A Contingency Approach to Decentralization

After decades of centralization, in 1980 the central government of the Netherlands embarked upon an ambitious project to decentralize the administrative system. It proclaimed a series of general decentralization measures that aimed to improve the performance of the administrative system and to boost local democracy. This article presents the results of research into the effects of these measures. It shows that the decentralization project did not meet the high expectations. This can be explained by the fact that the theoretical framework underlying the decentralization policy was overly simple. The authors present a new framework that represents the contingent character of the effects of decentralization.     

Local Governments Connecting to the Global Economy: Globalization as Catalyst in Governance of East African Cities

This article responds to two questions: first, how are large local governments in East Africa responding to the emerging global economy? Second, is globalization a catalyst in enhancing local governance in Nairobi, Kampala, and Dar es Salaam? The paper is an empirical analysis of strategies adopted by local government organizations in search of meeting challenges brought by a globalization. While there are some similarities in the strategies and processes adopted, the implementation pace varies across the three organizations. At the end, an attempt is made to explain these differences.     

人口结构、家庭资本与农民的政府满意度

基于2017年全国调查数据的分析,探讨中国农民对政府的满意度现状,并运用多元线性回归模型重点研究人口结构特征、家庭资本和政治资本对政府满意度的影响。研究发现：农民对各级政府的满意度从基层到高层依次递增,且总体上呈现出上升趋势。政治身份与农民的政府满意度呈正向关系,即党员和村干部身份的农民对政府的满意度相对更高。家庭年收入对政府满意度呈现出显著的正向影响,即家庭年收入越高,其对政府满意度就会越高;但家庭负债与政府满意度呈现出负相关性,即家庭越负债,其对政府满意度越低。农民对政策的满意度以及农民的政治认同感也对政府满意度有显著的正面影响,尤其是保障性政策满意度与国家认同度越高,农民对政府的满意度也会越高。     

Testing Wagner's Law in India: A cointegration and causality analysis

The present study empirically analyzes the validity of Wagner's Law for Indian economy. With the use of annual time series data from 1970–71 to 2013–14, all the six versions of Wagner's Law have been analyzed to test the relationship between government expenditure and gross domestic product. Wagner's Law states that the economic growth is the causative factor of the growth of the public expenditure. The study applied the unit root test and cointegration test to find the long-run relationship between government expenditure and gross domestic product. The present study employed the various econometric techniques such as unit root test, cointegration, and causality analysis for empirical analysis. The empirical analysis under study inferred mixed results of Wagner's Law for Indian economy, where four versions, namely Peacock, Gupta, Guffman, and Musgrave, found valid for Indian economy. The study concluded that the Wagner's Law is valid for the Indian economy except the Pryor and Mann Versions of the Wagner's Law.     

How to Evaluate Government Performance while Building a Rule of Law Government in China*

Building a law-based government is a central element of the comprehensive framework for promoting the rule of law in China, while using evaluation to catalyze growth is in line with the incentive principle of management studies. Since China started to implement reform and opening up over thirty years ago, rule of law development and organizational evaluation have gone through several stages, each with different characteristics. Efforts to build a law-based government have met with success, but what the country now has is essentially still goal-oriented assessment. At present, this suffers from the lack of a clear goal orientation or definition of functions, an imperfect technical system and unsound motivation mechanisms, not to mention the practical problems of each government department going its own way, duplicating evaluations or being left rudderless. Drawing on a combination of value rationality and instrumental rationality and using government performance evaluation to promote the building of a law-based government not only conforms to the spirit of the rule of law and value rationality in government performance, but also strengthens the role of evaluation as an instrument for organizational management. Therefore, we need to create new evaluation theories, expand public participation, introducing diversified evaluating entities, improve technical systems, strengthen institutional buildup, and foster a performance-based culture. In addition, replacing goal-oriented assessment with performance evaluation will help the emergence of a new discipline—the performance evaluation of rule of law government, thus promoting multidisciplinary efforts to integrate and create new public administration theories in China.     

地方政府审计职能软化问题研究

政府审计是对权力的监督和制约,现阶段,我国地方政府审计面临的发展困境主要是审计职能软化问题,针对地方政府审计存在的主要问题,剖析原因,从多角度提出解决审计职能软化的对策。     

试论中国政府形象构建的路径选择——以全球化为背景

良好的政府形象是政府巩固统治合法性的基础,是社会稳定和发展的必要条件,也是政府赢得国际良好声誉的保障。在全球化背景下,政府形象本身所承载的价值也被提升和扩展到全球,因此政府形象构建面临着前所未有的压力和挑战。就我国政府形象构建而言,应进一步增强形象塑造意识,着力构建能力型政府和开放型透明政府,以构建起理想的政府形象体系。     

汉代政府公务“招募”活动研究

汉代社会中广泛存在着雇佣关系,此种关系也被汉政府以＂招募＂的形式大量利用。除募兵外,汉政府在许多经济、政治活动中采用了＂招募＂的形式,像募凶杀人、募人出使、募人除害等。其薪酬除金钱给付外,还有封王赐爵、赐田宅、赦免罪行等。其有着自己的特点,如带有强制性、种类多样化、报酬多元性及非等价性、主体范围特别大。它们保证了政务活动的顺利实施,加强了社会的稳定,促进了社会经济的发展,优化了社会资源的配置。     

Global Governance,neoliberalism and national responses: The case of Bangladesh’s ready‐made garment (RMG) sector

This article on the ready‐made garment (RMG) sector of Bangladesh shows how over‐reliance on foreign capital for development financing and deregulated investment—a hallmark of neoliberal economic arrangements—undermines the incorporation of SDGs’ and INGOs’ equity principles, contributing to biased policy responses yielding unequal outcomes. The article cautions that while countries prioritize economic growth over social and environmental nourishment and continue to adopt neoliberal economic policies to promote economic growth, inequity is unavoidable, if not inevitable. Thus, the way forward may be to shift the focus of ‘development’ from the economy to society, to building ‘good societies’ where institutions and strategies, including those that contribute to economic growth, are organized such that these complement not compromise the evolution of such societies.     

Myths and realities about input subsidies in sub‐Saharan Africa

Using a recent public expenditure dataset, this article proposes a ‘reality check’ of the level and composition of input subsidies in nine African countries between 2006 and 2013. Results show that input subsidies (1) received close to 35% of agricultural‐specific expenditure on average and (2) cover a variety of interventions, including investments in capital, such as on‐farm irrigation, and in on‐farm services, such as inspection or training. Further, the figures show that input subsidies tended to become entrenched in agricultural budgets over time, leading to sub‐optimal execution rates, and were primarily funded by the national taxpayer, while donors invested more in public goods. Findings confirm that input subsidies crowded out other spending categories likely to be more supportive of long‐term agricultural development objectives. The article concludes that the political economy of input subsidies should be directed to making more concrete efforts to attain a better balance of public expenditure on agriculture. Furthermore, policy‐makers should aim to increase the efficiency and policy coherence of input subsidies, since merely abolishing them is likely to be unfeasible in the short term.