Time for a revival? Public policy implementation: a review of the literature and an agenda for future research

This paper argues that there is not a vigorous contemporary literature in the UK which addresses implementation studies as part of the public policy process, whereas this is not the case in the USA. A review of the literature is presented, and a critique of the more traditional thematic groupings used to review the literature is given. A revised thematic review of the literature is presented based on the four themes of: (1) the role of knowledge and learning in policy implementation; (2) the processes of policy implementation; (3) the role of actors and agents in implementation; and (4) the role of bureaucratic discretion. The paper argues for a revival of research into public policy implementation and suggests a research agenda for the future which can use the aforementioned themes from the literature.     

The Role of Emotion in Global Warming Policy Support and Opposition

Prior research has found that affect and affective imagery strongly influence public support for global warming. This article extends this literature by exploring the separate influence of discrete emotions. Utilizing a nationally representative survey in the United States, this study found that discrete emotions were stronger predictors of global warming policy support than cultural worldviews, negative affect, image associations, or sociodemographic variables. In particular, worry, interest, and hope were strongly associated with increased policy support. The results contribute to experiential theories of risk information processing and suggest that discrete emotions play a significant role in public support for climate change policy. Implications for climate change communication are also discussed.     

Bridging the Gap? The Role of Regional Governance in Delivering Effective Local Public Services: Evidence from England

Between 2004 and 2010 local area agreements (LAAs) represented a key part of the New Labour Government's agenda for local government in England, which centred on increasing the level of involvement that local areas had in the issues affecting them. To deliver this agenda, New Labour deployed government offices for the regions (GOR) to negotiate with localities on behalf of central government. As part of a broader consideration of the role of regional governance structures in delivering local public services, this paper draws upon the results of a national survey of LAA practitioners in England, and findings from more detailed case study work, to consider the role of GOR in the LAA process. These findings examine the role GOR played in negotiating LAA targets and the extent to which these negotiations allowed local areas to respond to local issues and priorities. Then, by considering local enterprise partnerships and the recently established combined authorities, the paper will consider how localism policy under the Conservative–Liberal Democrat Coalition government, who came to power in 2010, has responded to the lessons of the LAA. In doing so, the paper seeks to fit into the wider discussion about how local public services can be delivered effectively and draw out the challenges faced by those trying to link local and central policy together.     

Anticipating or Accommodating to Public Concern? Risk Amplification and the Politics of Precaution Reexamined

Regulatory use of the precautionary principle (PP) tends to be broadly characterized either as a responsible approach for safeguarding against health and environmental risks in the face of scientific uncertainties, or as “state mismanagement” driven by undue political bias and public anxiety. However, the “anticipatory” basis upon which governments variably draw a political warrant for adopting precautionary measures often remains ambiguous. Particularly, questions arise concerning whether the PP is employed preemptively by political elites from the “top down,” or follows from more conventional democratic pressures exerted by citizens and other stakeholders from the “bottom up.” This article elucidates the role and impact of citizen involvement in the precautionary politics shaping policy discourse surrounding the U.K. government's “precautionary approach” to mobile telecommunications technology and health. A case study is presented that critically reexamines the basis upon which U.K. government action has been portrayed as an instance of anticipatory policy making. Findings demonstrate that the use of the PP should not be interpreted in the preemptive terms communicated by U.K. government officials alone, but also in relation to the wider social context of risk amplification and images of public concern formed adaptively in antagonistic precautionary discourse between citizens, politicians, industry, and the media, which surrounded cycles of government policy making. The article discusses the sociocultural conditions and political dynamics underpinning public influence on government anticipation and responsiveness exemplified in this case, and concludes with research and policy implications for how society subsequently comes to terms with the emergence and precautionary governance of new technologies under conflict.     

Risk Communication as Government Agency Organizational Practice

The dynamics of organizational risk communication is an understudied topic in risk research. This article investigates how public officials at six government agencies in Sweden understand and relate to risk communication and its uses in the context of agency organizational work on policy and regulation. Qualitative interviews were used to explore the practitioners’ views on some key topics in the academic literature on risk communication. A main finding is that there is little consensus on what the goals of risk communication are; if, and how, uncertainty should be communicated; and what role is to be played by transparency in risk communication. However, the practitioners agree that dissemination (top down) to the public of robust scientific and expert knowledge is a crucial element. Dialogue and participation is used mainly with other agencies and elite stakeholders with whom agencies collaborate to implement policy goals. Dialogue with the public on issues of risk is very limited. Some implications of the findings for the practice of risk communication by government agencies are suggested.     

The More You Give,the More You Get? The Impact of Corporate Political Activity on the Value of Government Contracts

Firms have been relying on corporate political activity (CPA) to achieve access and to affect public policy change for decades. Most research on CPA and public policy outcomes has implicitly assumed that access afforded by CPA results in an either‐ or (dichotomous) policy outcome such as votes or election outcomes. Based on recent research on how CPA can be a strategic signal to government agencies, however, it is possible that CPA may in fact, have a linear association with public policy outcomes as opposed to merely a dichotomous one, and we explore this relationship in the unique public policy context of government contract awards. We specifically analyze how higher levels of CPA impact the financial value of government contracts awarded to firms. Utilizing the S&P 1500 sample for 16 years (1997–2012) we find that CPA has a one to one association with the value of contract awards, indicating that CPA and public policy outcomes can be linked in ways that motivate firms to continuously invest in CPA, to maximize their political rents. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of this finding in light of extant research on CPA and its direct impact on public policy outcomes.     

企业非市场与市场行为及其竞争特点对企业绩效的影响研究

随着我国企业步入激烈的动态竞争时代,企业的成功不仅依赖于产品和服务、分销渠道、供应链、价格等市场行为,也依赖于企业与政府、社会公众以及各种利益相关者之间的关系等非市场行为.本文首先提出了一个企业非市场、市场行为(或回应)及其竞争特点与企业绩效关系的理论模型及其相关假设,然后以2004年至2006年我国钢铁、汽车、医药、日化、电力和电信等六个行业中的30家企业的非市场与市场行为为样本,通过结构内容分析方法对有关企业竞争行为新闻报道的编码数据进行处理和信效度检验,接着在对各种非市场与市场行为频数统计和独立样本T检验的基础上,运用回归方程模型进一步分别检验了非市场与市场行为及其竞争特点对企业绩效的影响.最后,本文将研究结果与中国企业现实情况进行了相互对照,并提出了研究结论和相关启示.     

11 The Effects of Governments on Management and Organization

Abstract

We review and integrate existing research from organization theory, strategy, organizational behavior, economics, sociology and political science on the effects of governments on organization and management, with a focus on how governing ideology and government capability influence independent organizations’ forms, strategies, and their participants’ behavior. When brought together these works suggest significant research opportunities in the fields of management and organization, as well as new perspectives on public policy challenges. Several avenues of potentially profitable empirical research include more attention to the influence of government on corporate strategies, more research on the strategies of pursuing corruption and government capture for competitive advantage, the role of government in fostering innovation and the growth of entrepreneurial organizations, and extra‐organizational contextual effects on managerial and employee organizational behavior. Possible public policy implications are illustrated with an application to the role of organizations in national wealth generation and dispersion.     

中国房地产限售政策对房价的影响研究——兼论限售和限购的政策组合效应

自2017年3月以来，中国多个城市相继出台了房地产限售政策。本文基于2017年1月至2018年5月的全国城市月度数据，针对限售政策分期出台的实际情况，构建更具适用性的多期双重差分模型（Multi-Stage Difference-in-Difference），分别从国家和城市层面实证分析了限售政策平抑房价的效果及其异质性。在此基础上，又对限售政策和限购政策的联合效应进行研究。研究结果表明：房地产限售政策能显著平抑房价且效果具有异质性。具体而言，在国家层面，限售政策对房价的平抑效果二手房强于新房、小户型强于中大户型；在城市层面，其平抑房价的效果一线城市强于二三线城市、中西部城市强于东部城市。此外，双限政策的联合效果优于单一限售政策。以上研究对进一步发掘限售政策的独特价值具有现实意义。     

New Public Management,Service Provision and Non-Governmental Organizations in Bangladesh

New public management (NPM) is now a universal phenomenon dominating the reform agenda of all countries. Bangladesh is no exception. Following the dismal performance of the state-led development the old paradigm of public sector has come under scrutiny. There is now a call for a minimal government. The scale of operations and the role of the government have to be drastically reduced to focus on core functions. In doing so, this will pave the way for the private sector and the civil society organizations to undertake developmental responsibilities in their areas of expertise. This article is an attempt to analyze the significant role played by Non-Government Organizations (NGOs) in rural development service provisions. It argues that the government has to share the developmental responsibilities with NGOs, which have proved their potential in reaching the target population and that an effective partnership is a sine qua non for the meaningful rural development in Bangladesh.     

中国农村公共支出及其绩效分析——基于农民收入增长和城乡收入差距的经验研究

本文运用1978～2004年的数据,采用多变量回归和Granger因果检验方法对农村公共支出、农民收入增长以及城乡收入差距之间的关系进行实证研究。结果显示,国家财政的农村支出对农民收入增长起到了一定的促进作用,但由于公共支出的管理、运用效率低下,其作用在统计上并不十分显著;从支出结构看,与农业生产直接相关的生产性支出和基本建设支出占比过高,而农业科研和社会福利等方面的支出过低,而且,由于政府重视程度不够和目标偏差,使得政府公共支出在降低城乡收入差距上的作用不甚明显,从而限制了政府增进社会福利功能的发挥,进而不利于公平增长的实现。在此基础上,本文进一步讨论了如何改变农村公共支出结构以及如何将公共支出政策与农村金融政策相结合等问题。     

GOVERNMENT SPENDING COMPOSITION,TECHNICAL CHANGE,AND WAGE INEQUALITY

In this paper we argue that government spending played a significant role in stimulating the wave of innovation that hit the U.S. economy in the late 1970s and in the 1980s, as well as the simultaneous increase in inequality and in education attainments. Since the late 1970s U.S. policymakers began targeting commercial innovations more directly and explicitly. We focus on the shift in the composition of public demand toward high‐tech goods, which, by increasing the market‐size of innovative firms, functions as a de facto innovation policy tool. We build a quality‐ladders non‐scale growth model with heterogeneous industries and endogenous supply of skills, and show that an increase in the technological content of public spending stimulates R&D, raises the wage of skilled workers, and, at the same time, stimulates human capital accumulation. A calibrated version of the model suggests that government policy explains between 12% and 15% of the observed increase in wage inequality in the period 1976–1991. (JEL: E62, J31, O33, O41)     

AD HOC MODEL BUILDING USING TIME-VARYING PARAMETER MODELS*

Decision support for managers and policy makers, such as required in planning and evaluation efforts, often requires ad hoc behavioral modeling to account for context-specific phenomena and to handle data limitations. This paper introduces a systematic approach useful for meeting these requirements in which time-varying parameter estimation plays an important role. A case study evaluating the impacts of public policy actions on residential natural gas conservation illustrates the approach.     

Residential Mortgages and Public Policy: What to do with Fannie and Freddie?

The current debate on U.S. housing policy focuses on the role of the government in supporting the mortgage market. Existing organizations (Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac) are in conservatorship status, and Congress is considering alternative structures and guarantees including the Johnson‐Crapo bill, to provide catastrophic insurance in support of the coverage from private companies. The resolution of this issue is complicated by the various activities involved in the issue—investment securities, public policy, macroeconomics, accounting, and insurance. This article reviews the impact of these activities on U.S. housing, with a discussion of the feasibility of creating a catastrophic insurance program similar to that of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. The federal government has successfully operated catastrophic insurance programs in support of private sector initiatives, and this experience—while certainly not perfect—may be a reasonable approach to the current Fannie/Freddie dilemma.     

Citizen Advisory Committees and Environmental Policy: What We Know, What's Left to Discover

Citizen Advisory Committees (CACs) are being used in increasing numbers to provide public input into environmental policy and management decisions. While there is a large body of literature consisting of guidelines for establishing and running CACs, the body of literature of empirical evaluations of CACs is markedly smaller. Fourteen empirical studies of CACs involved in environmental policy decisions (spanning the period from 1976 to 1994) are reviewed here, including case studies, large-scale surveys, and consultant reports. For each study consideration is given to the methods of study, the issues considered by the CACs, the organizations advised, the definitions of success used in the study, and the suggested factors contributing to the success, or lack of success, experienced by the CACs. The review shows that the influence of CACs on policy outcomes have varied from case to case, with some accomplishing little and others having significant policy impacts. The increased use of CACs by government and industry presents an excellent opportunity for academics and practitioners to strengthen their understanding of the internal processes and capabilities of CACs through comparative evaluation research.     

公众社区参与意愿对危化品危害利益相关者感知的影响

面对危化品危害,政府及相关单位面临着日益严峻的既要保证公众知情,又要避免信息过度传播的难题,"信任"是导致这种沟通困境的重要因素。为解决危害信息有效沟通问题,从重构公众与政府之间信任关系的角度入手,以公众利益相关者感知衡量信任,探究公众社区参与意愿对利益相关者感知的影响关系,并将社区参与分为代表单向沟通的仪式性参与和代表双向沟通的实质性参与。研究结果表明:公众社区参与意愿有利于提升公众危化品危害利益相关者感知,特别是仪式性参与意愿的直接作用效果更为显著;实质性参与意愿和危害利益相关者感知的关系中,预决策过程起到完全中介的作用;危化品危害知识在社区参与意愿和利益相关者感知的影响关系中起到显著的正向调节作用,特别是在预决策过程与利益相关者感知的影响路径中。研究结论为构建公众和政府之间的信任关系,进而为缓解危化品危害信息沟通难题提供理论支撑和实践价值。     

货币供应机制与财政支出的乘数效应——基于DSGE的分析

本文通过构建包括货币供应机制的DSGE模型,分析了中国政府购买支出和公共投资支出的乘数效应,发现两类财政支出对私人消费和私人投资都产生了挤出效应,公共资本的产出弹性低是产生挤出效应的结构性原因,在中国货币供应机制减小对通货膨胀负向反应和增大对产出正向反应的配合下,政府购买支出和公共投资支出能够对私人消费和私人投资产生正向的挤入效应。     

PUBLIC DEBT UNDER LIMITED PRIVATE CREDIT

There is a conventional wisdom in economics that public debt can serve as a substitute for private credit if private borrowing is limited. The purpose of this paper is to show that, while a government could in principle use such a policy to fully relax borrowing limits, this is not generally optimal. In our economy, agents invest in a short‐term asset, a long‐term asset, and government bonds. Agents are subject to idiosyncratic liquidity shocks prior to the maturity of the long‐term asset. We show that a high public debt policy fully relaxes private borrowing limits and is suboptimal. This is because agents expecting such a policy respond by investing less than is socially optimal in the short asset which can protect them in the event of a liquidity shock. The optimal policy is more constrained and it induces a wedge between the technological rate of return on the long asset and the rate of return on bonds. In such a regime, agents subject to liquidity shocks are also borrowing constrained, and this expectation of being borrowing constrained induces them to invest the optimal level in the short asset.     

Evaluating Citizen Advisory Boards: The Importance of Theory and Participant-Based Criteria and Practical Implications

The role of risk communication and public participation in environmental and public policy decision making has significantly increased over the last 15 years and remains an important social policy issue. In spite of this emphasis, government officials and participants in the process continue to struggle with what makes for "good" public participation. This study used two frameworks--one theoretical and one participant-based-to evaluate two U.S Army Restoration Advisory Boards (RABs). The theoretical framework explores the extent to which the RABs facilitate Habermas's idealized conditions of speech as related to fairness. Not surprisingly, we found that the two RABs do not consistently foster the idealized aspects of fairness suggested by Habermas. The participant-based criteria were elicited through interviews with participants from the various stakeholder groups represented on the RAB, direct observation of RAB meetings, and a review of RAB-related documents. We found that participants' value outcomes (the results of participatory processes) and not just the process itself, which is the focus of the theoretical framework. We also found that participants in the various stakeholder groups had different perceptions of the goals of the participatory process, which were closely related to their notions of success. Our results illustrate both the complexity and importance of using multiple frameworks for evaluating participatory efforts and the need for more systematic evaluation.     

Supply Policies in an Open Economy with Centralized Wage Setting

Abstract. In this paper we examine the effectiveness of a fiscal policy based on government subsidies to firms in an open economy, characterized by the “strategic” interaction of government and unions. Before developing the theoretical model, some evidence about government reaction functions for selected OECD countries is presented. The main theoretical results can be summed up as follows. A fiscal policy based on a tax-financed increase in government transfers to firms makes the country more competitive internationally, but reduces employment. Only when the increase in government transfers to firms is financed by the public debt is the fiscal policy able to achieve its two-fold aim of greater competitiveness and a higher level of employment.