This book provides a balanced assessment of China's communist rule, its viability as well as its prospect of democracy.

The People's Congresses and Governance in China presents a complex but convincing analysis of the transformation of governance in China. As the first systemic and theoretical study of China's provincial legislatures, it draws our attention to one of the most promising growth points in China's changing constitutional order. Through in depth and first hand research, the author provides a comprehensive explanation about why the provincial legislatures have acquired institutional maturation and expanded power in the context of Chinese transitional political economy. The book portrays an innovative pattern of legislative development, sums up pragmatic local strategies for market creation, and identifies multiple dynamics for promoting accountability and democracy. Based upon the case study of provincial legislatures, Ming Xia reveals the formation of a new mode of governance in China's national politics: the network structure featuring institutional arrangements and the mohe (co-operation through competition) pattern of interaction abided by the major power players.

This volume will be of interest to parliamentary scholars and parliamentarians who are concerned with the role of parliaments in transitional politics and economies of both post-communist and developing countries. It will also appeal to students and researchers of Chinese politics, governance and Asian studies.

Regions are difficult to govern - coordinating policies across local jurisdictional boundaries in the absence of a formal regional government gives rise to enormous challenges. Yet some degree of coordination is almost always essential for local governments to effectively fulfill their responsibilities to their citizens. State and local governments have, over time, awkwardly, and with much experimenting, developed common approaches to regional governance. In this revolutionary new book, authors David Miller and Jen Nelles offer a new way to conceptualize those common approaches: Regional Intergovernmental Organizations (RIGOs) that bring together local governments to coordinate policies across jurisdictional boundaries. RIGOs are not governments themselves, but as Miller and Nelles demonstrate, they do have a measure of political authority that allows them to quietly and sometimes almost invisibly work to further regional interests and mitigate cross-boundary irritations. Providing a new conceptual framework for understanding how regional decision-making has emerged in the U.S., this book will provoke a new and rich era of discussion about American regionalism in theory and practice. Discovering American Regionalism will be a future classic in the study of intergovernmental relations, regionalism, and cross-boundary collaboration.

This book offers a comprehensive analysis of the state of political institutions, the military establishment and political parties in Pakistan. It provides a nuanced understanding of the practices of disenfranchisement by theocratic governments in the country which has relegated the people to the margins of their society. The volume provides an in-depth account of the political history of Pakistan focusing not only on national politics and foreign policy but also on their congruences with subnational systems of governance, the criminal justice system, bureaucracy, the electoral system and the police. It discusses challenging issues plaguing the country such as the continued dominance of the military, lagging economic development, lack of accountability within political institutions, sectarianism and terrorism. The author dissects and critically examines Pakistan's hegemonic politics and underlines the need for a new social contract based on the principles of inclusiveness and equality. The volume offers fresh perspectives on the multifaceted problems in Pakistan's politics. It will be of great interest to policy practitioners and to academics and students of politics, law and governance, sociology, international relations, comparative politics, Pakistan studies and South Asia studies.

A host of promising public sector reform efforts are underway throughout the world. In governments challenged by budget deficits and declining public trust, these reform efforts seek to improve policy decisions and public management. Along the way, program efficiency and effectiveness help rebuild public confidence in government. Whether through regular measurement of program inputs, activities, and outcomes, or through episodic one-shot studies, performance monitoring plays a central role in the most important current reform efforts. "Monitoring Performance in the Public Sector," now available in paperback, is based on experiences derived from comparative analysis in different countries. It explains why there is interest in performance monitoring in a given setting, why it has failed or created uncertainties, and identifies criteria for improving its design and use.

One of the challenges this book offers is the need to consider dimensions of performance beyond the traditional ones of economy, efficiency, and effectiveness. With an increasingly diverse, interdependent, and uncertain public sector environment, for some stakeholders meeting objectives fixed some time ago may not be as important as the capacity to adapt to current and future change. In this vein, the contributors address a number of themes: the critical importance of organizational support for performance monitoring and making it consistent with the organizational culture, the need for active and effective leadership in defining criteria and implementing practical performance monitoring, the value of linking ongoing measurement with more than the traditional, strictly quantitative aspects of public sector performance.

As we gain experience with performance monitoring and its uses, such systems should become more cost effective over time. This book will be of deep interest to public managers, government officials, economists, and organization theorists, and useful in courses on public administration..

First published in 1998, this volume responds to the increase in performance review driven by government policies and examines the performance environment and processes for local government. Rob Ball explores the political and managerial environment before moving onto service planning, performance indicators and the Citizen's Charter along with case studies. It is hoped to be of particular interest to undergraduate and postgraduate students of public administration or public management.

As national political fights are waged at the state level, democracy itself pays the price Over the past generation, the Democratic and Republican parties have each become nationally coordinated political teams. American political institutions, on the other hand, remain highly decentralized. Laboratories against Democracy shows how national political conflicts are increasingly flowing through the subnational institutions of state politics-with profound consequences for public policy and American democracy. Jacob Grumbach argues that as Congress has become more gridlocked, national partisan and activist groups have shifted their sights to the state level, nationalizing state politics in the process and transforming state governments into the engines of American policymaking. He shows how this has had the ironic consequence of making policy more varied across the states as red and blue party coalitions implement increasingly distinct agendas in areas like health care, reproductive rights, and climate change. The consequences don't stop there, however. Drawing on a wealth of new data on state policy, public opinion, money in politics, and democratic performance, Grumbach traces how national groups are using state governmental authority to suppress the vote, gerrymander districts, and erode the very foundations of democracy itself. Required reading for this precarious moment in our politics, Laboratories against Democracy reveals how the pursuit of national partisan agendas at the state level has intensified the challenges facing American democracy, and asks whether today's state governments are mitigating the political crises of our time-or accelerating them.

Challenges to Local Government offers a timely discussion of how local governments have implemented public policies during the last decade. Concentrating on Britain and the United States (but with essays on Scandinavia, France and Canada) the authors document, explain and analyze the implications of these policies for local autonomy, focusing especially upon local economic initiatives.

From 1891 to 1941, Santiago - Chile's capital and its largest and most important city - experienced rapid urbanization, industrialization, and administrative expansion along with a massive internal migration that had significant social and economic consequences for the city. This book is the first study to focus on this important period in Santiago's history. Drawing on a wide range of original research, the book describes the growth of the city, both demographically and physically, and highlights the role of the local administration in this process. Histories of urban politics are relatively rare for both Chile in particular and Latin America in general, and this study seeks to fill these gaps. Some of the topics covered include the impact of Chile's complex multi-party system on local administration, the role of corruption in the management of city affairs, the relationship between the municipality and powerful foreign interests, the emergence of economic nationalism, and the pioneering part played by women both as voters and as elected officials in the capital's governance.

Local officials are responsible for a number of important tasks that have a significant impact on the quality of life of most Americans. Arguably, the policy choices made by local governments in the United States more directly impact individual well-being than do the choices made at any other level of government. From zoning decisions to the creation of parks and the maintenance of sidewalks and trails, local governments are largely responsible for direct services to the public and can provide the necessary tools and skills to create an attractive and vibrant community. And yet one area of significant importance for both individuals and for the country as a whole, local sustainability, is a relatively new policy area for many American municipalities. For example, how many local governments are adopting sustainability policies and plans? How are those initiatives performing? Without an honest and robust examination of both the effectiveness and the efficiency of local sustainability policies, the success of the entire sustainability movement in the United States is uncertain. This book provides readers with a comprehensive understanding of what constitutes local sustainability and why it matters. Focusing closely on environmental initiatives, economic development issues, and social equity concerns, each chapter offers both an account of the sustainability policies being adopted and a close exploration of the performance measurement activities of cities in that policy area. Readers are introduced to the metrics that American cities are using to measure the performance of their sustainability efforts, as well as benchmarks and comparison statistics that may be used to develop and evaluate the performance assessment efforts in their own sustainability programs. Students of public administration, urban planning, and political science - as well as public officials - will find this book useful to understand the complexity of sustainability and local government.

Who governs? And why? How do they govern? These remain vital questions in the politics of our small cities and towns. In this new book, author Daniel Bliss takes issue with those who believe that small towns and cities are fatally vulnerable to the pressures of a global economy. Based on in-depth analyses of small town America, this book demonstrates how political agency can address and solve real problems affecting US towns, including capital flight, industrial closures, and job losses. Bliss illustrates how small localities exercise choices - such as nurturing local businesses and developing infrastructure rather than engaging in a "race to the bottom," heavily mortgaging tax revenues to attract large box retailers and small box call centers while passively watching more productive firms and better-paying jobs slip away. Taking careful account of comparative literature as well as variations in city governments, their planning agencies, and their relations with state authorities, this book explores the ways in which local politicians and public planning bodies can mobilize local constituencies to weather global challenges and common structural problems such as unfavorable demographics, skill shortages and out-migration. Economic Development and Governance in Small Town America holds out the promise of meaningful democratic change even in unfavorable political and economic circumstances.

The Sinews of State Power seeks to explain why rural China has been so unstable since 2000, despite numerous national reforms. Using original fieldwork, it traces the rise and demise of cohesive local states in rural China since the Maoist era. It shows that, the county, township, and village levels of government, when in alliance, have facilitated economic growth and caused social grievances. However, national reforms redressing local deviation, together with individual responses from each level of administration, have dismantled elite alliances, and consequentially undermined the extractive, coercive, and responsive capacity of the state. This book forms dialogue with two fields of inquiry in China studies and comparative politics. First, researches on farmer protest often either focus on farmers' grievances, organizations, and strategies, or examine responses from the state as a uniform entity. This book, instead, highlights the anthropology of the state by looking into elite cohesion across administrative levels that determines the exercise of state capacity. Second, studies of regime stability or endurance have stressed holistic factors, such as institutional adaptability, political culture, or epidemic corruption. The Sinews of State Power instead revisits the fundamental components of a capable government - a coherent and robust local leadership that enables the function of a state.

We hear the term "sustainability" everywhere today. In the context of city management, the term often refers to environmental concerns, both locally and globally. Managing the Sustainable City examines not only how cities can prepare to weather the local effects of climate change, but also how urban centers can sustain themselves through other modern management challenges, including budgeting and finance, human resource management, public safety, and infrastructure. This clearly written and engaging new textbook provides a comprehensive overview of urban administration today, exploring the unique demographics of cities, local government political structures, intergovernmental relations, and the full range of service delivery areas for which cities are ever more responsible. Throughout the book, two important components of city management today-the use of technology and measuring performance for accountability-are highlighted, along with NASPAA accreditation standards and competencies. Particular attention is paid to incorporating Urban Administration standards to provide students using the text will have a thorough understanding of: The ethics of local government management The roles and relationships among local and elected/appointed government officials, as well as what makes local institutions different from other institutions Strategies for engaging citizens in local governance The complexities of intergovernmental and network relationships to develop skills in collaborative governance How to manage local government financial resources as well as human resources Public service values such as accountability, transparency, efficiency, effectiveness, ethical behavior, and equity and emphasized throughout the text, and discussion questions, exercises, and "career pathways" highlighting successful public servants in a variety of city management roles are included in each chapter. Managing the Sustainable City is an ideal textbook for students of public administration, public policy, and public affairs interested in learning how cities can be sustainable-in their management, their policies, and their interactions with their citizens-as well as in preparing for and managing the impacts of climate change.

How did the territorial Conservative Party adapt to devolution? This detailed analysis of the Scottish and Welsh Conservative Parties explains how they moved from campaigning against devolution to sitting in the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly. Tracing the processes of party change in both parties this study explains why the Welsh Conservatives unexpectedly embraced devolution while the Scottish Conservatives took much longer to accept that Westminster was no longer the priority. This book will be of interest to students of British, Scottish and Welsh politics and anyone who is interested in the Conservative Party. It also speaks to wider debates about the nature of devolution, party change and multi-level governance. -- .

The Government of World Cities assesses the future of metropolitan administrations in the light of some spectacular challenges to their operation, notably the collapse of the "metro model" in cities as diverse as London, Barcelona and Copenhagen. This key collection of essays from recognised authorities, including the final publication by the late Jean Gottmann, the doyen of urban studies, provides a balanced and provocative view of the strengths and weaknesses of metropolitan government at possibly the most crucial point in its history. The purpose of this book is to take stock of the concept of the metropolitan government idea as it currently seems to be faring in a variety of contexts and examples throughout the world. Specific cities that exemplify the three categories (outright abolition, under fire, and successfully thriving) are examined to determine why the experience of each has differed so markedly. Each essay offers an up-to-date account of the relative success of each metro government and its prospects for the future. This book also evaluates whether it is possible to make some judgement as to how far the existence of a metropolitan government has improved the governance of the big city. This is an invaluable book for students of geography, urban studies, urban politics and planning, as well as professionals in local government.

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

In 1925, Essae Martha Culver, a California librarian, arrived in Louisiana to direct a three-year project funded by the Carnegie Corporation that aimed to introduce public libraries to rural populations. Culver purchased a round-trip ticket, but she never used the second half. Instead, she stayed in Louisiana the rest of her life, working tirelessly to see libraries established in every parish by 1969. In Spreading the Gospel of Books, Florence M. Jumonville chronicles the impressive, colorful history of Louisiana parish libraries and the State Library of Louisiana. She draws upon Culver's journals and library reports, in addition to correspondence, scrapbooks, and State Library internal documents, and includes photos from five decades, many never before published. The campaign to persuade individual parishes to financially support a library of their own was a long, uphill pull through poverty and politics, flood and famine, discouragement and depression, war and bureaucracy, ignorance and prejudice. Culver credited success to the citizens, whose thirst for books and embrace of the idea of a library inspired perseverance. In time, Culver's Louisiana plan served as an exemplar of library development elsewhere in the United States as well as abroad. Culver touched the lives of generations of Louisianians who have never heard her name. Spreading the Gospel of Books is her story, along with that of colleagues and supporters, of making the dream of library service come true for all.

European cities are on the rise, taking advantage of the opportunities of the European integration and globalization processes. But they also face economic changes, social inequalities, poverty, and a new set of constraints. Taking examples through the European Union, the new book shows the impact of the transformation of the nation states on cities and the change of local societies and local governments. It argues that new modes of urban governance are emerging and that cities are becoming collective actors within the European governance.

Ukraine was liberated from German wartime occupation by 1944 but remained prisoner to its consequences for much longer. This study examines Soviet Ukraine's transition from war to 'peace' in the long aftermath of World War II. Filip Slaveski explores the challenges faced by local Soviet authorities in reconstructing central Ukraine, including feeding rapidly growing populations in post-war famine. Drawing on recently declassified Soviet sources, Filip Slaveski traces the previously unknown bitter struggle for land, food and power among collective farmers at the bottom of the Soviet social ladder, local and central authorities. He reveals how local authorities challenged central ones for these resources in pursuit of their own vision of rebuilding central Ukraine, undermining the Stalinist policies they were supposed to implement and forsaking the farmers in the process. In so doing, Slaveski demonstrates how the consequences of this battle shaped post-war reconstruction, and continue to resonate in contemporary Ukraine, especially with the ordinary people caught in the middle.

The subject of local government and post-conflict reconstruction sits at the intersection of several interrelated research areas, notably conflict/peacebuilding, governance, and political economy. This volume addresses a gap in the academic literature: whilst decentralisation is frequently included in peace agreements, the actual scope and role of local government is far less frequently discussed. This gap remains despite a considerable literature on local government in developing countries more generally, particularly with regard to decentralisation; but also, despite a considerable and growing literature on post-conflict reconstruction. This volume provides a mixture of case study, cross-case studies, practitioner reflection, and conceptual material on the function of local government in the context of decentralisation in post-conflict countries, from both academics and policy-makers. This collection of in-depth single- and multi-country case study analysis is complemented by practitioner reflections and framed within the 2030 Agenda building on the New Urban Agenda, and particularly the Sustainable Development Goal 16 to 'promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels.' The chapters in this book were originally published in the online journal Third World Thematics.

Unlike most competing texts that are densely written and heavily theoretical, with little flavor of political life, this book is a readable, jargon-free introduction to real-life local politics for today's students. While it encompasses local government and politics in cities and towns across America, "Local Politics: A Practical Guide to Governing at the Grassroots" gives special attention to the politics of suburbia, where many students live, and encourages them to become engaged in their own communities. The book is also distinguished by its strong emphasis on nuts-and-bolts practical politics. It provides focused discussion of institutions, roles, and personalities as well as the dynamic environment of local politics (demographics, immigration, globalization, etc.) and major policy issues (budgets, land use, transportation, education, etc.). Other texts treat communities as abstractions and readers as passive observers. "Local Politics: A Practical Guide to Governing at the Grassroots" is designed to inspire civic engagement as well as understanding. It features "In Your Community" research projects for students in every chapter along with informative tables, clear charts, essential terms, and guides to useful websites.

Government-by-proxy and intergovernmental relations profoundly affect the public administration of foster care. Using examples from foster care systems in the states of Delaware, Michigan, New York, and Rhode Island, Rebecca Padot eloquently combines a rigorous methodology and theory work to expose the conditions under which foster care outcomes can be improved. The cases selected suggest that the federal government has increased its focus on measuring the performance of state programs while simultaneously decreasing its funding of state foster care programs and offering the states very little management or mentorship. Padot turns the page and recommends administrators place a greater priority on building community partners, integrating the advice of mentors, providing leadership from public managers, and cultivating relationships with the federal government. An original and timely resource for scholars and practitioners, this book represents a significant contribution to our understanding of how leadership and management variables may be associated with more positive foster care practices and performance in the United States.

Reviving local democracy offers a vivid and persuasive critical examination of New Labour's programme for the modernisation of local government, providing a balanced view of the democracy and participation debate. Since 1997, the Blair government has sought to mobilise popular participation through local referenda, new political structures, electoral reform, and the creation of powerful new elected mayors. Through these mechanisms it is hoped that the lack of public interest and persistently low election turnouts will be overcome. The book draws on a wide range of new survey data to relate the crisis of local politics and governance to wider changes in the political culture. The author goes on to evaluate the government's proposals to reverse decline, asking whether this programme of reform is likely to succeed. With the aid of a series of recent surveys of both public and councillor opinion, and the successful blending of historical and empirical analysis, she offers an assessment of the realities which the democratic renewal project will have to confront in its implementation. The book is topical and timely, and highly accessible, and will appeal to students, those involved in local government, and anyone concerned to see local government become more representative, responsive, and open to popular participation.

In spite of the expanding role of public participation in environmental decisionmaking, there has been little systematic examination of whether it has, to date, contributed toward better environmental management. Neither have there been extensive empirical studies to examine how participation processes can be made more effective. Democracy in Practice brings together, for the first time, the collected experience of 30 years of public involvement in environmental decisionmaking. Using data from 239 cases, the authors evaluate the success of public participation and the contextual and procedural factors that lead to it. Thomas Beierle and Jerry Cayford demonstrate that public participation has not only improved environmental policy, but it has also played an important educational role and has helped resolve the conflict and mistrust that often plague environmental issues. Among the authors' findings are that intensive "problem-solving" processes are most effective for achieving a broad set of social goals, and participant motivation and agency responsiveness are key factors for success. Democracy in Practice will be useful for a broad range of interests. For researchers, it assembles the most comprehensive data set on the practice of public participation, and presents a systematic typology and evaluation framework. For policymakers, political leaders, and citizens, it provides concrete advice about what to expect from public participation, and how it can be made more effective. Democracy in Practice concludes with a systematic guide for use by government agencies in their efforts to design successful public participation efforts.

The book explores the regional governing of metropolitan America in a comprehensive and systematic fashion. It reviews the financial system of state and local government at the broadest possible level--the national level--and explores the relationships between the federal government, the 50 state governments, and the 86,000 local governments that constitute the United States system. It assesses and identifies the fundamentally different purposes, organizational designs, and powers of the several forms and types of local government--counties, municipalities (both cities and towns), and special districts.Although defined for statistical purposes by the federal government, metropolitan areas can be used to begin to understand how metropolitan regions in the United States are responding to the governance needs of their areas. The book compares and contrasts variations in the governing structures of metropolitan systems in the United States. It introduces the Metropolitan Power Diffusion Index (MPDI), a scale that measures the distribution of local government power for each metropolitan area in the United States. The scale also is used to assess changes in the diffusion of power over the later quarter of the 20th century. The book overviews the classic debate that has raged for the last 50 years over how metropolitan areas in the United States ought to be organized. One view, which I call the "region as organic whole," sees the metropolitan region as formally organized to explicitly serve the purposes of the region as it competes with other metropolitan regions throughout the world in pursuit of economic development. The second view, which I call the "polycentric region," views the metropolitan region as a diverse set of personal choices in which citizens choose to reside in places that match their personal preferences. Global competitiveness results from creating an environment that encourages private enterprise and entrepreneurship. The book explores, in detail, cooperative strategies that have been developed to govern the metropolitan areas of the United States. It identifies and presents four types of approaches. Those types are: coordinating regionalism; administrative regionalism; fiscal regionalism; and structural regionalism. Each of these strategies can be found to one degree or another in each of the metropolitan regions in the United States. Finally, the book explores problems or issues that arise as a result of the structuring of government systems in metropolitan areas. It pays particular attention to the issues of regional economic performance, racial segregation and fiscal equity between local government jurisdictions.