Reforming local public services

Abstract

The following article is aimed at analysing reforms in public service delivery and management at the local level of government in Germany and France from a cross-countries comparative perspective. Particular attention is paid to the results and effects these reform initiatives have caused with regard to the administrative organization, steering capacities, and output performance. Two major approaches of reform will be addressed: privatization, contracting-out, and ‘corporatization’ of local services on the one hand and public management reforms on the other. Proceeding from the distinct ‘starting conditions’ of reforms in the two local government systems, the question will be pursued, as to whether there has been an increasingly convergent or divergent development in French and German local service provision, and how these evolutions can be explained.     

Local Political Corruption: Potential structural malfunctions at the central–local,local–local and intra-local levels

Abstract

Despite growing preoccupation on the part of both the public and researchers with the concept of political corruption and the ‘corruption eruption’ phenomenon, research studies addressing corruption in local government are few and far between. This exploratory research offers a theoretical conceptualization of institutionalized corruption in local government, and identifies structural factors that lead to such corruption. Further, this study empirically assesses institutional corruption at the local level and its correlation to attitudes and characteristics of local authorities and their populations, based on a survey of 1,709 residents of 156 local authorities in Israel and data on the local authorities from a separate database. This article proposes a model according to which local corruption arises from structural factors at three levels: the central–local level (relations between local authorities and the central government); the local–local level (competition between local authorities) and the intra-local level (factors relating to the performance of local councils and local democracy). Our analyses reveal correlations among characteristics of the local authority and community, residents' perceptions of local performance and perceptions of local corruption. Implications of the findings in light of strategies conventionally employed against corruption in local government are discussed.     

Team Work or Territorial War?

Abstract

This article studies the extent to which the newly created figure of the management team in local government in Flanders might lead to changes in administrative conduct. It uses a new institutionalism perspective in three worlds of action to study the mediating effect of meso-organizational and micro-individual factors on macro-constitutional reform. The empirical analysis (based on an assessment of the reform by the key acting municipal secretaries) highlights the importance of meso-factors for change. Especially the extent to which integrative thinking and independence from politics are present in the administrative logic of appropriateness seems to matter. This is complemented by micro-individual assumptions on the overall improvement of the macro-constitutive framework of reform.     

Public managers’ perception of performance information: the evidence from Polish local governments

ABSTRACT

Performance management requires wise utilization of performance information to generate expected results. The framework of Performance Information Utilization (PIU) explains why and how performance information is used in the public sector, although it does so without recognizing the role of the information user’s perception. This article adapts the information system theories to conceptualize perception of performance information (PPI). Statistical analysis confirmed the validity of the construct and showed a significant relationship between quality and usefulness of performance information, and usefulness of multiple performance information systems. Tested model offers new insights in explaining the use of performance information in local governments.     

Bonding and Bridging Associational Social Capital and the Financial Performance of Local Authorities in Israel

Abstract

This study explores whether bridging and bonding social capital differ in their impacts on government performance at the local level and the extent to which these impacts vary between localities exhibiting differing socioeconomic resources. The study is based on an analysis of 256 local authorities in Israel. The findings show that bridging and bonding social capital do differ in their respective effects on government performance and that the nature of the relationship of each type of capital with government performance varies by the community's socioeconomic profile. Poor communities with high densities of bridging social capital were characterized by lower deficits as a percentage of total municipal budgets, more accurate expenditure forecasts and greater spending on services per capita.     

提高地方高校硕士学位论文质量的对策研究

学位论文质量是硕士生培养水平的重要体现,随着高校研究生培养规模不断扩大,如何通过切实有效的制度措施,确保硕士学位论文的总体质量水平,已成为高校在研究生管理领域的一个重要方面。本文通过对当前地方高校硕士学位论文质量的分析,结合地方高校硕士研究生培养现状,从课程设置、学术规范、中期检查等方面提出了加强地方高校硕士研究生学位论文质量建设的对策建议,为提高地方高校硕士研究生培养质量提供了新的思路。     

因子分析法应用于人力资源配置的分析研究

随着房地产业的发展以及税收改革的深化,地税系统管理任务繁重,人力资源配给矛盾突出,人力资源如何合理分配日趋严峻。本文以M市地税系统为例,利用因子分析法通过对该市地税系统人力资源分配的各个因素如工作强度、工作难度和工作环境进行分析,并提出了对应方案。     

基于全球价值链的我国本土生产型外贸企业升级机理分析

在阐明我国本土生产型外贸企业基本内涵的基础上,依据企业国际竞争优势的差异将我国本土生产型外贸企业分为低级生产型企业、高级生产型企业、创新型企业和知识型企业四种类型。在融入全球价值链的分工体系后,两种生产型企业升级的本质特征是扩大所在生产环节的增值空间(低级生产型外贸企业的升级策略是降低生产成本,高级生产型外贸企业升级的策略是提高产品市场售价),实现基于全球价值链的横向扩张式升级;创新型企业升级的本质特征是从低增值向高增值的生产环节转移,实现基于全球价值链的纵向渗透式升级;知识型企业升级的本质特征是从低增值空间的价值链向高增值空间的价值链转换,实现基于全球价值链的阶梯跃迁式升级。     

The past as staged-real environment: communism revisited in The Crazy Guides Communism Tours,Krakow, Poland

Through an analysis of a tourism design in Krakow Poland, The Crazy Guides Communism Tours, I wish to present one possible way of promoting a district through dealing with an unwanted past, an undesirable heritage. In this instance, it is Nowa Huta, a part of city from the unwanted past, that is revalorized partly through the construction of staged environments in real places. Such designs realize the communication potential of the situation and can change socially constructed knowledge into social (inter-) action. The Crazy Guides Communism Tours require a high level of bodily and emotional investment both from the tourists and from the guides themselves. The paper investigates the designs on a representational and an experiential level and uses field analysis to try and answer the questions if, for whom and why these tourism designs change anything.     

The activation of local service suppliers by incoming tour operators in a “developing” destination – the case of Madagascar

This article elucidates how organised tourism initiated by the international tour operator system can involve local actors in a developing country with a young tourism industry. The empirical basis is incoming tour operators in Madagascar with the focus on their policies and practices in getting involved with local tour operators and individual providers of service by the realisation of their programs for international markets. The study adopts a qualitative approach based on personal interviews with incoming tour operators located in the capital city of Madagascar. The central theoretical frameworks applied are primarily from the research literature on partner selection and cooperation in exchange relationships (channels of distribution) and contract theory and the results are discussed within in the wider perspective of local competence development and sustainable tourism. The findings demonstrate that incoming tour operators have a quite limited involvement in the cooperation with local actors and uncover the problems linked to partner-specific, local attraction-specific and context-specific factors. The study offers an insight into a field that has been scarcely illuminated empirically by research and it is believed that the results have relevance beyond the geographical context of the research.