Public Management

The Provincial Agency for Sustainable Development (OPDS) and municipalities under the law of industrial settlement: delegation and decentralization in provincial regionalization.

by Federico Del Giorgio Solfa

Co-authored with Luciana Mercedes Girotto, published in VII Congreso de Medio Ambiente de la AUGM, May 22th - 24th 2012.

Environmental issues are oriented towards clean production, that is, a preventive strategy against contamination and a... more Environmental issues are oriented towards clean production, that is, a preventive strategy against contamination and a key point in the environmental policy. There is a trend to generate a sustainable productive development, including the environmental dimension. Among the rules and regulations, the General Environmental Act of the Province of Buenos Aires (Law No. 11723) seeks to protect, preserve, enhance and restore natural resources within the territory. This Act also compels the Provincial Executive Branch and the Municipalities to guarantee environmental rights, environmental policy principles as well as an environmental impact assessment on industries. This paper shows the relationship between the provincial institution for sustainable development (OPDS, in Spanish) - as the authority to enforce the law- and the municipalities within the Province of Buenos Aires. Municipalities were classified according to their productive features and resources. The industrial profile of each municipality was analyzed and the need for more exhaustive and direct control was determined in order to strengthen environmental protection. Advantages and obstacles (operative, legal and economic) from a local and a provincial perspective were also analyzed in order to delegate the OPDS faculties to Municipalities so the latter can issue environmental certificates and control industrial business. After this analysis, some proposals were made in order to strengthen  environmental actions taken by the provincial government.. Two lines were stated to improve the control of productive enterprises to achieve sustainable development: 1. trengthening the idea of the delegating OPDS faculties to municipalities, 2. decentralizing OPDS in the provincial program.

El horizonte en la temática ambiental es la producción limpia, estrategia preventiva de la contaminación e instrumento clave de la política ambiental. La tendencia es generar un desarrollo productivo sustentable, incorporando la dimensión ambiental. Entre las normativas, la Ley N° 11.723 “Ley de Medio Ambiente”, tiene por objeto la protección, conservación, mejoramiento y restauración de los recursos naturales y del ambiente, en la Provincia de Buenos Aires. La misma, obliga a que el Poder Ejecutivo Provincial y los Municipios, garanticen los derechos ambientales y los principios de política ambiental; al mismo tiempo que cada emprendimiento industrial cuente con una evaluación de impacto ambiental. En este contexto, el presente trabajo da cuenta de la relación existente entre el Organismo Provincial para el Desarrollo Sostenible (OPDS) -como Autoridad de Aplicación de la Ley- y los Municipios bonaerenses. Se clasificó a los Municipios, tomando en cuenta sus características productivas y recursos territoriales. Se diagnosticó el perfil industrial de cada municipio y se determinaron las necesidades de controles más directos y exhaustivos, para el fortalecimiento de la protección medioambiental. También se analizaron ventajas y obstáculos –operativos, legales y económicos- desde las perspectivas municipal y provincial, para la delegación de facultades del OPDS a los Municipios, en la expedición de Certificados Ambientales y las fiscalizaciones de los establecimientos industriales (Art. 2°, Ley N° 11.459). Una vez realizado el diagnóstico y el análisis respectivo, concluimos con algunas propuestas tendientes a alinear está temática con los principales ejes del gobierno provincial (PBA, 2011) y de esta manera, fortalecer la gestión medioambiental. Se desarrollan dos líneas: 1. Fortalecimiento de la delegación de facultades del OPDS a los Municipios; y, 2. Descentralización del OPDS en el marco del Programa de Regionalización Provincial. Entendiendo que a partir de estas propuestas, se podría mejorar el control de los emprendimientos productivos, logrando un desarrollo sustentable.

Factors Influencing Effectiveness of the Provincial Administrative Organizations in Providing Infrastructure Public Services

by Voharn Yasarawan

The objectives of this research were: (1) to study the effectiveness of Provincial Administrative Organizations in... more The objectives of this research were: (1) to study the effectiveness of Provincial Administrative Organizations in providing infrastructure public services under the concept of Balanced Scorecard from 4 perspectives, i.e., internal process perspective, financial perspective, learning and growth perspective and customer perspective; (2) to study factors influencing effectiveness of Provincial Administrative Organizations in providing  infrastructure public services under the concept  of  Steers from 4 types, i.e., the organizational structure, the organizational environment, the individuals in the organization and policy of administration and operation; (3) to create forecasting equations to forecast the effectiveness of Provincial Administrative Organizations in providing infrastructure public services; and (4) to study guidelines for developing the provision of  infrastructure public services of Provincial Administrative Organizations. The results revealed that: (1) the effectiveness of Provincial Administrative Organizations in providing infrastructure public services was at a high level; (2) organizational structure factors, organizational environment factors, and the individuals in the organization factors had a positive relationship with the effectiveness of Provincial Administrative Organizations in providing infrastructure public services at a rather high level, and policy of administration and operation factors had a positive relationship with the effectiveness of Provincial Administrative Organizations in providing infrastructure public services at a  rather high level; and (3) the variables of organizational culture, communication, change management, strategic management, organizational structure, conflict management, technology, motivation, personnel quality, and politics and law can jointly interpret the variance of the effectiveness of Provincial Administrative Organizations in providing infrastructure public services at 77%.

Spicuiri din studiul diagnostic privind coruptia in administratia locala

by Codru Vrabie

prezentare realizată cu ocazia finalizării studiului diagnostic privind corupţia din administraţia publică locală; partener Totem Research & Communication; client Ministerul Administraţiei şi Internelor; finanţator Fondul Social European/AMPODCA;  documentele finale sunt disponibile la http://modernizare.mai.gov.ro/UCRAP/faces/wcm/templates/page/U/publications/publications-sa-list.jspx?_adf.ctrl-state=gyraxp8p8_17&_afrLoop=4933969669410083

Embracing Disciplinary Diversity: Public Administration Education in Italy

by Denita Cepiku

Paper prepared for the XXII World Congress of Political Science (IPSA)
Madrid, July 8-12, 2012

The paper presents a statistical analysis exploring public administration education in Italian universities. It aims... more The paper presents a statistical analysis exploring public administration education in Italian universities. It aims at verifying if the administrative law approach to university-based public administration teaching is still prevalent in Italy – as stated by the literature, as well as the extent of development of other disciplinary orientations. The research also highlights the main specificities of public administration education in Italy with reference to the disciplinary character, the geographical distribution, the type and level of PA programs, etc. It aims at describing how universities are adjusting curricula in relation to public sector modernization, by comparing the main faculties (economics and management sciences, law, political sciences, sociology, engineering, sciences of communication, social sciences) of all Italian universities.
Information from 204 faculties of 72 universities was gathered. 2.198 education programs at different levels were registered and classified.
Overall evidence suggests that the legal cluster, including but not limited to administrative law, is not the prevalent approach in teaching public administration in Italy. The public cluster - mainly political sciences and public economy approach - is instead widespread in Italian universities. Furthermore, there is a strong, yet more recent, development of the managerial approach.

Call for papers: FINANCIAL SUSTAINABILITY AND CUTBACK MANAGEMENT: GLOBAL ISSUES FOR PUBLIC ORGANISATIONS

by Denita Cepiku

Papers are encouraged on long term financial sustainability and cutback management as emerging critical issues faced... more Papers are encouraged on long term financial sustainability and cutback management as emerging critical issues faced by Public Sector Organisations. Serious questions surround the ongoing viability of States, Universities and Local Governments both in terms of financial sustainability, financial as well non-financial performance.
Papers will be selected for publication in one Special Issue of Public Money & Management. The goal of the conference and special issues is to advance the knowledge on a world-wide phenomenon to all public organisations’ stakeholders (academic researchers, practitioners, state and local government organizations, international organisations - such as EC, IMF, WB and OECD - and rating agencies, media and the public, among others) due to its significant implications on the political, social, and economics state of affairs.

Deadline for submission of papers for the Euram Mini-Conference: October 1, 2012

Book review: La Réforme administrative en Nouvelle Zélande et en Australie dans les années 80s et 90s. Etat des lieux.

by Mahama Tawat

Cet article passe en revue la littérature sur les réformes administratives introduites en Nouvelle Zélande et en Australie à la fin des années 1980s. Malgré de nombreuses similitudes entre les deux pays, chacun adopta une stratégie différente. La Nouvelle Zélande, contrairement à l' Australie et plus que tout autre pays occidental, appliqua les Nouvelles Politiques Managériales (NPM). Cet article résume tous les livres qui ont été publiés sur le sujet à ce jour.
This article takes stock of the existing literature on the adoption and implementation of New Public Management (NPM) in Australia and New Zealand in the 1980s and 1990s. Despite strong similarities between both countries, New Zealand unlike Australia and indeed any other Western country implemented NPM.

Performance management in primary healthcare services: evidence from a field study

by Paulino Silva

Co-authored with Aldónio Ferreira published in Qualitative Research in Accounting and Management

Purpose – There is a growing interest in research focusing on performance management practices in the public sector,... more Purpose – There is a growing interest in research focusing on performance management practices in the public sector, but research is still limited with regards to public primary healthcare services (PHSs), which play an important role in national healthcare systems. These organisations are frequently criticised for alleged poor performance management practices and misuse of resources, though such claims are not always substantiated. The purpose of this study is to examine performance management practices in public PHSs.

Design/methodology/approach – Three case studies of PHSs organisations were conducted resulting in interview material and archival data. Otley's performance management framework was used to examine the data.

Findings – It is found that the performance management systems of the studied PHSs were disjoint and lacked consistency and coherence. Lack of direction and motivational were key issues in PHSs. Furthermore, the observations indicate that vertical controls between PHSs and parent organisation were weak and accountability poor.

Research limitations/implications – Generalisability of findings and social desirability bias are the important limitations. A key research implication is that the conceptual framework adopted can be meaningfully used to generate insights into performance management issues in public sector healthcare organisations.

Practical implications – The study highlights the implications of the poor design and use of performance management systems and highlights areas for improvement in the organisations studied, and potentially across the sector.

Originality/value – This study is the first to draw upon Otley's performance management framework to examine performance management practices in PHSs and to demonstrate its usefulness in this context.

Playing tick-box games: Interrelating defences in professional appraisal

by Gerry McGivern

McGivern, G. & Ferlie, E. 2007, ‘Playing Tick Box Games: Interrelating Defences in Professional Appraisal’, Human Relations, 60 (9) 1361-1385.

We here examine the introduction of appraisal for senior medical professionals. Our recent qualitative field research... more We here examine the introduction of appraisal for senior medical professionals. Our recent qualitative field research found four main experiences of appraisal (developmental, disappointed reflection, defensive assessment and cynical dismissal of appraisal as a waste of time), which we developed into a typology. We argue many professionals `play tick-box games' to give the impression of auditable practice while continuing to practise in a traditional way. We develop existing theory on the `audit society', social defences and `mock bureaucracy' to explain interrelating defences which occur in appraisal as a reaction to the risks and conflict experienced in professional regulation.

(2007) Avances y obstáculos en el fortalecimiento del Estado en Centroamérica y República Dominicana: un análisis de la capacidad institucional, la reforma de la administración y la gestión pública.

by Eloisa del Pino

Madrid: INAP. (Con CÉSAR COLINO,  IGNACIO MOLINA y SALVADOR PARRADO).

El trabajo abarca a siete países (Centroamérica y República Dominicana) y atiende a cuatro ámbitos en los que se han... more El trabajo abarca a siete países (Centroamérica y República Dominicana) y atiende a cuatro ámbitos en los que se han centrado las actuaciones de reforma administrativa en los Gobiernos Centrales. A) Apoyo a la profesionalización del servicio civil. B) Apoyo a las reformas institucionales de las estructuras administrativas. C) Mejora de los sistemas de diseño y ejecución de políticas públicas y servicios públicos. D) Mejora de la legitimidad del sistema mediante la lucha contra la corrupción. En cada uno de estos ámbitos se ha analizado los avances y las herramientas en materia de modernización administrativa y sus condicionantes políticos y técnicos en la década de los noventa y de principios de este siglo.
Se ha pretendido realizar un análisis sistemático, tanto exhaustivo como comparativo, de los programas de reforma acometidos por las administraciones centrales de estos países.

Bringing Change in Government Organizations: Evolution Towards Post-Bureaucracy with Web-Based IT Projects

by Maria Christina Binz-Scharf

Co-authored with Emmanuelle Vaast, published in ICIS Proceedings 2008, p. 213

This paper examines the following question: How do government organizations become more “post-bureaucratic” with... more This paper examines the following question: How do government organizations become more “post-bureaucratic” with web-based IT projects? It draws on evolutionary thinking to conceptualize processes of change in government organizations as involving sequences of variation, selection, and retention as well as to identify various sources of change: internal ones (e.g. administrators), as well as external ones (e.g. technological innovations and institutional pressures). The paper relates findings from four in-depth qualitative case studies of web-based IT projects in different government organizations. The interpretation of these findings helps expand the evolutionary conceptualization by suggesting how different sources of change interact in the change process and variously affect different stages of the evolution.

Lending a Helping Hand: Voluntary Engagement In Knowledge Sharing

by Maria Christina Binz-Scharf

Co-authored with Ines Mergel and David Lazer, published 2008 in International Journal of Learning and Change 3(1), pp. 5-22

Knowledge is essential for the functioning of every social system, especially for professionals in knowledge-intensive... more Knowledge is essential for the functioning of every social system, especially for professionals in knowledge-intensive organisations. Since individuals do not possess all the work-related knowledge that they require, they turn to others in search for that knowledge. While prior research has mainly focused on antecedents and consequences of knowledge sharing and understanding why people do not share knowledge, less is known why people provide knowledge, and what conditions trigger voluntary engagement in knowledge sharing. Our article addresses this gap by proposing a multi-level framework for voluntary engagement in knowledge sharing: individual, relational, group, and informational. We provide illustrations from a particular knowledge-intensive community, DNA forensic scientists who work at public laboratories.

A New Order of Things: Management Novelty and Cooperation in E-Government Projects

by Maria Christina Binz-Scharf

Co-authored with David Lazer

In this paper, we explore the challenges of managing e-government projects. In particular, we highlight two... more In this paper, we explore the challenges of managing e-government projects. In particular, we highlight two extraordinary managerial challenges that e-government poses: novelty and cross-agency cooperation. E-government is novel because it offers some fundamentally new possibilities for how government does business. The management of e-government is, in significant part, the management of ideas, creativity, and knowledge. E-government requires cross-agency cooperation because of functional needs for scale, consistency, and integration. We examine how four governments that have adopted a project-based approach to the introduction of e-government have coped with the challenges of novelty and cross-agency collaboration. Our findings indicate that e-government projects experience different activities and coordination mechanisms according to the stage of completion of the project and the complexity of the task at hand. We discuss the implications of our findings for the management of e-government projects.

"The managerial work of Italian City Managers: an empirical analysis"

by Alessandro Sancino

"Le caratteristiche del lavoro del city manager: una ricerca esplorativa"

by Alessandro Sancino

"Between democracy and management: local government and the dilemma of spoils system. An analysis of the UK model"

by Alessandro Sancino

"Community governance as a response to economic crisis"

by Alessandro Sancino

"L'attuazione della public governance negli enti locali: implicazioni per il management"

by Alessandro Sancino

(2005) “Attitudes, performance and institutions: Spanish citizens and public administrations”

by Eloisa del Pino

Public Performance and Management Review, 28, 4: 512-531.

This article presents the two perspectives that have analyzed citizens' attitudes toward public administration: a... more This article presents the two perspectives that have analyzed citizens' attitudes toward public administration: a macro-perspective on democratic governance versus studies on micro-performance. The article aims to compensate for some of the analytic problems existing in each perspective related to public administration. An approach is proposed that assumes the complex nature of public administration and tries to overcome the shortcomings of the democratic governance school, which focuses solely on variations in the attitudes of the subjects and not so much on their object (administrative institutions and outputs). It also seeks to avoid some of the methodological pitfalls in studies focusing too narrowly on the performance of particular public organizations. Using the case of Spain to apply the concepts of process and structure congruence, the article shows how citizens' attitudes toward public administration are primarily influenced by political culture, specific public activities, and institutional design.

Council of Disabled People as an Application of Participatory Democracy [The Case of Bursa, Turkey]

by Serhat Ozgokceler

The aim of this study is to emphasize that the Council of Disabled People that become meaningful
under the... more The aim of this study is to emphasize that the Council of Disabled People that become meaningful
under the perspective of the conception of participatory democracy is a tool of social inclusion and
equality policies for the disabled people. The method of in-depth interview was utilized in the study.
The findings obtained from the interview with active members from the Administrative Board of
Council of Disabled People designate that the disabled people have a say in the fields such as business,
politics, culture, education, health etc., that they help the disabled people to improve their sense of
participation into urban life and their feeling of belongingness to the city, that whatever required is
done to make sure that the rights and benefits of the disabled are protected, that a public opinion is
forged through the means of communication for the solution of the problems of the disabled people, and
that based on the needs and problems of the disabled people, demands are determined and it is ensured
that they play an active role in the production of solutions and projects. The interviews have been
made face to face with the disabled people who are the members of the Council of Disabled People of the
Bursa City Council within the body of the Metropolitan Municipality of Bursa and the names of the
interviewees are to stay anonymous.

Keywords: Participatory democracy, Council of Disabled People, social inclusion, social exclusion,
local governments

(2010) “Cómo escuchar, cómo aprender y cómo responder: las encuestas ciudadanas como una herramienta para la reinvención del gobierno” [Listening, learning and responding: Citizen surveys as a tool of government reinvention]

by Eloisa del Pino

en M. Villoria y J. Ruiz-Huerta. Gobernanza Democrática y Fiscalidad: una reflexión sobre las instituciones. Madrid: Tecnos. (WIITH GREGG VAN RYZIN).

This paper presents a pragmatic overview of the topic of citizen satisfaction surveys and their role in government... more This paper presents a pragmatic overview of the topic of citizen satisfaction surveys and their role in government reform and modernization. It begins with a look at the debate about viewing citizens as customers of government, a surprisingly contentious idea among public administration scholars and one closely associated with the New Public Management (NPM). Despite the ongoing intellectual debate, several nations have implemented successful systems of citizen satisfaction measurement and reporting over the last few decades, including the UK, Canada, the USA, Spain and the European Union, and these international experiences are both encouraging and instructive. The paper then turns to the question of how to listen to citizens – that is, how to gather feedback from citizens about government performance – and how to learn – that is, how to analyze and making sense of citizens satisfaction data. Finally, the paper concludes with some ideas about how to respond to citizen satisfaction or dissatisfaction – what governments can do to boost satisfaction and gain the trust of citizens in the process of government reform and modernization.