New development: Corporatization of local authorities in England in the wake of austerity 2010–2016

A key institutional driver of current reforms within English local government is ‘alternative service delivery’. Our review of councils’ annual accounts between 2010/11 and 2016/17 suggests ‘corporatization’—the creation of local authority companies—is a growing phenomenon across the whole of English local government. This represents such a significant and far-reaching development in the governance, performance and efficiency of local public services that it constitutes a major field-level change at the interstices of the institutions of state, market, corporation and community. In this article, the authors briefly sketch ways corporatization could be regarded as a field-level change, before presenting findings and reflecting on their implications.     

Leading for collaborative public service innovation

ABSTRACT

This article examines the critical leadership actions that support collaborative public service innovations, drawing on evidence from UK local government led partnerships. It concludes that success is more likely if leaders help the partnership to: build mutual trust; agree clear, well thought through, politically supported ambitions; invest time, resources and energy; galvanize managers and staff; make a long term commitment to achieving the objectives, learning, adapting and growing innovations together.     

New development: Making partnerships work—a local politician's guide to leadership

Local strategic partnerships are non-hierarchical structures requiring facilitative leadership. The authors describe research that shows that facilitation demands acceptability, the development of a shared vision and the ability to deliver it. This implies a plethora of skills and relevant qualities, supported by favourable partners and an enabling political environment, with enough time to get it right.     

New development: Directly elected mayors in Italy—creating a strong leader doesn't always mean creating strong leadership

More than 20 years after their introduction, directly elected mayors are key players in Italian urban governance. This article explains the main effects of this reform on local government systems and provides lessons for other countries considering directly elected mayors.     

Budgetary Stewardship,Innovation and Working Culture: Identifying the Missing Ingredient in English and Welsh Local Authorities’ Recipes for Austerity Management

Drawing on fieldwork with 70 local authorities in England and Wales, this paper builds on previous studies of austerity management by highlighting the importance of organisational cultures to achieving strategic objectives. It finds that, in line with their prevailing ‘belief system’ of budgetary stewardship, local authorities in both countries are holding down input costs to deal with austerity. However, the scale of funding cuts means that this strategy is unlikely to be successful over the longer term. Instead, they need greater freedom to generate revenue, in order to facilitate innovation and develop more sustainable business practices and service models.     

An International Comparison of Materiality Guidance for Governments, Public Services and Charities

The annual report is promoted and regarded as the primary medium of accountability for government agencies. In Australia, anecdotal evidence suggests the quality of annual reports is variable. However, there is scant empirical evidence on the quality of reports. The aim of this research is to gauge the quality of annual reporting by local governments in Queensland, and to investigate the factors that may contribute to that level of quality. The results of the study indicate that although the quality of reporting by local governments has improved over time, councils generally do not report information on aspects of corporate governance, remuneration of executive staff, personnel, occupational health and safety, equal opportunity policies, and performance information. In addition, the results indicate there is a correlation between the size of the local government and the quality of reporting but the quality of disclosures is not correlated with the timeliness of reports. The study will be of interest to the accounting profession, public sector regulators who are responsible for the integrity of the accountability mechanisms and public sector accounting practitioners. It will form the basis for future longitudinal research, which will map changes in the quality of local government annual reporting.     

Government Weakness and Local Public Debt Development in Flemish Municipalities

The Weak Government Hypothesis states that government fragmentation leads to higher public deficits and debt. This relation can be explained by government inaction, common pool problems or the strategic use of debt that arise in coalition governments. Importantly, whereas government inaction models concentrate on the short-term effects of government fragmentation on indebtedness, common pool and strategic debt models imply that such effects will persist in the long term. We test these hypotheses using a large panel of data on municipal debt in 298 Flemish municipalities (1977–2000). We find that there is no long-run effect from weak governments. However, there is general support for the fact that the number of parties in a coalition has a positive effect on the municipality’s short-term debt levels–in line with government inaction models.JEL Code: E62, H72, H74     

Management accounting,performance measurement and strategy in English local authorities

This paper analyses the results of an extensive survey of UK local government which explored the relationship between strategy, management accounting practices (MAPs), and performance measurement techniques (PMTs). The research investigated a resource-based view of strategic capabilities and Porter’s strategic typologies. PMTs and MAPs were shown to be associated with strategic capabilities. Strategic typologies, however, were found to be only weakly associated with the use of PMTs and MAPs.     

主要发达国家地方债制度比较

地方债的发展与一国的城市化、工业化进程密不可分,由于社会发展和人口增加,社会对公共物品的需求激增,政府在提供公共物品过程中的资金需求与资金供给的不匹配也越来越明显,政府财政收支缺口不断扩大,产生经常性的融资需求。与其他融资工具相比,地方债为政府在贷款之外提供了长期、低成本的直接融资机会,因而在发达国家及一些发展中国家受到重视。研究发达国家地方债制度,对建立我国的地方债管理制度能提供很好的经验与启示。     

The public disclosure of environmental performance information—a dual test of media agenda setting theory and legitimacy theory

This paper documents the results of an empirical study undertaken within Australia of the relationship between the print media coverage given to various industries' environmental effects, and the levels of annual report environmental disclosures made by a sample of firms within those industries. The paper draws upon previous studies in media agenda setting theory and legitimacy theory to develop two testable hypotheses. Nine industries are reviewed across the period from 1981–1994. Drawing upon two theories, it is argued that the media can be particularly effective in driving the community's concern about the environmental performance of particular organisations (from media agenda setting theory). Where such concern is raised, organisations will respond by increasing the extent of disclosure of environmental information within the annual report (from legitimacy theory). The results indicate that for the majority of the industries studied, higher levels of media attention (as determined by a review of a number of print media newspapers and journals) are significantly associated with higher levels of annual report environmental disclosures.     

A Second-Best Theory of Local Government Policy

This paper provides a model where a large number of small jurisdictions compete for mobile firms and households by supplying local public goods and factors. Jurisdictions only have an incomplete set of tax instruments at their disposal to achieve an efficient allocation. We derive second-best behavioral rules for local governments and extend optimal taxation results to the local level. Local governments distort locational decisions of mobile firms and households by taxing them above marginal congestion costs so as to balance relative locational distortions between taxes. The analysis also reveals that there is a systematic difference between the provision of local public goods and factors. While local public goods are provided according to the Samuelson rule in most situations considered, local public factors are undersupplied relative to this rule.     

政府审计、贫困县官员政绩压力与债务风险

以经济人假设、政府审计是治理政府官员代理问题的免疫系统为理论基础,利用2015-2018年H省贫困县政府债务数据,实证检验政府审计抑制贫困县官员政绩压力对债务风险的影响。研究发现：官员政绩压力与贫困县债务风险显著正相关,政府审计的揭示、预防功能对抑制贫困县官员政绩压力影响债务风险的作用显著,而其抵御功能不显著。鉴于此,应构建和运用政府债务“数智审计”、系统改进官员绩效考核制度和科学合理地利用债务资金的杠杆作用,以助力实施“巩固拓展脱贫攻坚成果同乡村振兴有效衔接”战略。     

地方政府与区域金融发展问题探究

与股份制改造并上市后的三大国有商业银行和13家股份制商业银行相比.地方性的金融机构在内部治理结构建设、外部监督等方面要逊色很多,因此未来不良资产的发源地很可能不是全国性的商业银行,而是地方性商业银行,且地方政府的干预将是不良资产产生的主因.在区域金融体系建设中如何规范地方政府的行为,是促进区域金融健康发展、防范区域金融风险的重点之一.     

The Best Value Agenda for Auditing

The developments in the public sector auditing can be seen against a backcloth of adverse publicity for private sector audits. This focus on the private sector has meant public sector developments have gone largely unnoticed. The advocacy of Best Value is a logical and useful development in addressing the needs of the citizen with an active interest in the public sector.     

Credit risk and bond pricing of local government in China

The relationship between credit risk and the pricing of local government bonds in China is explored in this paper. The pricing of local government bonds was found to reflect credit risk, but the risk premium was small. The type of bond (‘directional’ or ‘non-directional’) significantly affected pricing. Repayment source had no effect. The authors make recommendations for the central government, local governments and investors.     

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS IN LOCAL GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTING IN SPAIN

This paper provides an analysis of the present situation concerning local government accounting in Spain following recent reforms introduced in the early nineties. It presents a picture of the main features of Spanish local finance—budgeting and accounting, the measurement focus, and the basis of accounting—and analyses the financial reporting system adopted by Spanish municipalities. This is followed by a critical review of several weak points in the reform which in the author's view will encourage further developments.     

地方政企合谋与信贷资源配置

通过建立地方政企合谋与信贷资源配置的数理模型来研究分权下地方政府干预信贷资源配置服务于地方政府的自身效用,结果表明地方政企合谋是地方政府在直接干预力度减弱的情况下,间接干预金融资源配置的一个重要的途径;且地方政府官员的政治晋升是助长这些干预行为的关键因素。若将发现地方政企合谋与政府地方官员政治晋升与否直接相关,即能起到威慑作用,并能形成最优的防范地方政企合谋契约。