公共管理者视阈下公共决策中的公民参与

公民参与不仅仅是重塑政府的动力,也是政府改革的重要目标.公民参与可能发展民主价值,但并不必然对所有方面的政策问题解决都带来积极的效果.托马斯综合整理了当前公民参与的际遇和挑战,深入剖析公民参与的优点和内在缺陷,最深刻地触及了代表性问题.本文力图对托马斯的理论进行评述,客观呈现其对中国目前的公民参与所具有的重要价值和意义.     

转型期我国公共行政改革的挑战与创新

随着改革开放的不断深入,特别是全球化和信息化浪潮的冲击,中国社会转型的步伐不断加快,伴随之而来的则是社会体制、 社会结构和社会形态的转型与变迁.这一系列变化导致中国的行政环境日趋复杂,传统的行政体制已经无法适应当代社会发展的要求,市场经济的进一步发展、 公民参与意识的不断提高以及各种新兴领域的问题涌现等,都对公共行政改革带来了前所未有的压力和挑战.在此背景下,中国公共行政需要尽快适应社会变化的趋势,找到公共行政改革的正确价值定位与路径创新,加快体制机制的改革,实现社会良好发展的新局面.     

中国地方治理改革、政治参与和政治合法性初探

改革开放以来,中国社会利益分化和利益多样化趋势日益明显,利益主体的权利意识也在逐步苏醒.利益主体通过各种方式向各级党委和政府反映自身利益和要求,力图影响政策制订过程.为了回应公民的要求,地方党委和政府进行了治理改革.本文就探讨了这些地方治理改革与创新是否提高了公民的政治意识,促进了政治参与,增强了政权的政治合法性等问题.     

大陆法系行政调查中公民调查义务的规范实证分析

行政调查是行政机关的重要权力活动之一,是进行行政处分与决定的基础。大陆法系各国对公民调查义务的立法规定,体现了现代行政法治发展中公民从完全被动接受管理的角色逐步发展为协助行政机关、共同参与实现行政管理目标的理念。针对大陆法系九个主要国家和地区行政程序法中公民法定调查义务的四个方面：提供相应文书资料、参与事实调查、拒绝履行协助调查义务的法定事由和不履行法定调查义务的后果作了规范实证分析.     

四国地方政府改革比较研究

本文首先介绍了传统行政改革和新公共管理驱动的(NPM-inspired)行政改革的区分,并对一些定义和概念的适当用法作了评述.然后对大不列颠/英格兰、瑞典、德国、法国等四国地方政府改革的相关措施和绩效进行了评价.可以说,从民主责任、多功能和区域可行性上看,瑞典和德国的地方政府属传统类型,它们在这些方面做得相对好些,而英国和法国的地方政府相对来说绩效不如人意.     

公民参与行政决策的理论支撑

公民参与行政决策既可以从政治哲学的角度也可以从后现代的角度获得理论支持。从政治哲学的视角来看,人的主体性、自然正义原则、人民主权理论都主张公民参与行政决策;从后现代的视角来看,反权威、反理性、反一致性都是公民参与行政决策的充分理由。     

NGO参与政策制定的条件分析

伴随着公民社会的不断培育、发展,作为公民社会重要主体的NGO(非政府组织)也在不断发展、壮大,在社会各领域中发挥难以替代的重要作用,尤其是通过多样化途径积极参与公共政策的制定。在改革与发展的当代中国,NGO组织自身的规范与完善,市场经济的利益多元、激烈竞争特性,政治与行政体制改革的推进,新技术手段的出现,都为NGO参与政策制定提供了强劲的动力和充分的条件。     

关于公众参与重大行政决策法律制度

随着我国经济水平的提升,国民素质也在不断提高,我国公民对自身权力与责任的认识更加深刻.老百姓更积极的去关注与自己生活密切相关的政府决策,而政府职能的不断完善也促进了公民参与政府议事相关制度的改进,在十八届四中全会通过的《决定》指出"健全依法决策机制.把公众参与、专家论证、风险评估、合法性审查、集体讨论决定确定为重大行政决策法定程序,确保决策制度科学,程序正当,过程公开,责任明确."更是把公众参与作为重大行政决策法定程序之一.关于公众参与重大行政决策法律制度的建立与完善符合我国行政法的基本原则,这一法律制度的建立与完善离不开公众、政府与参与途径这三个基本要素.     

浅论政府营销中的行政价值观

行政价值观对政府行政行为起着基础性的作用。从西方行政价值观的演变历程来看,中国各级政府机构应孜孜不倦地构建新公共服务学的行政价值观——公民对话协商和公共利益,但就现阶段中国政府改革而言,其他行政价值观也同样具有明显的借鉴意义。     

当代行政与时代热点

当代行政具有明显的时代气息特征,与此同时也必须有强大的理论与法治程序作为后盾.社会各个阶层的本身,各个行业的自身利益在社会运转的过程中都涉及当代行政这一议题.本文将围绕以下问题进行讨论:如何转变政府职能,贯却落实科学发展观,深化推动改革,全面推动小康社会的建设?如何开创具有中国特色的社会主义道路、社会主义事业新局面?如何与时俱进加强当代行政,共同筑建美好的中国梦,也是研究的课题.全面推行法制社会的建设、完善与健全法制机构,以法、行政指导为前提,转变政府职能,贯却落实科学发展观,深化推动改革,全面推动小康社会的建设.我国应结合古代千年文化制度与现代文化制度,建设高效政府、吸取西方先进管理制度为我所用,开创具有中国特色的社会主义道路、社会主义事业新局面.培养公民的法律、道德意识、民族意识,推行行政管理组织的法制化,与时俱进加强当代行政.     

Electricity Market Restructuring: Reforms of Reforms

Electricity systems present complicated challenges for public policy. In many respects these challenges are similar to those in other network industries in providing a balance between regulation and markets, public investment and private risk taking, coordination and competition. As with other such industries, naturally monopoly elements interact with potentially competitive services, but electricity has some unusual features that defy simple analogy to other network industries. Following a reversal of a long-term decline in real electricity prices, the last two decades of the twentieth century were for the United States a time of reform, reaction, and reforms of reforms in electricity systems, moving slowly towards greater reliance on competition and markets. Changing technology, new entrants in the generation market, and a legislative mandate to provide access to the essential transmission facility accelerated a process that required major innovations in institutions and operations. Complete laissez faire competition is not possible, and the details of an efficient competitive electricity market are neither obvious nor easy to put in place. The benefits of reform may be substantial, but they require careful attention to market design. A review of the past identifies some choices on the road ahead.     

Reforms and confidence

We examine the choice of economic reforms when policymakers have present-biased preferences and can choose to discard information (maintain confidence) to mitigate distortions from excess discounting. The decisions of policymakers and firms are shown to be interdependent. Confident policymakers carry out welfare-improving reforms more often, which increases the probability that firms will invest in restructuring. While policymakers in different countries can be equally irrational, the consequences of bounded rationality are less severe in economies with beneficial initial conditions. We also examine how present-biased preferences influence the choice between big bang versus gradualist reform strategies. Our findings help explain differences in economic reform success in various countries.     

Telecommunications Reforms In Malaysia

The article examines the range and scope of physical and structural changes that have taken place in the telecommunications sector in Malaysia in the past 15 years. It reviews the main policy reforms that have shaped the sector, including corporatization and privatization, and liberalization in fixed line and cellular services. The article documents the increase in competition, particularly in the cellular phone service market. Major regulatory reforms were introduced in the 1990s with the passage of the Communications and Multimedia Act and the establishment of the Malaysia Communications and Multimedia Commission. The key principles for regulating the sector are reviewed, including those directed towards economic regulation and consumer protection. With the absence of a formal competition law in Malaysia, the onus for addressing competition issues in the telecommunications sector rests with the sectoral regulator.     

Limits to Institutional Reforms

The essay draws on the theory of (macro)economic policy, as it has evolved, to discuss implicit policy determinism in the new economics of institutions. The extension of rational-choice methods to new levels of analysis, such as micropolitics, macropolitics, political macroeconomics, and microfoundations of cooperation, has apparently reduced the policy choice set and diminished the role of experts. All outcomes reflect constrained maximization by rational agents. The essay argues, however, that scarcity of knowledge leads to incomplete and variable policy models, and that competition among policy models creates a role for experts in social change.     

Reforms to Schooling in the UK: A Review of Some Major Reforms and their Evaluation

Abstract. We aim to give a brief overview of some important reforms to the school system in the UK and existing evidence on their consequences. These reforms include a change in the type of secondary school open to pupils – from a selective to comprehensive system; a change in the examination system; quasi-market reforms; area-based initiatives; reforms to the content and structure of teaching; payments to encourage the pursuit of education beyond compulsory schooling.     

Piecemeal Reforms in a Transitional Economy

Many transitional as well as developing economies have retained large elements of state ownership in some sectors. This paper analyzes the effects of piecemeal reforms in a small open economy in which the state enterprises’ employment and output decisions are the result of bargaining between the state treasury and enterprise “insiders.” Competition policy enhances welfare; privatization in a sector protected from foreign competition increases (lowers) welfare if state enterprises care more (less) for wage raises than for employment increases; and a small increase in the import quota has the usual welfare-ambiguous effects. A free-trade policy maximizes national welfare.     

Reforms and education inequality in Ghana

We analyze the evolvement of education inequality and the gender gap in Ghana before and after two major education reforms. Using different measures of inequality, our findings suggest that the gender gap at the basic school level has closed following the introduction of the education expansion policies, but inequalities persist at the postbasic school levels and across regions. We further demonstrate that the educational expansion–schooling inequality nexus is best illustrated by an inverted U-shaped Kuznets curve. We find that after an average of 6 years of schooling has been reached, inequality starts to decline, and gender equality can be achieved when the average years of schooling reach 9.     

Poverty-Reducing Tax Reforms with Heterogeneous Agents

The poverty impact of indirect tax reforms is analyzed using sequential stochastic dominance methods. This allows agents to differ in dimensions that cannot always be precisely captured within the usual money‐metric indicators of living standards. Examples of such dimensions include household size and composition, temporal or spatial variation in price indices, and individual needs and “merits.”     

在规制和民营化之间:改革的顺序选择--以电信行业改革为例

改革顺序的选择问题是多年争论的焦点。1990年代早期，许多西方顾问从市场制度将随民营化自然确立的假设出发，极力鼓动东欧国家和前苏联迅速推进民营化。随后，人们才认识到并强调在民营化之前先行确立能促进竞争的制度框架的重要性。直到现在，对这场争论的经验性分析尚付阙如。本文试图通过电信行业改革顺序效果的检验来填补这一空缺，允其是检验了先于原垄断企业民营化之前建立监管机构这种做法的实际效果。文章从中得出了与目前流行的观点相一致的结论，即在那些先于民营化分别确立监管机构权威的国家里，电信行业的投资、安装电话的透明度、移动电话普及率等方面都有明显的增长。在比较中，作者进一步发现，投资者也更愿意把资金投向那些确立了规制权威的国家的电信企业，这种投资意愿的增长与投资者在管制规则不确定的国家中的投资需要额外的风险补偿是一致的。