themselves to be prospective candidates to “reign” in these organisations. As evident in the 2014 coup, these unconventional political actors – academics, doctors and civil society leaders – made collective efforts to topple the elected government in exchange for gaining selection into the wide range of unelected bodies. Governance reform in Thailand has hitherto reinforced the status quo, although the article further argues that reign-seekers should be seen as contingent, rather than consistent, authoritarians.