Truth in Public Life explores the difficulty in defining truth, its critical importance in civilised society and the challenges and threats to telling the truth in different public service settings. Three leading experts reflect on subjects related to truth in public life. Vernon White, in his essay 'Truth Pursued, or Being Pursued by Truth', shows that absolute truth exists and explains why and how it matters morally. In 'Truth Sustained', Stephen Lamport describes why truth is important to sustaining civilised society and argues that truth is central to other essential qualities, such as objectivity, honesty, openness, leadership, selflessness, integrity and accountability. In her essay 'Truth Told', Claire Foster-Gilbert explores the challenge of truth-telling for public servants: for politicians, who are routinely not believed; for civil servants, whose ministers may only want to hear those facts that support their policy ideas; for journalists, tempted to tell the story that is 'too good to check'; for judges, who may suffer from unconscious bias; for police officers, who must win the trust of the public by believing accusers, without jeopardising justice for the alleged perpetrators. This short book is a potent reminder of how important truth is, even as it is threatened afresh.

This multidisciplinary work explores ways of making environmental policy decisions in managing public goods and natural parks with the goal of maximizing economic benefits to society. The contributors to the volume seek the best strategies for improving the environmental sustainability and quality of a public resource by showing how to develop quantitative information about the natural area and how it interacts with the economy. Such an analysis can be used to define policies that encourage interactions among institutions, local economic agents and park users. At the same time, it provides a measure to account for the implications of those policies on the local economy.A public resource, such as a natural park, has many different functions - the production of marketed goods, ecosystem protection and tourism - and its management requires the knowledge of the physical, biological and ecological characteristics of the functions supplied by the resource, as well as the value of each function and the public resource as a whole. To ensure the implementation of the optimal practice, the contributors adopt a participative approach to establish a credible social contract between the area's public manager and its consumers. Balancing the interests of residents, visitors and local businesses, and coupling the development of both the natural potential of the area and the local economy, are necessary steps for the best strategy to be adopted. Economists and agricultural-environmental economists, forest and resource planners interested in practical guidance, and professors who teach environmental economics or forest planning courses will all find this collection invaluable and instructive.

The book is the first of its kind to attempt to deal with the economics of pensions and ageing on the basis of a rigorous theoretical framework alternative to neoclassical economics. Sergio Cesaratto breaks the dominant conformism in the current pension debate and explains that the strength of the various reforms proposed depends on the validity of the economic theories on which they are respectively based. He also illustrates the relevance of the Sraffian criticism to undermine the theoretical core of the mainstream proposals. Academics and practitioners interested in the pension debate, welfare state, income distribution and institutions will find Pension Reform and Economic Theory of great interest, as will demographers, political scientists and mainstream economists open to dissenting views in economic analysis and interested in understanding the economic foundations of pension reform proposals.

In almost every liberal democratic society, an issue that is a topic of constant and passionate public discussion is how much that country's ministers, legislators, senior civil servants, and senior judges should be paid. Nor is this surprising; the issue has considerable voyeuristic appeal, particular democratic significance, and important ramifications for the functioning of the public sector as a whole. However, like most political debates, these discussions tend to be messy, fragmented, and full of unverified assertions and spurious appeals to populist sentiment. It is hardly surprising that those discussions rarely succeed in putting the matter to rest. Paying Our High Public Officials examines the political discourse concerning this question in 17 liberal democracies (Canada, the United States, Mexico, Norway, Finland, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Poland, Italy, Hong Kong, Singapore, and New Zealand). Based on many hundreds of parliamentary debates, newspaper articles, speeches, as well as reports by think tanks and high commissions of state, the book identifies seven central arguments that occur in all these societies, translates them into the language of analytical philosophy, and then rigorously evaluates them. This approach contributes to a better understanding of this controversy and may result in better-justified and more legitimate conclusions concerning which policy to adopt.

Civil services in Western liberal democracies have undergone significant changes since the early 1980s, so much so that many of the traditional assumptions underpinning their role and operating practices have been fundamentally questioned. This volume explores a number of themes inherent in this transformation process and the significant problems encountered in modernizing civil services. The commitment to modernizing public services has been a constant trend of Western governments and has encompassed many approaches under a variety of labels, such as new public management and reinventing government. As a result of such developments, the public services of many countries have been transformed, with civil services being singled out for particular attention. This book critically examines the application of the modernization agenda in the old Commonwealth, the USA and Western Europe, including the institutions of the EU. Particular attention is given to developments in the British civil service, including the implications of devolved government, human rights legislation, and the Blair government's attempts to improve the policy process. For students and academics of public administration, public policy and comparative politics, this book will provide unrivalled coverage of one of the most critical issues in contemporary public management and policy.

Packed with international case examples and clearly delineating principles as they apply to public sector organizations, Lean for the Public Sector: The Pursuit of Perfection in Government Services demonstrates that Lean in the public sector is neither rocket science nor a typical profit-driven improvement program. The book begins with coverage of the basic philosophy of Lean before detailing specific methods for improving processes in the public sector. It addresses concerns specific to the public sector environment and considers the role of the citizen, not only as customer, but as a voter, taxpayer, and community participant. The author provides a clear explanation of methods such as 5S, kaizen, standardization techniques, and Value Stream Mapping shaped to Lean Government. His approach provides a reality-based view of value-added services and waste in the public sector. Written specifically to address the application of Lean practices in government and the public sector, this how-to workbook gives you the wherewithal to combat the 'We don't make widgets' mentality. Providing the tools to manage the entire Lean transformation process, the book helps you immediately integrate the Lean way of thinking and its tools into your improvement program.

Networks have been described in terms of metaphors, governance arrangements and structural or institutional arrangements. These different perspectives of networks come out of a variety of disciplines, including political science, public administration, urban affairs, social welfare, public management and organizational/sociological research. This wealth of research, while contributing to a deeper understanding of networks, presents a dilemma which is addressed by this book. That is the question of whether there is a theory of public networks that informs networks in their various forms, and is there a need for a new theory of networks? More importantly, is network research still relevant to practice? Does network theory improve the process of governance? Are different terms and/or approaches actually the same or different? What do these different approaches mean to theory? This book deeply explores and integrates existing network theory and related theories from a number of perspectives, levels and jurisdictions to develop a framework to guide network design, governance and management. The book focuses on the important issue of network performance, looking at networks as bounded and consciously arranged; the actors who participate in them design the relationships among a bounded set of individual organizations to purse common objectives. Finally, the chapters tease out the variety of governance modes or regimes that intersect with network governance. This book offers a comprehensive, integrative, interdisciplinary approach that enables specialists, practitioners and administrators across a wide array of interests and fields to formulate and work on problems using a common language, analytical framework and theoretical basis.

Innovation is seen as an interactive process that involves many actors within and across organizational boundaries. In public sector services, innovation is a frequent, often holistic, and multi-layered process that involves many actors and many services at the same time. However, most of the existing literature on innovation in public sector services is based on the economics of innovation, which is heavily influenced by investigations of the private sector. Innovation in the Public Sector develops a more context-sensitive and rich approach in order to explore the different logics of innovation that prevail here. Rather than presenting a general theory of innovation, the book specifies how innovation and value creation are interconnected with social and institutional elements. Analytical constructs, including dynamic capability, absorptive capacity, and practice-based approaches, are reviewed and anchored in the organizational context of public sector services. Such a perspective on innovation can help us develop new understandings of the process and history of innovation, contributing to processual organizational analysis in a broader sense, and further developing present theories of organizational change.

Lionel Bell analyses the until recently secret government papers which are now available under the 30-year rule. With a lifetime of experience in the Public Records Office and elsewhere in the Civil Service, including responsibility for the papers of Winston Churchill, he is in a unique position to assemble and weigh all the evidence relating to this issue, which continues to have such momentous consequences for Europe's future.

With conributions from eminent scholars worldwide, this handbook is a "state-of-the-science" summary of the body of knowledge about cultural intelligence--an individual's ability to funtion effectively in situations characterized by cultural diversity--and its relevance for managing diversity both within and across

This book aims to develop four key challenges that remain unresolved in the boundary-spanning literature, which span from the conceptual, to the practice, to the translational. In doing so, it tackles the question of boundary-spanning from four different angles, providing an in-depth investigation of the current state of the field in each of these realms, in addition to new directions for solving the identified challenges. Finally, the book synthesises the lessons from each of these challenges into a coherent and integrated final piece of the boundary dilemma. In doing so, it will provide depth and a clearer agenda for future research and practice. Crossing Boundaries in Public Policy and Management digs into the heart of enduring questions and challenges for cross-boundary working, providing in-depth conceptual contributions on the fundamental challenges of boundary work. It displays the latest state of knowledge on the topic and will be of interest to researchers, academics, practitioners, and students in the fields of public management, public policy, public administration, public-private relationships and coordination and collaboration.

The concept of hybridity, although well developed in various research areas, is relatively new in the management field, where "organisational hybridity" refers to organisations that combine managerial features, value systems and institutional logics of different sectors (market, state, civil society). Hybrid organisations have traditionally been compared with private, public and non-profit ones, by considering goal ambiguity, governance, organisational structures, personnel and purchasing processes, and work-related attitudes and values. This research has led to substantial evidence on relevant differences between hybrid and other organisations. Hybridisation has also become a permanent feature in today's welfare system. New Public Management and welfare state reforms of the mid 1990s contributed to the emergence of hybrid organisations, with neo-institutional theory also attributed to this phenomenon. Considering the hybrid phenomenon as a whole, little is known about governance and controls, especially with regard to accountability mechanisms and issues such as the prevention of corruption. Even less is known when we consider the main variables of hybridity to be mixed ownership, competing institutional logics, multiplicity of funding arrangements, and public and private forms of financial and social control. This book seeks to answer the unsolved questions related to hybrid organisations. It does so by adopting a multifaceted approach along its ten chapters, which focus on different national contexts, including the UK, Italy, Australia, and Sweden, as well as global organisations. The authors consider policy sectors including humanitarian aid, local transport, healthcare, and welfare services.

Selected Contents: 1. Precis2. Public Administration as Discipline and the Estrangement of Theory3. Ontology and Theory in Public Administration4. Critical Theory and Public Administration5. Evolutionary Critical Theory6. Evolutionary Critical Theory, Power, and Emancipation7. Evolutionary Critical Theory and the "Good Society"8. Evolutionary Critical Theory and Public Administration

This volume includes perspectives on public service selected from six decades of major public administration journals. Recurring themes include: motivations to enter the public service, positive and negative images of public servants and of government, conflicts between loyalty to the organization and loyalty to the public, morale, burnout, and turnover. The volume also includes cross-national analyses of the public service in other systems, proposals for rethinking public service systems, and questions as to the future of the public service. It recaptures a long, continuing debate as to the health of the public service, and in so doing suggests agendas for university research and administrative action.

Contracting out public sector services and divesting public enterprises are reforms that have enjoyed widespread global popularity in recent years. Better services, lower prices and greater accountability are the promises made by politicians, senior executives, and investment companies when functions are moved from the public sector to private enterprise. But in Privatization, Graeme A. Hodge challenges these assumptions. Through an examination of hundreds of international studies on the performance of privatization activities, Hodge demonstrates that privatizing public services is often not the guaranteed panacea portrayed by its political supporters. Importantly, privatization activities can lead to modest gains, but there are also winners and losers in this reform. It therefore deserves far more care and balanced debate than it usually attracts.

The relationship between evil and public affairs, as well as other fields and professions in public life, has come to the fore as institutions of government seek new ways to operate in an environment of extreme mistrust. Unmasking Administrative Evil, 5th Edition argues that the tendency toward administrative evil, as manifested in acts of dehumanization and genocide, is deeply woven into the identity of public affairs. Indeed, ordinary people may simply act appropriately in their organizational role-in essence, just doing what those around them would agree they should be doing-and at the same time, participate in what a critical and reasonable observer, usually well after the fact, would call evil. Even worse, under conditions of moral inversion, ordinary people can all too easily engage in acts of administrative evil while believing that what they are doing is not only correct, but in fact, good. This 5th edition offers important updates, including: A thorough discussion of contemporary virtue ethics as the field has evolved to offer an alternative to technical/rational ethics. An all-new three-part structure (What is Administrative Evil?, History and Cases, and The Future of Ethics in Praetorian Times) designed to aid in course organization and instruction. All-new cases, including an examination of the Flint water disaster, to provide contemporary examples of how populations can be marginalized and harmed by administrative processes that are blind to their consequences until it is too late. Laying the groundwork for a more ethical and democratic public life - one that recognizes its potential for evil, and avoids state-sponsored dehumanization and destruction - Unmasking Administrative Evil, 5th Edition is required reading for all students of administrative ethics and public service ethics, as well those in other administrative sciences.

This title was first published in 2003. Over the past two decades in Australia and other developed nations, public sector management philosophies and how the public sector is organised have changed dramatically. At the same time, there have been many demands, and several attempts, to preserve and promote ethical behaviour within the public sector - though few go much beyond the publication of a Code. Both developments require an understanding of how public organisations operate in this new environment. Organisational and management theory are seen as providing important potential insights into the opportunities and pitfalls for building ethics into the practices, culture, and norms of public organisations. This book brings together the experience and research of a range of 'reflective practitioners' and 'engaged academics' in public sector management, organisational theory, management theory, public sector ethics and law. It addresses what management and organisation theory might suggest about the nature of public organisations and the institutionalisation of ethics.

Beginning with railroad regulation in 1887 and continuing for eight decades, the U.S. Federal Government expanded its regulatory scope to cover key transportation, telecommunications and energy sectors. In the last quarter of the 20th century this long-term trend was abruptly and dramatically reversed as important sectors of the U.S. economy were deregulated. This Research Review introduces the causes and effects of this process, and the political and economic forces behind the elimination of regulatory authority.

Divided into four sections-public safety agencies, key issues like interoperability and cybercrime, management skills, and emerging trends like the transfer of military technologies to civilian agencies, Managing Public Safety Technology illustrates how essential managing technology is to the success of any project. Based on the authors' years of experience dealing with information systems and other tools, this book offers guidance for line personnel, supervisors, managers, and anyone dealing with public safety technology. Designed for current or future public safety personnel, especially those in management, Managing Public Safety Technology can also be used for undergraduate and graduate public safety management and leadership programs.

'Carrera and Dunleavy provide a crystal clear and comprehensive account of the complex issues involved in how best to improve the productivity of government services. They offer a nuanced but powerful explanation of productivity puzzles, conundrums and dilemmas in the public sector. But they also offer solutions to many of these problems. Finally, I have found a text on public economics that makes sense, gives genuine management insights and offers real suggestions to practitioners as to what to do next.' - Barry Quirk, Chief Executive, London Borough of Lewisham, UK'This book presents a welcome and sobering analysis of productivity performance in UK central government - a subject that has received remarkably little serious academic attention up to now, in spite of decades of general commentary on managerialism.' - Christopher Hood, All Souls College, UK 'Leandro Carrera and Patrick Dunleavy have performed an amazing feat in this book through their rigorous examination of a thorny topic that has dogged pundits and academics alike. Just how efficient is government and how well does it do its job? As a result of an impressive - but accessible - set of data analyses, the authors make an authoritative attack on the proponents of the New Public Management, and offer some clear recommendations for reform based on better use of new technology.' - Peter John, University College London, UK Productivity is essentially the ratio of an organization's outputs divided by its inputs. For many years it was treated as always being static in government agencies. In fact productivity in government services should be rising rapidly as a result of digital changes and new management approaches, and it has done so in some agencies. However, Dunleavy and Carrera show for the first time how complex are the factors affecting productivity growth in government organizations - especially management practices, use of IT, organizational culture, strategic mis-decisions and political and policy churn. With government budgets under stress in many countries, this pioneering book shows academics, analysts and officials how to measure outputs and productivity in detail; how to cope with problems of quality variations; and how to achieve year-on-year, sustainable improvements in the efficiency of government services.

This book contains a concise, simple, yet precise discussion of externalities, public goods and insurance. Rooted in the first fundamental theorem of welfare economics and in noncooperative equilibrium, it employs elementary calculus. The book presents established theory in novel ways, and offers the tools for the application of the social welfare criteria of efficiency and equity to environmental economics, networks, bargaining, political economy, and the pricing of public goods and public utilities.This innovative, user-friendly textbook will be of use over a broad range of disciplines. The applications found here include international global-warming issues (North vs. South model), and bargaining over externalities (Coase's theorem). This text also introduces the Wicksell-Lindahl model in its original form, which depicts the parliamentary negotiation between representative parties and provides an effective introduction to political economy. Later, these ideas are applied to the pricing of an excludable public good, revealing the theoretical connection between public utility pricing and the pricing of excludable public goods. The text integrates three forms of discourse: verbal, graphical, and formal. Elementary calculus is frequently used, allowing for clarity and precision; qualities that are often missing in conventional textbooks. The main text considers a finite number of consumers and appendices cover the continuum mathematical model, which is implicit in the references to the 'marginal consumer' found in traditional texts. The analysis found in Public Microeconomics is simple and operational, conducive to computationally easy examples and exercises. This textbook is ideally suited to graduate and upper-level undergraduate courses in economics, political science, policy and philosophy. Contents: Preface Foreword to Students 1. Introduction 2. Private Goods Without Externalities 3. Externalities 4. Public Goods 5. Public Utilities 6. Uncertainty and Asymmetrical Information Index

A seminal figure in the field of public management, Mark Moore presents his summation of fifteen years of research, observation, and teaching about what public sector executives should do to improve the performance of public enterprises. Useful for both practicing public executives and those who teach them, this book explicates some of the richest of several hundred cases used at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and illuminates their broader lessons for government managers. Moore addresses four questions that have long bedeviled public administration: What should citizens and their representatives expect and demand from public executives? What sources can public managers consult to learn what is valuable for them to produce? How should public managers cope with inconsistent and fickle political mandates? How can public managers find room to innovate? Moore's answers respond to the well-understood difficulties of managing public enterprises in modern society by recommending specific, concrete changes in the practices of individual public managers: how they envision what is valuable to produce, how they engage their political overseers, and how they deliver services and fulfill obligations to clients. Following Moore's cases, we witness dilemmas faced by a cross section of public managers--William Ruckelshaus and the Environmental Protection Agency, Jerome Miller and the Department of Youth Services, Miles Mahoney and the Park Plaza Redevelopment Project, David Sencer and the swine flu scare, Lee Brown and the Houston Police Department, Harry Spence and the Boston Housing Authority. Their work, together with Moore's analysis, reveals how public managers can achieve their true goal of producing public value.

Since first publication in 1982, Howard Elcock's Local Government has established a reputation as a comprehensive and unbiased account of how British local government really works. This respected textbook has been completely revised and rewritten for its third edition, to take account of changes in local government and in the circumstances in which it operates. The third edition examines new management structures and accountabilities that follow the policy initiatives of the central Conservative administration. It appraises the impact of the three-pronged reform of the Thatcher years: impact on local authorities' financial resources, new structures of local government and new pressure to contract services out to the private and voluntary sectors.