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.
The thirty-one chapters in The Oxford Handbook of New York State Government and Politics assemble new scholarship in key areas of governance in New York, document the state's record in comparison to other US states, and identify directions for future research. Following editor Gerald Benjamin's introduction, the handbook chapters are organized in five sections that look at the state constitution, state political processes, state governmental institutions, intergovernmental relations, and management and policy areas. Chapters address a wide array of topics including political parties, campaign finance policy, public opinion polling, elections and election management, lobbying and interest group systems, the state legislature, the governorship, the judiciary, the state's "foreign policy," education, health care policy, public safety, economic development, transportation policy, energy policy, and more. A final chapter, compiled by the state archivist, consists of a most extensive annotated bibliography of resources on state history, state political history, the state constitution, and state political processes. Chapter authors include both scholars of New York State and current and former state officials.

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
- the role of direct democracy in the institutional context and culture of national political systems,
- political processes of introduction and development of initiatives and referendums,
- regulations of procedures of municipal direct democracy,
- practice of local direct democracy,
- the contribution of local direct democracy to democratic development in general.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.
Benjamin L. Read views the work of the neighborhood associations he studies as a form of administrative grassroots engagement. States sponsor networks of organizations at the most local of levels, and the networks facilitate governance and policing by building personal relationships with members of society. Association leaders serve as the state's designated liaisons within the neighborhood and perform administrative duties covering a wide range of government programs, from welfare to political surveillance. These partly state-controlled entities also provide a range of services to their constituents.
Neighborhood associations, as institutions initially created to control societies, may underpin a repressive regime such as China's, but they also can evolve to empower societies, as in Taiwan. This book engages broad and much-discussed questions about governance and political participation in both authoritarian and democratic regimes.

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.
Benjamin L. Read views the work of the neighborhood associations he studies as a form of "administrative grassroots engagement." States sponsor networks of organizations at the most local of levels, and the networks facilitate governance and policing by building personal relationships with members of society. Association leaders serve as the state's designated liaisons within the neighborhood and perform administrative duties covering a wide range of government programs, from welfare to political surveillance. These partly state-controlled entities also provide a range of services to their constituents.
Neighborhood associations, as institutions initially created to control societies, may underpin a repressive regime such as China's, but they also can evolve to empower societies, as in Taiwan. This book engages broad and much-discussed questions about governance and political participation in both authoritarian and democratic regimes.

"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.

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.

This edition of Politics in the New South takes the remarkable story of the transformation of southern politics in the twentieth century up through the virtual triumph of southern Republicanism in the mid-1990s. The book explores not only the fundamental changes that have occurred - in party politics, political leadership, voting rights and black participation - but also the strong continuities in the political culture of the South despite a reversal of party allegiances. There is no richer or more readable introduction to the politics of the South - a region that shows us important aspects of both our past and our future.

How are metropolitan regions governed? What makes some regions more effective than others in managing policies that cross local jurisdictional boundaries? Political coordination among municipal governments is necessary to attract investment, rapid and efficient public transit systems, and to sustain cultural infrastructure in metropolitan regions. In this era of fragmented authority, local governments alone rarely possess the capacity to address these policy issues alone. This book explores the sources and barriers to cooperation and metropolitan policy making. It combines different streams of scholarship on regional governance to explain how and why metropolitan partnerships emerge and flourish in some places and fail to in others. It systematically tests this theory in the Frankfurt and Rhein-Neckar regions of Germany and the Toronto and Waterloo regions in Canada. Discovering that existing theories of metropolitan collective action based on institutions and opportunities are inconsistent, the author proposes a new theory of "civic capital", which argues that civic engagement and leadership at the regional scale can be important catalysts to metropolitan cooperation. The extent to which the actors hold a shared image of the metropolis and engage at that scale strongly influences the degree to which local authorities will be willing and able to coordinate policies for the collective development of the region. Metropolitan Governance and Policy will be of interest to students and scholars of comparative urban and metropolitan governance and sociology.

Despite increasing interest in how involvement in local government can improve governance and lead to civic renewal, questions remain about participation's real impact. This book investigates participatory budgeting--a mainstay now of World Bank, UNDP, and USAID development programs--to ask whether its reforms truly make a difference in deepening democracy and empowering civil society. Looking closely at eight cities in Brazil, comparing those that carried out participatory budgeting reforms between 1997 and 2000 with those that did not, the authors examine whether and how institutional reforms take effect.
"Bootstrapping Democracy" highlights the importance of local-level innovations and democratic advances, charting a middle path between those who theorize that globalization hollows out democracy and those who celebrate globalization as a means of fostering democratic values. Uncovering the state's role in creating an "associational environment," it reveals the contradictory ways institutional reforms shape the democratic capabilities of civil society and how outcomes are conditioned by relations between the state and civil society.

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.

This book, first published in 2005, explores the location and dynamics of power within the state, focusing on a recent wave of decentralizing reforms that have swept across both developed and developing countries in recent years. Variation in the timing of reform across countries only vaguely relates to the genesis of an international consensus pushed by big lenders and development banks or the reemergence of democracy in decentralizing countries. The book develops a theory linking decentralization's adoption to the electoral concerns of political parties: decentralization represents a desirable strategy for parties whose support at subnational levels appears more secure than their prospects in national elections. It examines this argument against experiences in Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela and speculates on how recent political changes may affect decentralization's shape and extent in coming years.

The relationship between citizens and local decision makers is a long standing policy pre-occupation and has often been the subject of debate by politicians across parties. Recent governments have sought to empower, activate and give responsibility to some citizens, while other groups have been abandoned or ignored. Drawing on extensive up-to-date empirical work by leading researchers in the field, "Changing local governance, changing citizens" aims to explain what debates about local governance mean for local people. Questions addressed include: what new demands are being made on citizens and why? Which citizens are affected and how have they responded? What difference do changing forms of local governance make to people's lives? The book explores governance and citizenship in relation to multiculturalism, economic migration, community cohesion, housing markets, neighbourhoods, faith organisations, behaviour change and e-democracy in order to establish a differentiated, contemporary view of the ways that citizens are constituted at the local level today. "Changing local governance, changing citizens" provides a pertinent and robustly empirical contribution to current debates amongst policy makers, academics, practitioners and local communities about how to respond to this changing policy framework. It will be of interest to post-graduate students and academic researchers in politics, public and social policy, sociology, local government and urban studies, as well as policy makers and practitioners.

Local Disaster Management explores what resilience means for local communities and local governments on the front line of responding to disasters and emergencies. Disaster management is often seen as a major international issue undertaken by global actors such as the UN, Red Cross and Red Crescent. Yet fundamentally, all disasters are local. Every disaster, regardless of its type, affects individuals, families and communities before they escalate to encompassing one or many communities or nations. This volume therefore explores fundamental issues of disaster and emergency management at the local level. What is resilience? What does resilience mean for a local government seeking to lessen the impact of disasters on their community? How do local governments adapt through their experiences of disasters and how do they recover from catastrophic experiences? This book explores these issues with chapters from top scholars in the field, draws out lessons for local government officials and disaster managers seeking to build community resilience, prepare their communities for a changing environment, and facilitate recovery after disasters strike. Local Disaster Management provides invaluable insight for local governments charged with managing the inescapable effects of climate change and the increasing frequency and severity of disasters, as well as for scholars of local governance, disaster resilience, government policy, and disaster management. The chapters were originally published as a special issue in Local Government Studies.

Wilson examines how economic and political decentralization is affecting the development policymaking environment at the state level. The book first empirically examines the changing economic geography of the country and the specific effects on the economic structure of states. Following this, three case studies are presented. These constitute an investigation of the intergovernmental context of public policymaking and the historical role of state government in development. Economic development and technology policy generally involve targeted assistance to particular elements of the economy. Telecommunications policy represents a regulatory role for states in the most significant infrastructure of the information age. Education and training, long principal responsibilities of state government, represent a form of social infrastructure and are perhaps the most vital for ensuring the long-term viability of a states's economy. Each of these policy areas present different state development roles, and the ability of a state to adapt its policies appropriately will determine--according to this author--its future prosperity.

This text will be of interest to scholars, students, and policymakers in regional planning, state and local government, public administration, and public policy.

After the 2016 election, the Republican Party seized control not just of the White House and Congress but of many state governments. To be precise, the GOP seized control of both legislative chambers in 32 states and governor offices in 33 states-a majority the party hadn't held since 1928. What happened? In In the Red, journalist Meaghan Winter argues that over the last couple decades, the Democratic Party has made a very risky strategic choice to abandon state and local races in order to win federal races, while the GOP poured money into winning state governor seats and state congresses. For Republicans, it paid off. For Democrats--and the American public--the fallout has been catastrophic. Abortion access is more restricted than it has been in decades; gun control legislation has become even harder to pass; and ID laws are undermining voting rights. In states across the country, activists on the ground are fighting massive Republican power alone, liberal and progressive candidates are running campaigns with no support, and American citizens are suffering. If the Democratic Party establishment changes its strategy--and soon--there is hope. Meaghan Winter's book reminds us of the importance of robust local politics and the role that states can play in checking presidential power.

Early results on election night suggested that Democrats had failed to make significant gains in the 2018 midterms. After all the votes were counted, a blue wave crashed on American electoral politics as Democrats won the House the Representatives and made significant gains at the state and local levels. In this book, Larry Sabato and Kyle Kondik bring together respected journalists and academics from across the political spectrum to examine every facet of the 2018 election, and what its outcome portends for our national politics and the coming 2020 presidential election. In frank, accessible prose, each author offers insight that goes beyond the headlines, and dives into the underlying forces and shifts that drove the election from its earliest developments to its eventual conclusion, long after the polls closed. Contributions by Matt Barreto, David Byler, Rhodes Cook, James Hohmann, Theodore Johnson, Kyle Kondik, Diana Owen, Madelaine Pisani, Josh Putnam, Larry Sabato, Emily Cahn Singer, Sean Trende, Michael Toner, and Karen Trainer.

This book is about the role that ideas, institutions, and actors play in structuring how we govern cities and, more specifically, what projects or paths are taken. Global changes require that we rethink governance and urban policy, and that we do so through the dual lens of theory and practice.