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This paper addresses the degree to which new public management (NPM) has continued to be an influential model for central government reform in Australia and New Zealand, two early adopters and exemplars of NPM. We analyse recent reform agendas and their impact on NPM in both countries. Several institutional and other types of explanations are provided for why NPM is retained, modified, or revived. NPM systems may resist or be diluted by new layers, or the incorporation of techniques and approaches from reform menus, producing revival, discontinuity and forms of hybridization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Trust in government and its antecedents and development remain leading policy and research concerns. Drawing on a broadly representative online survey of 3100 respondents in Japan, we examine measures of trust in three local government actors. We find political participation is not associated with trust in local government, contrary to our expectations. Civic participation is associated with trust in the mayor, but not councillors or administrators. Satisfaction with services provided by local government, and positive perceptions of policy process, are associated with trust, with interactions suggesting process is the stronger antecedent. To develop greater trust in local government, it is important that public sector actors exhibit respect for rights and follow procedure, laws, and regulations, as well as deliver positive outcomes. Points for practitioners: Building trust in government remains a key concern for policy makers, as it is related to successful adoption of policies. Trust in local government in Japan is related to perceived performance and citizen satisfaction. Civic participation is also related to some forms of trust in government. However, possibly more important are citizen perceptions that policy processes respect rights, procedures, and laws. To increase trust in government, practitioners need to practice, and show that they practice, good processes in developing and delivering policy, and show that policy leads to better perceived outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9299.2010.01848.x Byline: SHAUN GOLDFINCH (1), JOE WALLIS (2) Abstract: The literature on public management reform exhibits two intertwined convergence myths. First, a world-wide consensus on a new public management (NPM) reform agenda is seen to exist amongst policy reformers and practitioners. If this agenda is not fully implemented in all cases, this is generally explained by political and reform setbacks rather than disagreement on policy aims. Second, this NPM agenda is now seen as challenged and even abandoned and replaced by an emergent post-NPM or 'public value leadership' agenda and/or policy paradigm. We show the NPM convergence is overstated, with a remarkable resilience of existing institutions, and a diversity of public management systems. On the other hand, even within NPM exemplars that have putatively now adopted a post-NPM agenda, there is debate to what degree NPM has been abandoned, and over the novelty, coherence and resilience of the post-NPM agenda. Divergence and contextual variation prevail. The role of myth in policy reform is further examined. Author Affiliation: (1)Shaun Goldfinch is Associate Professor at Nottingham University Business School, University of Nottingham. (2)Joe Wallis is Professor and Head of Department, Management, Marketing and Public Administration in the School of Business and Management, American University of Sharjah, UAE. Article History: Date received 24 July 2009. Date accepted 31 July 2009.

To authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8500.2009.00643.x Byline: Shaun Goldfinch (*), Robin Gauld ([dagger]), Peter Herbison ([dagger]) Keywords: e-government; participation; trust in government Abstract: Drawing on 438 telephone interview surveys in Australia and 500 in New Zealand, we find evidence of a 'participation divide' where those participating in politics do so using a range of means, including electronic ones. Those less likely to participate in politics, are less likely to participate across all means measured. Those with higher levels of education and income and of European ethnicity are more likely to participate. We confirm the existence of the so-called 'digital divide' with those that use e-government means and those that do not, being stratified by education, ethnicity, income, gender and age. Contrary to our expectations we find that lower levels of trust in government are associated with higher levels of some types of participation, including e-government ones. Author Affiliation: (*)Nottingham University Business School ([dagger])University of Otago

A study was conducted to find the nature of relationship between the Australian and New Zealand business communities. Findings reveal that relationship between Australian and New Zealand business communities are much deeper than bi-lateral trading relationships.

The New Zealand economy before the election of the Fourth Labour Government in 1984 is often portrayed as something not only highly regulated--but as something uniquely so amongst developed nations, with a stagnant economy declining in the post-war era and nearing collapse by the 1984 election--the Polish shipyard. We show that New Zealand was not overly-regulated by the standards of the time, with many of its policies reflecting development elsewhere; it was generally liberalising in the post-war era; and its economic decline and supposed collapse have been considerably overstated. This invented history gave impetus to radical economic reform alter 1984 by framing the apparently failed and bizarre past as forcing inevitable solutions. It is an important constraint on policy-making in New Zealand, allowing policy to develop only along certain ''appropriate' paths. It provided cohesion for policy makers in the face of less than certain results and harnessed emotional and intellectual energy towards the free-market quest, while legitimating certain policy directions and de-legitimating others.

Article citation rates and article productivity for Australasian units are measured. The University of Otago has the highest ranking of 9 citations per article.

The paper examines the sources of the key economic policy decisions In Australia's Hawke and Keating Labor governments. The author rejects the belief that central agencies were the key influence in economic policy and shows that other people and institutions were also important.

A reply that refutes Clair Donovan's analysis on the illusory nature of citation rankings to measure research in Australasian political science units is presented.

An older body of research claims variously: a world‐wide transformation from new public management (NPM) to new public governance or post new public management (post‐NPM); a 'layering', where new management rhetoric and techniques are layered upon existing ones; or a 'hybridisation' synthesised from competing systems. More recent studies, particularly in central and Eastern Europe, suggest a nuanced and context‐specific degree of transformation. Influenced by a growing research interest in citizen perceptions of public management, this study expands this more nuanced approach by surveying local government public management perceptions of 1,140 New Zealand and 3,100 Japanese citizen online survey respondents. Using principal component analysis, we show both New Zealand and Japan exhibit degrees of hybridisation of public management paradigms, with Japan exhibiting a higher degree of eclecticism. Citizens perceptions of public management change in Japan and New Zealand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]