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Municipalities by design are at the grassroots and the gateway for providing direct development interventions to the masses of the people of South Africa. There is, however, evidence that success in implementing youth development programmes is limited, owing mainly to the lack of performance management application at the local government level. Nkangala District Municipality (NDM) was used as a case to explore the extent to which municipalities apply the prescripts and principles of performance management to the youth development programmes. The study sought to establish whether municipalities have performance management frameworks and systems, and whether youth development matters are included in the same. Evidence from the study shows that there are still gaps to be addressed in NDM. Finally, the study suggests a Youth Development Performance Management Framework, which will also integrate youth participation, monitoring and evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public administration scholars continue to grapple with how and why public organizations differ from private organizations. The judiciary deals with similar questions in ruling on constitutional claims that apply exclusively to state actors. The authors consider similarities and differences between scholarly and judicial approaches, adding to the body of research attempting to capture the complexities of the public-private distinction. The application in this article includes the coding of seminal court decisions and qualitative comparative analysis ( QCA) to find combinations of causal conditions that lead to state action rulings. The specifics revealed through QCA provide valuable lessons for extending public norms and preserving constitutional protections when outsourcing public services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Herbert Simon, in his 1946 essay 'The Proverbs of Administration,' indicted public administration as having conflicting and contradictory theories and an absence of a knowledge base that could provide a guide to practice. Simon proposed that public administration define concepts, adopt efficiency as its objective, focus on the study of decision making, and construct models that could predict efficient results. This 75th-anniversary article revisits Simon's essay in light of contemporary public administration. It examines the progress that has been made and what still needs to be accomplished, and it ends with a list of barriers to further progress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In addition to public administrations and public managers, there is increasing interest in studying citizens' interactions with and views toward government from a comparative perspective in order to put theories to the test using cross-national surveys. However, this will only succeed if we adequately deal with the diverse ways in which respondents in different countries and regions perceive and respond to survey measures. This article examines the concept of cross-national measurement equivalence in public administration research and explores methods for establishing equivalence. Two methodologies are examined that test and correct for measurement nonequivalence: multiple-group confirmatory factor analysis and multilevel mixture item response theory. These techniques are used to test and establish the cross-national measurement equivalence of two popular measurement constructs: citizen satisfaction with public services and trust in public institutions. Results show that appropriately dealing with nonequivalence accounts for different forms of biases that otherwise would be undetected. The article contributes to the methodological advancement in studying public administration beyond domestic borders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the relationship between managerial capacity and local government performance is well established, research into the direct effect of population size on performance has yielded mixed findings. Using data for 787 municipalities in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais, this article examines the direct and nonlinear effects (moderating and curvilinear) of population size on municipal performance. Performance is measured in terms of property tax collection and averaged for the 2005-07 mayoral administration. Mayor's age (a proxy for experience) and educational attainment serve as measures of managerial capacity. After controlling for political and economic factors, both municipal size and mayoral capacity are positively correlated with property tax collection. However, population size neither moderates managerial capacity nor relates curvilinearly to municipal performance. These findings challenge the promoters of fragmentation, which has been the trend in transitional and developing economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Cadernos EBAPE.BR is the property of Fundacao Getulio Vargas, Escola Brasileira de Administracao Publica e de Empresas and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Theories of coalition politics in parliamentary democracies have suggested that government formation and survival are jointly determined outcomes. An important empirical implication of these theories is that the sample of observed governments analyzed in studies of government survival may be nonrandomly selected from the population of potential governments. This can lead to serious inferential problems. Unfortunately, current empirical models of government survival are unable to account for the possible biases arising from nonrandom selection. In this study, we use a copula-based framework to assess, and correct for, the dependence between the processes of government formation and survival. Our results suggest that existing studies of government survival, by ignoring the selection problem, overstate the substantive importance of several covariates commonly included in empirical models. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The questionnaire survey is one of the most commonly used methods of data collection in public management research. These surveys often provide the information used to measure both the independent and dependent variables in an analysis. However, this introduces the risk of common method bias—a serious methodological challenge that has not received much attention as a distinct topic in public management research. We discuss the challenge of common method bias in relation to public management studies and illustrate the problem using an analysis of intrinsic work motivation and sickness absence. Thereafter, we discuss solutions for reducing common method bias when it is not possible to use different methods. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article aims to contribute to recent debates on research methods in public administration by examining the use of quantitative methods in public administration research. We analyzed 1,605 articles published between 2001–2010 in four leading journals:Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory (JPART), Public Administration Review, Governance, andPublic Administration (PA).Results show that whereas qualitative methods are still predominant compared to quantitative methods (56% versus 44%), the field is becoming increasingly quantitative. Of quantitative methods used, surveys are most dominant, while a combination of methods is used far less often. In general, very few studies use a mixed methods design. As to the areas of research, we found that the use of quantitative methods is unequally distributed; some subfields (public management) use quantitative methods more often than others (policy and politics), and some journals (JPART, PA) publish articles on quantitative research more than others (Governance). Implications for public administration research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In recent times, research on public management has grown rapidly. Nevertheless, despite the expansion of attention to management in the public sector, many important questions about the state of public administration research remain unanswered. One of the most salient of these questions concerns the relationship between public administration and generic management research. In particular, to what extent, and in what ways, is public administration research connected with developments in mainstream management and organization studies. In this article, we use bibliographic methods to explore the place of the generic management literature within the intellectual structure of public administration. Our findings suggest that the influence of generic management theories on certain public administration journals and scholars has grown in recent years, although management scholars appear to be uninterested in public administration articles. Further analysis of the subject matter in published articles is suggestive of the possibility that the emergence of the “New Public Management” has played an important role in re-shaping the connections between the two fields of study. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The measurement and comparison of the public administration output of universities is an important means for mapping the state of the field. However, such exercises are very sensitive to design choices made in the ranking and measurement methodology. Following an overview of existing research on journal reputation and quality in public administration and studies of institutional reputation and productivity, this article presents five alternative rankings of journal article output in public administration to illustrate how rankings of universities in the field of public administration vary depending on what is considered to be a “good journal.” Article output extracted from Web of Science and Scopus for the period 2009-2013 is used. It was found that using SSCI Journal Citation Reports as opposed to journal reputation has a considerable effect on the regional composition of the rankings. The article discusses key challenges in measuring and ranking article output in the discipline of public administration. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Copyright of Optimum: Journal of Economics & Management Sciences / Ekonomi ve Yönetim Bilimleri Dergisi is the property of Optimum: Journal of Economics & Management Sciences and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista Opara: Ciências Contemporâneas Aplicadas is the property of Revista OPARA and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista Opara: Ciências Contemporâneas Aplicadas is the property of Revista OPARA and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Implementation of the labour market flexicurity concept on national level can be seen as governmental project management issue in public administration - to manage a group of critical success factors that are to be achieved by enforcing four flexicurity principles: (a) flexible and reliable contractual arrangement through modern labour laws, collective agreements and work organisation; (b) comprehensive lifelong learning strategies; (c) effective active labour market policies; and (d) modern social security system that provides adequate income support, encourages employment and facilitates labour market mobility. There is no single indicator that measures the total flexicurity of the labour market. Furthermore, the value for society from the four flexicurity principles is perceived differently across EU countries in response to economic and political history and national traditions that have impact on public administration, as well as labour market regulations. Fuzzy Logic Approach is used when vague criteria must be incorporated into the analysis in order to measure the project effectiveness more precisely. By assuming that the labour market has the highest efficiency when concept of the flexicurity is enforced, the target of this research is to create a joint measurement of the labour market efficiency level in EU countries using Fuzzy Logic Approach (Ray S et.al., 2013) that consists of following steps: 1) selecting the critical success factors to be used for project effectiveness measurement; 2) define linguistic variables and their scales for the critical success factors as well as the effectiveness measurement scales; 3) define importance rating and performance rating scales for the critical success factors; 4) define fuzzy measurement index (FMI) for the project effectiveness; and 5) matching FMI with pre-defined linguistic levels of the project effectiveness measurement scale as defined in step 2. The outcome of this research provides public authorities with comparative analysis and information on measuring adequacy of the flexicurity concept in EU countries using the Fuzzy Logic Approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Project management approach in the public administration becoming gradually applied tool for implementation of different public programs and activities. Latvia has several methodological documentations to evaluate the possible benefits from infrastructure but still there is need for improvements as the only clear defined methodology is for transport sectors and those which have been provided by the European commission, but not always have been practically used in local municipalities' project evaluations. Public projects, and planning for such projects, generally have the following characteristics: • Such projects are inherently risky due to long planning horizons and complex interfaces. • Technology is often not standard. • Decision making and planning are often multi-actor processes with conflicting interests. • Often the project scope or ambition level will change significantly over time. • Statistical evidence shows that such unplanned events are often unaccounted for, leaving budget contingencies sorely inadequate. • As a consequence, misinformation about costs, benefits, and risks is the norm. • The result is cost overruns and/or benefit shortfalls with a majority of projects. Paper exanimates public project management applications in the context of the underlying structure that adverse dynamics and their application to specific areas for micro-economical level of project management, synthesizes the policy messages, and provides directions for future research. Public sector project management in Latvia become popular in recent years as there is different type of public funding sources available. The paper examined the application of the project management practice and its micro-economic aspects in public sector in Latvia. Public sector project management in Latvia become popular in recent years as there is different type of public funding sources available. The paper describes the public sector project management practice in Latvia. Study shows that public sector project maturity level is low and should be improved. Research period covers the time from January 2013 - March 2015. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides the introduction to a symposium on contemporary public values research. It is argued that the contribution to this symposium represent a Public Values Perspective, distinct from other specific lines of research that also use public value as a core concept. Public administration is approached in terms of processes guided or restricted by public values and as public value creating: public management and public policy-making are both concerned with establishing, following and realizing public values. To study public values a broad perspective is needed. The article suggest a research agenda for this encompasing kind of public values research. Finally the contributions to the symposium are introduced. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The contextual nature of management approaches is important for understanding administrative centrality in governance networks in the public values process. This is of particular concern in a policy domain such as community development, which is characterized by the extensive involvement of nongovernmental actors in determining what ought to be done as well as carrying out those objectives. Using qualitative data, I explore the management approaches and policy tools used to fulfill Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) objectives in two different management contexts to analyze administrative centrality in governance networks in the public values process. Two different approaches emerge, suggesting different administrative trajectories to public values authorization and creation. Furthermore, the findings suggest that administrative centrality in the public values process may be influenced by the management context in which local agencies are embedded. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The study of public values (PVs) is generating growing interest in public administration and public management, yet many challenges and unanswered questions remain. For the study of PVs to progress, we need to go beyond the traditional boundaries of public administration and management, to explore how and why scholars in different disciplines use the concept, and how and where approaches to the concept differ and overlap. This article represents the first step in that effort. Specifically, the article uses a meta-analysis of 397 PVs publications from across 18 disciplines to generate a preliminary map of the PVs research terrain. Our findings show an increasing number of PVs publications over the decades, but with particular growth since 2000. Moreover, although PVs research is flourishing in public administration, it appears to be subsiding in other disciplines. Implications of these and other findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Decentralisation implies that responsibilities for development planning and management are transferred from central governance levels to sub-national levels, including local governments. Decentralisation reforms assume that local people's greater involvement in local decision-making will lead to more sustainable social and environmental development. Participatory rural techniques and approaches have been devised to support decentralisation reforms. This article presents the case of a multi-donor-funded ‘participatory’ essential oil distillation project in the High Atlas of Morocco. The project sought to respond to urgent issues around natural resource conservation, desertification, poverty alleviation, and out-migration of Berber communities towards urban areas. The article addresses the role that institutional partners and local authorities played in the implementation of the project. Based on extensive empirical fieldwork, the findings demonstrate that the approaches utilised by the Moroccan government to involve local communities are not adequately addressing local needs and suggest that there is little desire, nor the necessary capacity, to empower the local communities in the way that would be necessary to achieve effective economic development. Indeed, the project raised high expectations among the villagers but delivered few concrete results, benefiting mostly the local elite. This had a disengaging effect on the local communities. Another explanation for the ‘failure’ of the project is the clash between traditional and modern notions of ‘governance’ that it brought with it and that played out inside the communities. The article argues that participatory approaches should embrace the community's customary norms, thus facilitating the establishment of endemic notions of good local ‘governance’ and negotiating local traditional practices at the community level. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Relations between science and politics are under pressure because urgent problems create an increasing external demand on sciences while inside sciences the old idea that “science speaks truth to politics” is increasingly seen as unfeasible and undesirable. We are not forced to choose between such an objectivist and a skepticist model. Associative democracy provides more fruitful interactions between sciences and politics in order to “democratize science/expertise” and to “expertize democracy” compared with the outworn institutional alternative of parliamentary democracy – incapable of solving risk-decisions because of limited and misguided information, lack of qualification and practical knowledge – and neo-corporatist “shifts from government to governance” – suffering from rigidity, exclusion of legitimate stakeholders, intransparency and lack of democratic legitimacy. It introduces contest where it matters most and where it is most productive: in the framing of issues, in the deliberation/negotiation on alternatives, and in the implementation and control of the chosen problem solving strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Why is it important for women to hold leadership positions in organizations? If it is important for women to hold leadership positions in organizations, how do women get into such positions? Both public administration research and organizational research provide answers to these questions. However, the integration of these two bodies of literature remains limited. This study joins public administration scholarship on representative bureaucracy and management scholarship on women in leadership to hypothesize and test institutional, organizational, and political explanations for women's attainment of leadership positions together in one model. This study examines how women get into upper-level leadership positions in 12 federal regulatory organizations over more than 20 years of time. Findings suggests that women are more likely to gain access to leadership positions when the dominant political ideology is democratic and in agencies that work in feminine policy contexts, are younger, and where the risk of failure is higher. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a study on "conducting evaluations of local administrations in Turkey and making recommendations concerning their taxing power, with particular attention to economic efficiency" is presented. The study draws on international literature and experience gathered from practice. Various approaches related to issue of taxing power, especially that of OECD classification framework which is based on an in depth analysis of different country administrative structures, are examined. It is observed that taxation authority is conferred on the central government by the Main Constitution of Turkey, and the central government has also to provide sufficient resources to local administrations conducive to their responsibilities. In addition, it is stated that the legislative body can make arrangements to assign related authority to local administrations if needed. Emphasis is placed on the inefficiency in collecting taxes from tax resources and allocating tax revenues, as one of the major reasons behind the funding deficiency of local administrations. Furthermore, it is argued that delegating taxation authority to local administrations is unlikely to solve such basic problems. In this scope, various recommendations are made with respect to actions needed to be taken by both the central government and local administrations in Turkey. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why do some countries (often developing and emerging economies) adopt special laws on PPP, whilst in others PPPs are governed by the legislation on public procurement and related bylaws? This paper explains the above global discrepancies from an institutional perspective. In a contract-theoretical framework we demonstrate how PPPs can enable projects that are not feasible through standard public procurement arrangements. Incentives for private partners are created through extra benefits (often non-contractible) from their collaboration with the government (e.g. risk reduction, reputational gains, access to additional resources, lower bureaucratic burden, etc.). In a well-developed institutional environment these benefits are implicitly guaranteed, suggesting no need in a specialized PPP-enabling legislation. Otherwise, a PPP law should establish an institutional architecture to provide the above benefits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the UK, major IT public procurement projects regularly fail at significant cost to the taxpayer. The prevalence of these failures presents scholars with a challenge; to both understand their genesis and to facilitate learning and prevention. Functional approaches have revealed numerous determinants of failure ranging from procurement specifications to risk escalation, but true and definitive causes remain elusive. However, since failure is not itself an absolute truth, but rather a concept which is reached when support is withdrawn, the survival of a project depends on there being sufficient belief in its legitimacy. We use critical hermeneutic methods and the conceptual lens of legitimacy to reveal powerful legitimating influences that enable and constrain action, but which are not analysed in the retrospective government inquiries that determine lessons learned. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to take stock of the European debate on governance networks in order to assess whether or not it has succeeded to develop a new a viable paradigm based on clear concepts, sound theories and methods and an expansive research agenda. The political and institutional conditions for the emergence of the Europe governance debate are analyzed and the notions of 'governance' and 'governance networks' are critically examined and defined. A brief assessment of the empirical significance of governance networks at different levels of governing is followed by a presentation and comparison of the main theories of governance networks that tend to draw on different strands of institutional theory. Finally, the large and expanding research agenda of the new 'second generation' of governance network research is revisited before concluding that, despite of the need for further methodological development, the European debate on governance networks provides a new and important paradigm for understanding the emerging forms of multilateral action and pluricentric governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Perceptions of the pervasive and persistent failures of governments in many issue areas over the past several decades have led many commentators and policy makers to turn to non-governmental forms of governance in their efforts to address public problems. During the 1980s and 1990s, market-based governance techniques were the preferred alternate form to government hierarchy but this preference has tilted towards network governance in recent years. Support for these shifts from hierarchical to non-hierarchical governance modes centre on the argument that traditional government-based arrangements are unsuited for addressing contemporary problems, many of which have a cross-sectoral or multi-actor dimension which is difficult for hierarchies to handle. Many proponents claim that recent 'network governance' or 'collaborative governance' arrangements combine the best of both governmental and market-based alternatives by bringing together key public and private actors in a policy sector in a constructive and inexpensive way. This claim is no more than an article of faith, however, as there is little empirical evidence supporting it. Indeed both logic and evidence suggests that networks too suffer from failures, though the sources of these failure may be different from other modes. The challenge for policymakers is to understand the origin and nature of the ways in which different modes of governance fail so that appropriate policy responses may be devised. This article proposes a model of such failures and a two-order framework for understanding them which helps explain which mode is best, and worst, suited to which circumstance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Governance is a term which is widely, but not always precisely, used, and this article seeks to clarify what the term is being used to mean. In particular, it is concerned with whether it denotes a particular mode of government, or whether is a broad category encompassing all modes of government. It focuses on the arguments about political practice on which the original claims about governance were based, and the evidence that there has been a change is political practice which demands a new label. It concludes with a discussion of the way that accounts of government are used in the practice of governing, and the incentives that this gives both participants and observers to adopt the warm but fuzzy term 'governance'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The term governance has come to be used commonly in both academic discourse and in ordinary discussions about how the public sector, and other institutions, manage themselves and their relationships with the broader society. The emphasis on governance in many ways reflects public concerns about the capacity of their political systems to act effectively and decisively to solve public problems. In this short paper I take a generic stance on the nature of governance. Rather than assuming that one set of actors or another is the appropriate source of governance, I will advance a conception of governance that focuses on the basic functions that must be performed in order to govern. Further, rather than forcing a choice between one set of actors or another, this more general conception of governance focuses on the possible mixtures of actors which can govern most effectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Turismo em Análise is the property of Revista Turismo em Analise and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article tests the impact of two organization-relevant factors, high commitment human resource practices ( HCHRP) and work overload on a component of public service motivation, civic duty and employee outcomes (job satisfaction, affective commitment, and quit intentions). Local government employees in Wales (n=1,755) were used to test our research hypotheses. Results show that both HCHRP and work overload had direct and indirect affects (via civic duty) on employee outcomes. The positive effects of HCHRP on employee outcomes more than compensated for the negative impact of work overload. However, given the modest relations between the organization-relevant factors and civic mindedness, firm efforts should perhaps focus primarily on recruitment and retention campaigns rather than training and socialization strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over recent decades, a number of managerial reform initiatives in continental Europe have aimed at moving away from the traditional Weberian model of public administration. Such shifting bases of legitimacy are brought about by changes in the institutional logics in place, which not only provide frames of reference but also social identities and vocabularies of motive for the actors in the field. In this article, we approach the expanding research on public service motivation ( PSM) by employing an institutional prism. Based on an executive survey in a continental European context, we examine the assumption that high PSM is associated with the traditional ethos and social identity in the public sector. What we find is that a Weberian legalistic-bureaucratic logic supports neither a high attraction to policy-making nor a high level of compassion. A managerial orientation, on the other hand, entails significantly higher scores on these two dimensions, as well as on overall PSM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While politicians are often seen as being motivated by narrow self-interest, this article offers an alternative view. The relationship between two pro-social dimensions - Commitment to the Public Interest ( CPI) and User Orientation ( UO) - and behavioural outcomes among local councillors is analyzed. The raison d'être for the local councils is to define the public interest. In line with this, CPI, which is directed towards doing good for the public interest, is associated with working hours and political influence; this is much less so for UO, which is directed towards doing good for individual citizens. Behavioural outcomes are thus greater if there is a fit between the personal motivation and the organizational environment. This has implications for democracy, as a fit could lead to a race to the top. The data are based on a survey of local councillors in Denmark in 2009. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the theory of punctuated equilibrium is one of the most widely cited theories in policy studies, most of the research has paid relatively little attention to the conditions under which a policy punctuation is likely to occur. In this study, we argue that one of the likely causes of a policy punctuation is cultural friction. Such friction occurs between two opposing forces: the force directed at amplifying the demand for policymaking that is expected to introduce a new cultural value, and the 'retarding' or slowing force, which is a pre-existing cultural value deeply rooted in a society that blocks the policymaking. Cultural friction makes it harder for policymakers to change policy even where there is increasing demand, but may eventually generate a larger change to make up for past inattention to the issue. We support our argument with evidence of the recent large-scale change in multicultural policy in Korea. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The existing literature addressing antecedents of public service motivation ( PSM) focuses on personal predisposition and institutional shaping. The authors offer a focus that differs from previous studies, arguing that workplace trust as a result of human interaction and personal choice has a bearing on PSM. It is postulated that public managers' trust in citizens, trust in colleagues, and trust in agency leaders enhance their PSM. The authors test this proposition by using data collected from middle managers working in the Taiwan central government and it receives strong support. This study brings trust into the study of PSM, facilitates interdisciplinary dialogues, and thus helps make PSM a type of knowledge that pushes back the boundaries of public administration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reviews the evolution of almost 25 years of public service motivation research in order to identify what is necessary to raise future research to a higher level. First, we look at the rise in public service motivation research and try to provide an explanation for the increasing number of publications. Second, we review the empirical research on public service motivation and summarize the knowledge that has been built up so far in terms of the nature of the concept and its prevalence, its antecedents, and its consequences or outcomes. Third, we identify the challenges which future research is likely to face and we develop a strategy to address the aforementioned issues. In doing so, we aim to provide a roadmap for future research and thus contribute to a further increase in more robust knowledge on a topic that has been increasingly influential in public administration and public management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the use of performance information by public managers. It conceptualizes purposeful data use as a type of extra-role behaviour which requires additional effort on the part of the managers and which is not extrinsically rewarded. The article sheds light on one potential antecedent of performance information use - the motivation of the users. It argues that we can observe high levels of data use if managers driven by public service motivation ( PSM) work under transformational leaders. Using a needs-supply perspective on supervisors and followers, we suggest that there is a PSM-leadership fit which fosters the performance of this extra-role behaviour. The article is based on data from German local government and its findings contribute to the literatures on PSM as well as on performance management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Students of public management often argue that imposing market-based logic on public sector organizations can undermine the altruistic motives of public employees. Focusing on the complex relationships between 'reinventing government' reforms, bureaucratic red tape, and public service motivation ( PSM), we contend that the effects of reinvention reforms on PSM change as a function of the ability of reforms to cut bureaucratic red tape. A series of structural equation models reveal that the relationships between reinvention reforms, bureaucratic red tape, and PSM are much more complex than previously thought. Contrary to conjectures in the mainstream PSM literature, implementing market-like reforms in public organizations positively influences PSM, if one views the reform as minimizing red tape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The geographic water routes have always played an important role in the geostrategic decisions of the great powers. Today, this aspect is actively integrated in a variety of policies, from those on cross-border cooperation and good neighbourhood to the sectoral ones for the development of transport, tourism and trade. In this respect, the Danube is one of the most obvious examples, its role being promoted by the riparian states, as well as outside Europe, due to the connections it opens. In terms of flow and navigation, the most important part is on the Romanian territory, in the so-called Lower Danube sector, while Romanian ports are key points in the implementation of development strategies. Accordingly, the article reviews their technical potential, so as to underline the differences, as well as the possibilities for future capitalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of International Public Administration Review / Mednarodna Revija za Javno Upravo is the property of University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Public Administration and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article provides a thorough investigation of the concept of institutional capacity applied to the case of EU Cohesion Policy. It presents part of the results of the SMART-IST project, funded under the ESPON Program, which comprised nine case studies across eight European regions. The article proposes and discusses three possible notions of institutional capacity: 1) the ability to come to terms with EU rules and procedures, 2) the capacity to use EU funds and procedures to bring forth local projects and strategies, 3) the capacity to use the competences built through managing EU policies in order to improve the overall quality of public administrations. Capacity building tools supporting such three types of capacity are presented and their effectiveness in improving capacity is discussed w ith respect to the ev idence collected across the case studies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines the scope and implications of socially responsible investing by public pension funds. Standard analytical methods from financial econometrics are applied to analyze a new dataset of the equity holdings of thirteen of the largest state government pension plans. Contrary to previous research, pension funds are found to be deeply engaged in socially responsible investing. Moreover, the recent performance of socially responsible investments is largely indistinguishable from that of the state pension funds. Much of this new socially responsible investing activity is due to the broadening definition of the term “socially responsible.” Policymakers and public pension fund managers should reconsider the term and, if necessary, redefine it more usefully. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Agencification, the practice of creating semi-autonomous public bodies based on a contractual relationship with a parent government, has spread across the industrialized and developing world. The main principles of this NPM-based reform are autonomy and result control. This study uses regression analysis with data from forty-four executive agencies in Korea to examine the effect of these factors on organizational performance. The results show that both human resource management autonomy and financial autonomy have statistically significant negative relationships with performance, whereas systems for performance evaluation and rewards for result control are significantly and positively related to the performance of executive agencies in Korea. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, Kyrgyzstan went through radical economic reforms to transition from a command to a market-based economy. The governance system had to be rebuilt to reflect the country’s shift from socialist ideology to free-market, democratic regime. Despite numerous reforms undertaken by the Kyrgyz Government to restructure its civil service, these efforts have fallen short in creating such a civil service system. To understand the reasons for the limited results achieved by reforms, this article examines formal rules regulating Kyrgyzstan’s civil service and assesses how they are implemented in practice. Key aspects of Kyrgyzstan’s civil service such as recruitment, selection, promotion, compensation, job security, and performance appraisal are examined. The article juxtaposes formal rules governing key elements of the civil service to the actual practices of the government. In conclusion, I offer an assessment of why civil service reforms produced inadequate results. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

For successful local administration process people working in the local public administration system need autonomy in carrying out the duties their function involves. One of the determining factors for autonomy at work is professional experience obtained in the field. In this respect, in this article we intend to analyze the link between the experience in local public administration system and the degree of autonomy exercised in the function held, by considering the specific situation of Suceava City Hall. The developed research has shown that a small professional experience tends to be associated with a low degree of autonomy and a high professional experience tends to be associated with a high degree of autonomy. The owners of a great professional experience demonstrate ability, skill and confidence in the performance of their duties, hence their ability to decide and act autonomously in the function held, and vice versa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]