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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > Local government > General
In his inaugural address, Governor Brereton C. Jones proclaimed, "This administration is committed to having the most positive, progressive, exciting four years in our state's history." Through speeches and press releases, this volume reflects the principal concerns of Jones's time in office. Thematically organized, the more than two hundred public statements included here present the public face of the Jones administration on such issues as health care, education, economic development, the environment, and governmental reform. Nowhere else has the full text of these speeches and press releases been printed. Governor Jones, born in 1939, was elected to the West Virginia legislature in 1964, where he served for four years before retiring from politics. After moving to Kentucky and switching allegiance from the Republican to the Democratic Party, he re-entered politics with a successful campaign to become lieutenant governor in 1987. He was elected the Commonwealth's fifty-fourth governor in 1991 by a record margin of nearly two to one. Jones initiated a number of reforms once in office. He turned a $400 million budget deficit into a $300 million surplus in four years, and he passed dramatic ethics reform in both the executive and legislative branches. Health-care issues were also of great importance to Jones, who spent the years before his election working with the Kentucky Health Care Access Foundation in addition to farming. After surviving a helicopter crash in 1992, he turned the main focus of his administration toward health-care reform and initiatives. Though he met with legislative opposition when he proposed universal health care for all Kentuckians, he did help pass legislation in 1994 that would serve as a solid beginning on the issue for future governors.
UCLG's Third Global Report on Local Democracy and Decentralization (GOLD III) examines basic service provision and the current state-of-play of the local governance of basic services around the world. Basic Services for All in an Urbanizing World examines the enormous challenge of ensuring the universal provision of basic services in a world that is being shaped by rapid global urbanization, climate change, and economic, social and technological transformation. The world's urban population is predicted to reach 5 billion people within the next 20-30 years. The report analyses the conditions necessary for local governments to provide these new urban residents with quality basic services. Water, sanitation, waste management, transport and energy are essential, not only for the preservation of human life and dignity, but also in driving economic growth and ensuring social equality. Each chapter examines a world region, drawing on existing research and consultation with local authorities on the ground. The chapters review access levels, legal and institutional frameworks, and the different ways in which basic services are managed and financed, as well as showcasing diverse examples of innovation in the local and multi-level governance of services. It concludes with a set of recommendations for all stakeholders with a view to making the goal of basic services for all a reality. This report contributes to discussions on the Millennium Development Goals and the UN Post-2015 Development Agenda. The findings of GOLD III will also be essential to promoting the vision of local governments at the 2016 UN Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat III).
"The Power of Persuasion" looks at how the New Right came to power in Ontario by using lessons learned from its successes in other countries (namely Great Britain, the US and New Zealand), to gain public consent for policies that were economically and socially harmful. Author Kirsten Kozolanka contends that this New Right trajectory is neither haphazard nor narrowly constructed, but purposeful in its use of sophisticated communications tools--advertising, polling and marketing--but also by closing down government information channels in a war of persuasion and limitation that contained, controlled and confused both the media, and political and public opposition.
Politics and Government in South Africa introduces readers to all aspects of government and politics in South Africa, from local, to provincial, national, and on to international considerations. The perfect guide for students and general readers, this textbook explains how South Africa’s key institutions are governed and interact with each other, and how important issues such as economics, gender, race, and class shape relations between citizens and government. Grounded in history and leading theories and debates, the book also brings in alternative perspectives from artists, writers, and popular culture, to demonstrate the diverse ways in which issues of politics and social justice are engaged with within South Africa. Written with the needs of students at the forefront, each chapter includes:
Interactive and engaging, Politics and Government in South Africa invites readers to consider what they would do in tackling issues such as land distribution, peacekeeping, South Africa’s role in the African Union, and military engagement abroad. It is an essential read for undergraduate students studying Political Science, International Relations, and African Studies, and for anyone looking to develop a deeper understanding of South Africa.
Winner of the Urban History Association's 2005 Best Book in
Non-North American Urban History Award.
This anthology, "Defining Public Administration," is designed to assist beginning and intermediate level students of public policy, and to stir the imaginations of readers concerned with public policy and administration. The forty-five articles included in the text are all reprinted from the "International Encyclopedia of Public Policy and Administration," and these accessible, interesting articles have been assembled to offer a sample of the riches to be found within the larger work. The articles provide definitions of the vocabulary of public policy and administration as it is used throughout the world-from the smallest towns, to the largest national bureaucracies. "Defining Public Administration" is organized into twelve parts. Each part focuses on a domain pertinent to the study of public administration, including overviews, policy making, intergovernmental relations, bureaucracy, organization behavior, public management, strategic management, performance management, human resource management, financial management, auditing and accountability, and ethics.
Local participation can and does influence the political process. Local Politics and Participation in Britain and France, first published in 1990, provides a unique comparative study of the involvement of average citizens in local politics and government between national elections. The work of Professor Mabileau and his colleagues will illuminate the nature of contemporary processes of participation at a time when the local level of government, administration and participation democracy are topics of renewed interest in all Western democracies. French and British teams explore the salient differences between the two local government systems - both of which have been reformed. Through a series of local case studies, they examine levels of individual and group participation, mobilisation into single-issue protest groups, links between councillors and the local electorate, and the importance of local context in participation patterns. Local Politics and Participation in Britain and France is a product of collaborative research carried out at the Universities of Manchester and Bordeaux. The results are based on surveys of ordinary people as well as on interviews with local leaders. They will be equally of interest to academics - students and specialists of British and French politics, local government, participation and democratic theory - and to local party workers and activists.
Growing numbers of residents are getting involved with professionals in shaping their local environment, and there is now a powerful menu of tools available, from design workshops to electronic maps. "The Community Planning Handbook" is the essential starting point for all those involved: planners and local authorities, architects and other practitioners, community workers, students and local residents. It features an accessible how-to-do-it style, best practice information on effective methods, and international scope and relevance. Tips, checklists and sample documents help readers to get started quickly, learn from others' experience and to select the approach best suited to their situation. The glossary, bibliography and contact details provide quick access to further information and support. This fully updated new edition contains extra material on following up after community engagement activities.
The UK public sector faces an unprecedented long-term challenge. A decade of plenty in the public finances has been followed by a decade and more of austerity. Public services are undergoing long-term annual spending cuts even as demographic changes create soaring demand in health, education and adult care. The challenge for the public sector is how to radically transform and adapt to the new era while avoiding the mistakes of previous reform programmes. In this first comprehensive 'bird's eye' account of public sector reform supported by studies from over 400 official sources, the book offers an invaluable practical guide to all those in the public, private and voluntary sectors grappling with the twin challenges of public spending austerity and the pressure to transform public services and ensure they are 'fit for purpose.'
The Oxford Handbook of Local and Regional Democracy in Europe analyses the state of play of democracy at the subnational level in the 27 member states of the EU plus Norway and Switzerland. It places subnational democracy in the context of the distinctive Anglo, the French, the German, and Scandinavian state traditions in Europe asking to what extent these are still relevant today. The Handbook adapts Lijphart's theory of democracy and applies it to the subnational levels in all the country chapters. A key theoretical issue is whether subnational (regional and local) democracy is derived from national democracy or whether it is legitimate in its own right. Besides these theoretical concerns it focuses on the practice of democracy: the roles of political parties and interest groups and also how subnational political institutions relate to the ordinary citizen. This can take the form of local referendums or other mechanisms of participation. The Handbook reveals a wide variety of practices across Europe in this regard. Local financial systems also reveal a great variety. Finally, each chapter examines the challenges facing subnational democracy but also the opportunities available to them to enhance their democratic systems. Among the challenges identified are: Europeanization, globalization, but also citizens disaffection and switch-off from politics. Some countries have confronted these challenges more successfully than others but all countries face them. An important aspect of the Handbook is the inclusion of all the countries of East and Central Europe plus Cyprus and Malta, who joined the EU in 2004 and 2007. This is the first time they have been examined alongside the countries of Western Europe from the angle of subnational democracy.
New York remains the Empire State. Its trillion dollar economy
makes the state a national-and often world-leader in banking,
finance, publishing, soft services (law, accounting, insurance,
consulting), higher education, culture, and the arts. With more
than one in five of its residents having immigrated from elsewhere,
New York State is an ethnic and social harbinger for an
increasingly diverse nation. Recent years have found it, like many
other big states, challenged to achieve effective governance. How
is, can, or should such a state be governed? What is its history?
What is its future? The Oxford Handbook of New York State
Government and Politics offers an unusually comprehensive,
detailed, and systematic study of this unique and influential
state.
Politics in Place focuses on political life in a typical Australian agricultural town. It examines the maintenance of a local political power structures through an analysis of the town's social processes and asociated ideologies. Dr Gray argues that local government does affect people's lives and discusses why it is that some people can use their local political system to their advantage while others remain unempowered. Unlike many earlier studies, Politics in Place does not rely on the identification of an elite group, nor does it merely describe static features of social stratification. Rather, it examines the historically based processes that have created the constraints which limit prospects for local people. The book will be of interest to anyone wishing to gain an insight into the workings of politics at local level.
Democratic institutions should promote accountability of government officials to the needs of citizens. Civil society plays a role in exposing corruption as well as in communicating the needs of low-income residents to officials. Neither the institutions of representative democracy nor the presence of civil society, however, appears to automatically guarantee adoption of social benefits for the poor. Can democratic institutions be created to address social challenges? Scholars, development practitioners, donors, and activists propose participatory governance institutions as mechanisms to create accountability and responsiveness through a public forum incorporating civil society. To date, however, little comparative research exists to confirm whether these institutions do influence adoption of social policies. Maureen M. Donaghy remedies this gap by combining data from Brazil's 5,564 municipalities with extensive fieldwork from five Brazilian cities to test whether participatory municipal housing councils are associated with an increase in adoption of social housing programs to benefit the poor. Housing represents an issue of critical importance in Brazil and other developing countries where large populations reside in informal settlements in unsafe and insecure conditions. Civil Society and Participatory Governance is the first book of its kind to move the conversation beyond budgeting to other social policy areas, providing fresh theoretical and empirical insights to demonstrate that participatory governance institutions are effective mechanisms to coordinate government officials and civil society to alter policy-making.
Examining the startling revival of the Scottish Conservative Party under Ruth Davidson's leadership Key features First book to examine the recent revival of the Scottish Conservative Party Analyses the Scottish Conservative Party and Ruth Davidson's leadership in ground-breaking ways, for example in the context of gender and LGBT politics; its relationships with the SNP, Northern Ireland, the Scottish media and the UK Tory Party; its use of Scottish national identity in promoting itself electorally Complements and updates David Torrance's 2012 edited volume for Edinburgh University Press on the decline of the party, Whatever Happened to Tory Scotland? Helps inform Scottish political and academic discourse ahead of the 2021 Holyrood elections When Ruth Davidson was elected leader of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party in 2011, it was considered something of a joke: in electoral decline for decades, politically irrelevant and apparently beyond the point of no return. But by 2017, 'Ruth Davidson's Conservatives' had become Scotland's second party at Holyrood and Westminster, and its leader spoken of as a future leader of the UK Conservative Party, if not the next Scottish First Minister. This book, which brings together leading academics and analysts, examines the extraordinary revival of the Scottish Conservative Party between 2011 and Ruth Davidson's shock resignation in 2019. Contributors look at the importance of gender and sexuality, the 2014 independence referendum, the Scottish media and the UK Conservative Party's 'territorial code' to the changing fortunes of the party and its leader, asking if it can be sustained amid the turbulence of two ongoing constitutional debates.
The Sources and Nature of the Statistics of the United Kingdom, produced under the auspices of the Royal S atistical Society and edited by Maurice Kendall, filled a notable gap on the library shelves when it made its appearance in the early post-war years. Through a series of critical reviews by many of the foremost national experts, it constituted a valuable contemporary guide to statisticians working in many fields as well as a bench-mark to which historians of the development of Statistics in this country are likely to return again and again. The Social Science Research Council* and the Society were both delighted when Professor Maunder came forward with the proposal that a revised version should be produced, indicating as well his willingness to take on the onerous task of editor. The two bodies were more than happy to act as co-sponsors of the project and to help in its planning through a joint steering committee. The result, we are confident, will be judged a worthy successor to the previous volumes by the very much larger 'statistics public' that has come into being in the intervening years. Mrs SUZANNE REEVE Mrs EJ. SNELL Secretary Honorary Secretary Economic and Social Research Council Royal Statistical Society *SSRC is now the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). vii MEMBERSHIP OF JOINT STEERING COMMITTEE (November 1986) Chairman: Miss S. V. Cunliffe Representing the Royal Statistical Society: Mr M. C. Fessey Dr S. Rosenbaum Mrs E. J.
Most social science studies of local organizations tend to focus on
civil society associations, voluntary associations independent from
state control, whereas government-sponsored organizations tend to
be theorized in totalitarian terms as mass organizations or
manifestations of state corporatism. "Roots of the State" examines
neighborhood associations in Beijing and Taipei that occupy a
unique space that exists between these concepts.
Most social science studies of local organizations tend to focus on
"civil society" associations, voluntary associations independent
from state control, whereas government-sponsored organizations tend
to be theorized in totalitarian terms as "mass organizations" or
manifestations of state corporatism. "Roots of the State" examines
neighborhood associations in Beijing and Taipei that occupy a
unique space that exists between these concepts.
"Innovating with Integrity" presents a comprehensive portrait of the local heroes - front-line public servants and middle managers - who are reinventing state and local government, and it offers practical recommendations for innovating successfully. Based on a study of more than 200 successful government innovations, this book is the first large-scale, systematic analysis of innovation in American government. Sandford Borins identifies the components of integrity that he finds in successful innovators, including the intellectual discipline to plan rigorously and to establish measurable goals; the ability to collaborate with others and accommodate criticism; and a willingness to mobilize both the private sector and the community. In addition to analyzing the common traits driving new initiatives, Borins shows the distinctive differences among six areas of innovation: information technology, organizational redesign, environmental and energy management, policing and community development, social services, and education. This trenchant analysis of what initiatives actually work and why contributes to both the practice and theory of public management. Its practical advice will be especially valuable for front-line government workers, public managers, union leaders, agency heads, politicians, and all concerned with reforming government.
Derived from the international literature on experiences with performance budgeting five elements which constitute performance budgeting as a comprehensive system can be identified in this book. This new definition is then applied to the German state level in order to investigate whether performance budgeting is effective in Germany, in detail, whether it actually leads to a reduction of public expenditure. With a survey in the state Ministries of Finance and an individually constructed panel dataset, the impact of the German performance budgeting reforms on their major aim, the enhancement of fiscal discipline, is empirically analyzed. The main result is that the potential of expenditure savings is prolonged by the enormous investments in the beginning.
This book provides a comparative analysis of the processes and impacts of austerity measures introduced in the field of Local Public Services (LPS) across Mediterranean Europe. The book describes and compares the trajectories of austerity, and the types of effects. It investigates how many (and what kind of) different responses were given to similar inputs and under the influence of what factors in order to understand if there are regularities in the way that the Mediterranean countries adopted and implemented the austerity measures and how these latter impacted on local government and LPS management and delivery. The book is a product of a sub network from the COST Action LocRef IS1207 and analyses seven countries (Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece, Croatia, Cyprus and Albania).
The Territorial Imperative explores a growing area of interest in comparative political economy - the interaction of politics and economics at the mesolevel of the polity. Noting the ubiquity of regional economic disparities within advanced industrial democracies, Jeffrey Anderson undertakes a sophisticated analysis of the complex political conflicts that are generated by declining regional economies, and involve myriad actors across multiple levels of the polity. In this study of political responses to regional crisis, the principal theoretical focus centers on the impact of constitutional orders as bona fide political institutions. On the basis of a carefully constructed comparison of four declining industrial regions within a broader cross-national comparison of unitary Britain and federal Germany, Anderson concludes that constitutional orders as institutions do in fact matter. In short, the territorial distribution of power, encapsulated in the federal-unitary distinction, is shown to exercise a strong political logic of influence on the distribution of interests and resources among subnational and national actors and on the strategies of cooperation and conflict available to them. In the course of the study, Anderson brings together in a creative manner theories of intergovernmental and center-periphery relations, corporatism, pluralism, and the state. His book provides new insights into more than just mesolevel politics; indeed, the explicit focus on the political economy of regions calls into question aspects of the conventional wisdom on British and German politics, based for the most part on national-level studies. Viewed in the context of widespread optimism surrounding thefuture of regions in a post-1992 Europe, Anderson's findings also underscore the need for caution when assessing the horizons of action for subnational interests in advanced industrial democracies. Offering an innovative theoretical approach grounded in comparative empirical research, The Territorial Imperative will be welcomed by political economists, scholars and students of comparative politics, sociology, and public policy, political geographers, and economists and historians interested in Western Europe.
Modern direct democracy has recently become an important element of
political life in many countries. These developments can be
observed at the national, regional, and local level of political
systems. Participation and democracy in local political affairs
play a major role in stabilising and developing democratic systems.
This volume presents, for the first time, a broad basis of
information on the wide variety of local institutions and practice
of direct democracy in 19 countries. Country specialists
analyse |
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