Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Maayan Davidovitz Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. Do street-level bureaucrats exercise discretion to encourage clients’ political participation' If so, how, and in what way is it demonstrated' This study examines these questions empirically through 36 semi-structured in-depth interviews with LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer) teachers in Israel. Findings reveal that these street-level bureaucrats encourage clients to participate politically through strategies they adopt both inside and outside the work environment. In the classroom their lessons contain political content and expressions of political protest. Outside school they employ digital media to influence students. Clients’ political participation is manifested both jointly with street-level bureaucrats and independently of them. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-06-16T01:58:09Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767221108287
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Thomas Schillemans, Sjors Overman, Matthew Flinders, Per Laegreid, Martino Maggetti, Yannis Papadopoulos, Matthew Wood Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. This paper develops and applies the concept of accountability styles for analyzing and comparing accountability practices in different countries. This is relevant as there is considerable scholarship on public sector accountability but only very few comparative studies. Extant studies have shown that national styles of accountability are both marked by convergence as well as the resilience of national differences. The concept of accountability style is adopted to describe and interpret how and why accountability practices differ between administrative systems. It does so by analyzing practices of accountability of public sector agencies in four European democracies with different state traditions: the Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland and the UK. These countries vary with regards to state strength (interventionist propensity) and administrative concentration (high or low centralization). The analysis focuses on the accountability of arms’ length agencies which lends itself for comparisons across counties. The paper shows that the national political-administrative context crucially shapes practices of accountability and accountability regimes of agencies. The Norwegian accountability style is characterized as ‘centralized and convenient’. The UK-style is equally centralized yet not so convenient as it incurs high accountability-process costs on agencies. Switzerland is marked by limited hierarchical accountability. And the Dutch accountability style is comparatively ‘broad and informal’. State strength and administrative concentration explain some of the variance while historical legacies explain additional national variations. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-06-10T01:21:09Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767221098292
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Wiljan Hendrikx, Marlot Kuiper, Nicolette van Gestel Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. Based on an extensive literature review, this article explores the impact of strategic renewal in the public sector on the roles and skills of public professionals. Findings show that successive reforms of New Public Management and New Public Governance have resulted in hybrid role requirements that go beyond the often-debated dichotomy between professionalism and management. Based on our review, we could distinguish four sets of skills for professionals, linking traditional professional expertise to competences for networking and co-creation. Implications for future research are discussed. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-05-27T11:16:33Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767221094446
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Mats A Bergman, Annika Fredén Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. This article addresses the relation between the design of regulatory agencies and efficiency, arguing that authority concentrated to a single individual outperforms more collegial decision-making when the regulated firms’ interests are aligned. The tentative explanation is that concentrated leadership reduces the risk for capture. This argument is developed from an empirical case on the markets for mobile and fixed broadband. In the mobile market, the regulated firms are similarly positioned, whereas in the fixed broadband market, the firms typically have adversarial positions, with an incumbent being challenged by entrants. A statistical analysis of regulatory agencies in 33 European countries lends support to the argument that regulation of mobile broadband benefits from having a single decision-maker whereas a bureaucratic regulation with more collegiality functions as well for the fixed broadband. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-05-21T09:04:58Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767221093878
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Machiel van der Heijden Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. Although networked collaboration is often linked to positive outcomes, choosing suitable partners for collaboration can be difficult. Actors often only have limited information about the preferences, capabilities, and trustworthiness of prospective collaborators, meaning that considerable uncertainty may underlie collaborative choices. This article analyses the decision-making uncertainty associated with collaborative choices and assesses factors that potentially mitigate such uncertainty. Based on qualitative research, it presents a conceptual model that brings together and specifies mitigating factors at the network-, organizational, and individual-levels of analysis. The developed conceptual model provides a clearer theoretical understanding and presentation of the cross-level factors important to consider when studying collaborative behaviour. In addition, through its focus on uncertainty, it provides more consideration of the challenges that individual officials face when choosing collaborators in complex networked environments. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-04-27T04:27:34Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767221088269
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Åge Johnsen Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. A common criticism of strategic planning is that it is of little use when the environment is turbulent and the future is unpredictable. The last decade has witnessed great environmental turbulence and uncertainty in many conditions that are important for public policy and administration. This study analyses survey data from 144 public sector organisations in Norway in 2020 on how strategic planning has been designed and used over the past 4 years and how managers perceived the usefulness of the strategic planning. Most of the central as well as local government organizations prepared strategic plans in addition to mandatory plans and the managers perceived the net benefit of the strategic planning as positive, even under the turbulent environments of the recent years. A multivariate regression analysis showed that a prospector adaptation, stakeholder participation, use of management tools and ease of use of the strategic planning process had the greatest positive correlation with the perceived usefulness of strategic planning. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-04-25T03:25:40Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767221080668
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Erik-Jan van Dorp Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. In this article, I ask how senior civil servants (SCSs) practice functional politicisation. The literature suggests that they balance responsiveness with astuteness towards ministers, while maintaining neutral competence. However, functional politicisation is prone to affect this balance. Drawing on 160 h of ethnographic shadowing in Dutch government, I show three faces of functional politicisation; while directly advising ministers, in the preparation of policy advice and while working in the public eye. The findings suggest that senior civil servants actively try to align their fellow civil servants with their version of the minister’s wishes. This practice of ‘proxy politics’ calls for a shift in functional politicisation research from political ‘skills’ to ‘authority claims’ among senior civil servants. I conclude with urgent implications for politicisation theory and civil service practice. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-04-13T06:42:14Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767221078093
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Teshanee T Williams, Jennifer Kuzma Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. This study utilizes the Narrative Policy Framework (NPF) and cultural theory to examine the use of policy narratives by coalitions (meso-level) and the institutional uptake (macro-level). We analyze Parliamentary hearings about genetically modified (GM) salmon in Canada to associate narrative strategies with certain cultural worldviews and policy-stances. We explore narrative strategies used by cultural groups with regard to whether they contain the scope of GM salmon issues to “science-only” (direct health and environmental impacts) or expand the issues to “science-plus” (to include broader economic, social, or cultural impacts). Finally, we examine whether certain framings of GM salmon issues or specific cultural narratives are preferentially taken up in the final policy documents generated after the hearings. Our findings reveal significant relationships between policy-stance (pro-vs anti-GM), the cultural disposition of a policy narrative, the narrative strategies being used, and ultimately policy uptake. For example, narratives with hierarchical cultural dispositions were more likely to expand the scope of the issue to science-plus when supporting their own policy position (typically pro-GM) but contain the scope to “science-only” when refuting an anti-GM policy-stance. With regard to policy uptake, final government documents referred more to narratives that contained the scope to “science-only” and expressed hierarchical or individualistic dispositions in comparison to the hearings. This study has practical implications for understanding whose perspectives and arguments are legitimized in national policy debates about GM foods. It also extends NPF theory to how narratives containing specific cultural dispositions and risk-based framings influence policy uptake at the macro-level. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-02-14T01:15:41Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767211065609
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Tiina Randma-Liiv Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. This study investigates the institutionalization of e-participation initiatives in six European countries—Estonia, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Scotland, and Spain—using a multiple case study. The following research questions are addressed: How have recently established e-participation initiatives been institutionalized in public administrations' What are the formal and informal aspects of their institutionalization' It is concluded that the adoption of a digital solution does not in itself trigger a change in the policy-making process because the institutionalization of e-participation is not a linear process. The formal institutionalization increases the sustainability, transparency, and throughput legitimacy of e-participation and allows citizen proposals to be handled in a standardized way. Although the formal institutionalization of e-participation is key for an institutional change towards deliberative democracy, it needs to be accompanied by informal institutionalization through the supporting ideas, values, and preferences of politicians and public officials who have the power to change public institutions. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-01-27T07:18:11Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767211069199
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Martino Maggetti, Yannis Papadopoulos Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. This paper opens up the black box of agencies’ accountability relationships and zooms in on their top managers and the perceptions of accountability thereof. So far, very few studies have examined how agency managers perceive and experience attempts to control the public sector organizations that they manage. The paper seeks to address this gap through a focus on “felt” accountability, denoting (1) a manager’s (more or less high) expectation to have to explain substantive decisions to a parent department perceived, (2) to have (more or less) the expertise, and (3) to be (more or less) in a legitimate position to assess those decisions. We empirically explore in two steps (using quantitative and qualitative data) agencies’ felt accountability to the parent department in Switzerland, which presents a puzzling case of relatively low accountability according to a survey of agency managers in seven established democracies (Australia, Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom). Our findings point to the differences between regulatory and non-regulatory agencies and show that the former’s perception of being weakly accountable largely stems from the passive attitude of the parent ministry as official accountability forum. Agency managers interpret this attitude as a manifestation of respect for the agencies’ independence, but also as a consequence of the forum’s lack of time and expertise. In some cases, the parent ministry is not even considered to be the relevant accountability forum, suggesting that this accountability relationship is just one facet of the accountability regime in which agencies are embedded. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-01-27T02:14:00Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767221074487
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Nissim Cohen Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. How do public administration reforms develop in cases of political instability' Administrative reform has always been on the agenda of governments. Ample literature discusses its necessity and the factors that are associated with both its successes and failures worldwide. Nevertheless, only a few studies discuss the impact of political instability on public administration reform. Focusing on the Israeli experience, we explore public administration reform in the context of political instability. Using content analysis and in-depth interviews, we highlight how political instability adds more costs to politicians’ cost-benefit calculations about actively promoting public administration reform, as well as how it blocks their desire to engage in mundane work when large, visible reforms have been proposed. Our findings indicate that the problems of non-governability and political instability that create the need for administrative reform also create powerful barriers to it—particularly the lack of political will. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-01-27T02:08:35Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767221076059
Please help us test our new pre-print finding feature by giving the pre-print link a rating. A 5 star rating indicates the linked pre-print has the exact same content as the published article.
Authors:Bishoy Louis Zaki, Francesco Nicoli, Ellen Wayenberg, Bram Verschuere First page: 226 Abstract: Public Policy and Administration, Ahead of Print. The COVID-19 pandemic has brought forward myriad challenges to public policy, central of which is understanding the different contextual factors that can influence the effectiveness of policy responses across different systems. In this article, we explore how trust in government can influence the ability of COVID-19 policy responses to curb excess mortality during the pandemic. Our findings indicate that stringent policy responses play a central role in curbing excess mortality. They also indicate that such relationship is not only influenced by systematic and structural factors, but also by citizens’ trust in government. We leverage our findings to propose a set of recommendations for policymakers on how to enhance crisis policymaking and strengthen the designs of the widely used underlying policy learning processes. Citation: Public Policy and Administration PubDate: 2022-01-03T03:20:06Z DOI: 10.1177/09520767211058003
Hybrid journal (It can contain Open Access articles)
[1174 journals]
