ЕКЗОГЕННІ ДЕТЕРМІНАНТИ ПУБЛІЧНИХ ВИДАТКІВ У СУЧАСНОМУ ГЛОБАЛІЗОВАНОМУ СВІТІ

Current events happening around the world, especially the 'humanitarian interventions' by NATO and the West within the context of the so-called Arab Spring, make the understanding of the role of spheres of influence in international politics absolutely critical. Hast explores the practical implications and applications of this theory, challenging the concept by using historical examples such as suzerainty and colonialism, as well as the emergence of a hierarchical international order. This study further connects the English School tradition, post-war international order, the Cold War and images of Russia with the concept of the sphere of influence to initiate debate and provide a fresh outlook on a concept which has little recent attention.

The relationship between public spending on Energy innovations (R&D of renewable and non-renewable energy, and energy efficiency) and CO2 intensity at constant purchasing power are investigated in this study. A Panel-NARDL model was used for the first time in 10 OECD countries (1990–2020) to evaluate the asymmetric relationship between energy innovative variables and CO2 impacts in the long and short run. In other words, this study aims to monitor how changes in public spending on R&D for renewable and non-renewable influence CO2 emissions. The results show that while an increase in the public budget for R&D of renewable energy will decrease the CO2 intensity in the long run, a positive relationship exists between these variables in the short run. Likewise, the result demonstrates that a cut in public spending on Fossil fuel R&D leads to an increase in the short horizon and a decrease in the long-run CO2 emissions per unit of GDP. The finding implies the substantial impact of R&D in both renewable and non-renewable energy on reducing CO2 emissions over time. In addition, CO2 emissions per unit of GDP respond positively to R&D public spending on energy efficiency. An increase in public expenditure on R&D of energy efficiency can induce economic activity and enhance CO2 emissions. All in all, the 30 years’ analysis of data from the selected OECD countries substantiates the right strategy of reducing the CO2 emissions of these countries by applying the public budget to promote R&D in energy sectors. This study results in contrast with those studies that found no relationship between R&D on renewable energy and CO2 impacts. Significance Statement This paper evaluated the asymmetric impacts of public spending on R&D of renewable energy and fossil fuel, and energy efficiency on CO2 intensity at constant purchasing power. Although a growing body of research has analyzed the impact of R&D on CO2 emission, research on the asymmetric effects of R&D public expenditure in energy sectors on CO2 emission is still narrow. Moreover, by employing Panel Nonlinear ARDL, we delve into the spillover impacts of selected OECD public budget on R&D over the short and long horizons. In addition, we estimate the impacts of both Renewable and non-renewable R&D budgets which help us to explore and compare the effectiveness of budget allocation on R&D with the strategy of reducing CO2 emission. Finally, this study found how the R&D and technology budget surging and declining in energy sectors would influence CO2 emission per unit of GDP.

This article examines the emergence and transformation of Norway’s peace engagement in the context of changing international relations. Focusing on foreign policy discourses and practices, the article portrays peace engagement as a value-based effort to support resolution of distant intrastate conflicts, and a strategy to promote Norway’s interests and influence in international relations. The article also argues that changing international politics after the turn of the century has challenged and reoriented Norway’s peace engagement in a more realist direction. Foreign policy discourses and practices are increasingly based on a broad notion of interests that also include ideals of peace, democracy and development. This means that peace engagement can support a domestic political consensus on foreign policy, and simultaneously promote Norway’s standing, relevance and influence in international relations. Peace engagement has thus been institutionalized as a foreign policy that promotes peace while also addressing the challenges associated with smallness in international relations.

While the specifics of Europe's internal dimensions — its ultimate geographic boundaries and its future institutional design — have attracted much attention and caused considerable debate, the future role of the European Union in international relations by comparison has been neglected in terms of both public debate and scientific scrutiny. This is perhaps not surprising, given the massive enlargement of EU membership since the mid-1990s, which has absorbed much of Europe's political energies over the last years, and will undoubtedly continue to do so in the near future. At the same time, the European Union since 1990 has also seen its standing and its influence in international relations on balance increase rather substantially, even if this trend has been buffeted repeatedly by setbacks and crises. Indeed, it could be argued that European influence in international relations has grown not despite, but because of major crises which have forced the member states to focus on their shared interests and act accordingly. Whichever it may be, this trend has perhaps been most clearly observed from a distance: several prominent American observers even predicted that the twenty-first century would belong to the new superpower Europe (Kupchan, 2002; Rifkin, 2004).

The article notes that modern processes taking place in the world are causing the reformation of the system of international relations, forcing scientists to think about the conceptualization of the concept of "political influence". Any influence is a process whose goal is to change behavior, preferences, positions, feelings and emotions, beliefs, as well as group norms, mass attitudes, and social consciousness. Political influence is one of the varieties of social influence. Political influence is traditionally seen as a manifestation of power. In international relations, the concept of "political influence" is associated with the concepts of "state power", "state power". It is noted that influence in the international arena can be exercised using various means and mechanisms, in particular, using "hard" or "soft" power. At the same time, the same resources can act as "soft" or "hard" power, for example, economic, human, communication, etc. In the system of international relations, dialogic and authoritarian communication is used, which affects the results of influence. The article analyzes the means of influence, in particular, attention is paid to the classification of resources of political influence. It is noted that political influence in international relations depends on many factors: economic, social, informational. It is pointed out that there are various methods of political influence, the subjects of which are both individuals and large transnational corporations, international organizations and states. The effectiveness of political influence will depend on the specific characteristics of the subject and the object of influence, on their status in the international arena, prestige, will, etc., and the nature of the relationship between the participants. It is concluded that political influence in international relations is an integral part of them.

In most OECD countries, health spending has been increasing over the last decades, often surpassing GDP growth. Current challenges faced by health systems - including the COVID-19 pandemic - pose additional concerns regarding whether societies can sustain continuous health spending growth. Such problem is particularly relevant in the context of public health spending. In the absence of significant economic growth, the room for further increases in public health spending without constraining other public spending is somewhat limited.On this paper I propose an exploratory analysis on the concept of financial sustainability of public health spending. I relate the sustainability concept with fiscal space of public finances and with the crowding-out of other public expenditures. I develop a static model where health contributes directly both to utility and output.The model suggests that increases on public health spending are not necessarily undesirable from a public finances' standpoint: the crowding-out of non-health public expenditures depends on the tax rate and coverage level of public health spending. Thus, economic growth is not a sufficient condition to achieve financial sustainability of health spending. Moreover, achieving financial sustainability by adjusting coverage levels might compromise ensuring the social sustainability of public health spending. Hence, this paper contributes to the debate on whether current increases of public health spending are desirable and sustainable.

In recent years, both state and non-state religious actors have become important for understanding international outcomes in many parts of world. Fundamental norms of international relations were enshrined in the Treaty of Westphalia (1648) - particularly the notion of state restraint in religious matters. This encouraged belief that international relations discourse is predominantly secular. Religion now influences international outcomes involving international society. All religious actors’ influence in international relations is linked to their ability to exercise ‘soft power’. The chapter examines the theory and practice of religion’s involvement in international relations.

ABSTRACT: One of the most fundamental yet unresolved health policy issues is whether public expenditure on healthcare leads to improved health outcomes. Given that health reflects one of the critical aspects of human capital, having implications for economic growth and other development goals, there has been enormous advocacy towards investing significantly in the health systems across the countries to improve the overall health status. However, the effect of public spending on health outcomes remains inconclusive. The present paper analyses the impact of public health spending on mortality probability, taking into account the role of governance while treating public spending as an endogenous variable. The study uses individual level data from the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) Round 5 and a few state-level characteristics. For estimation purpose, it uses a two-level mixed effect model to capture the benefit incidence of public spending on Individual mortality probability. The findings reveal that public spending has a significant but differential impact on mortality across the Indian States, whereas the quality of governance is found to be a mediator. Given a level of public spending, States with better government effectiveness and rule of law can translate public health spending more effectively in reducing mortality at the individual level. The study also found heterogeneous mortality status across gender, location of stay, wealth status, and age groups with a differential impact of public spending across gender, wealth, and age groups. The variation in average distance of mortality probability level in each state from the overall mean mortality probability indicates that the states are very different in terms of health challenges that they are facing. The policy options call for state-specific health interventions to reduce the mortality rather than one-size-fits-all health policies. There needs to more unconditional grants/transfers from the Union Government to the States so that states will be able to tailor policy responses to address the unique challenges faced by the respective states. At the same time, states need to adopt output-based conditions with greater flexibility to deliver services and greater accountability to improve transparency, governance quality, and implementation capacity.

Outsourcing can be defined as the delivery of public services by the private sector. The sign of the effect of outsourcing on public spending is ambiguous ex-ante. While outsourcing may reduce public spending through higher competition in the private sector, it may also increase public spending due to the presence of transaction costs or the so-called “hold-up” problem among others. Using a panel of Spanish regions over the 2002-2018 period, this paper explores the association between outsourcing and public spending empirically. Spain offers an interesting case study from a broad perspective, as the degree of decentralization of public health and education is almost complete, and the different regions have adopted quite distinct approaches as regards the public-private mix in the provision of these public services. In line with previous cross-country evidence [e.g. Alonso et al. (2017); Potrafke (2018)] our estimates point to a positive relationship between public spending and outsourcing. The result holds when a number of robustness exercises are carried out. By components, we find that outsourcing is associated with higher public consumption and health spending, while there is no statistical association with investment and education expenditure. In any case, it is worth mentioning that the impact of outsourcing on the efficiency of public spending cannot be ascertained with our approach, due to data limitations.

A major determinant of poverty and inequality among children is the provision of public services, like health and education, which are crucial to their quality of life. Quantitative assessment of the distribution of public spending on these services and their impact on child poverty is a cornerstone for any analysis of social and economic justice among children. Government spending on social sectors is a strong measurement of the financial commitment governments make to protect and invest in their own people, in particular children. Thus, in this article we address three issues: (i) measurement of public spending in education, health, and direct transfers (cash transfers and near-cash); (ii) the methodological issues involved in this measurement (both in terms of public spending and in child poverty); and (iii) an assessment of the impact on children in poverty and equity. Thus, the chapter deals with how to measure pro-poor public spending. Such analyses measure the benefits an individual or household receive from different public services by linking administrative budget data with nationally representative household surveys. Information on social expenditures (from public budgets) and about poverty and services utilization (from household surveys) exists for over 100 countries. However, comparable data covering at least two of the three sectors (education, health, and social transfers) exist for only 11 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. An assessment is made in terms of both equity and impact on child poverty. Finally, the relationships between the level and distribution of these expenditures with distributive justice (of public social spending) and children’s quality of life is explored.KeywordInequityInequalitySocial justiceChildrenChild povertyBenefit incidence analysisPro-poor public social spending

Narratives as tools of sociological imagination: a reply to ‘From discourse to legitimacy: narratives as instruments of influence in international relations’ by Armağan Gözkaman

The third Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) aims to enable everyone to live in good health and to promote the well-being of all. However, despite the various efforts made to achieve this goal, sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is still characterised by low human longevity. To increase longevity, authors have stressed the importance of public spending on health. However, continuous borrowing and servicing of public debt deprive the SSA of funds that could be devoted to public spending on health. In this context, this research provides evidence on how public debt mitigates the effect of public health spending on human longevity in SSA. Using public indebtedness as a transition variable, this paper uses dynamic panel threshold regression to analyse the effects of public health expenditure on human longevity in 27 SSA countries covering the period 2010–2020. The results reveal a nonlinear relationship between public health spending and human longevity. This research shows that a level of public debt greater than 35.1348% of gross domestic product leads to a reduction in public spending on health and a decrease in human longevity. In view of these results, the governments of SSA countries must strengthen prudent budgetary measures to reduce public debt and increase the mobilisation of domestic resources to finance the health sector.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13561-025-00673-0.

In the 1870s and 1880s total public sector expenditure in the United Kingdom, net of transfer payments in the form of subventions paid by central government to local government agencies to defray the costs of providing important services, averaged 10 to 11 per cent of Gross Domestic Product, GDP, the conventional measurement of the size of the national product of the economy in a financial year, customarily 12 months from April to the following March, but this share began to rise in the 1890s to reach 15 per cent during the decade before the Great War after having been somewhat greater during the Boer War, as shown in Figure 1.1. During the Great War, by which term contemporaries described the First World War, public spending rose sharply in response to the war effort, before declining to a new peacetime level that, throughout the interwar years, remained well above the level attained before 1914. For most of this later period, total net government spending ranged between 25 per cent and 30 per cent of GDP but rose above 30 per cent as another great international conflict approached. During the Second World War government spending reached even greater heights than it had during the First World War, and came close to 70 per cent of GDP. When peace was restored, public expenditure found a new and fairly stable level between 35 per cent and 45 per cent of GDP in most years although the trend turned clearly downward towards the end of the 1980s when it fell below 40 per cent of GDP. The decline in the final decades of the century reflected the policy of privatizing public sector housing which was energetically pursued by the Conservative government in the 1980s, the stock being sold on extremely generous terms to existing tenants as an inducementto encourage them to purchase. By 1988–89 total managed public sector expenditure had fallen to 39.3 per cent of GDP although it exceeded 40 per cent again in the mid-1990s before falling to 39.3 per cent in 1997–98, as the newly elected Labour government committed itself as an election pledge to adhere to the public sector spending plans of their predecessors in office for the first two years of the new parliament, so that public spending fell to 38.4 per cent in 1998–99 and to 37.7 per cent in 1999–00 before recovering to 38.4 in 2000–01 by which time the trend was again clearly upwards. [Rodney Lowe, p.455] By the middle of the first decade of the new century public expenditure had, again, passed the level of 40 per cent of GDP.

Public construction procurement is a Government program to meet infrastructure needs. As a government program that uses the public budget as a source of funding, public procurement tends to be vulnerable to various problems and criticisms, especially related to public trust as users. Therefore, the government must prove that the implementation of procurement including the procurement of construction can be relied upon, so it must be carried out professionally and ethically. To guarantee that, construction procurement must adhere to the principles set out in the regulation. Presidential Regulation of the Republic of Indonesia Number 16/2018 regulates Public Procurement of Goods and/or Services and establishes 7 principles of procurement implementation, including: efficient, effective, transparent, open, competitive, fair, and accountable. This paper is an initial stage of research to evaluate the implementation of the principles of construction public procurement. The purpose of this study is to identify the indicators that must be met by the government in the implementation of these principles. These principles will become the research variables, while the indicators are obtained from related literature studies. The data in this study were obtained by distributing questionnaires and interviews with several parties concerned with the public procurement in Surabaya. According to the experts’ opinion, there are found that 48 indicators of the principles which could be used to evaluate the principles of the implementation of public construction project procurement in Surabaya.

Public procurement fulfils an important role in the economy and public expenditure of a country and can be regarded as a critical indicator of the effectiveness of a government, because it is a central aspect of public service delivery. Notwithstanding various reforms made to date to public sector procurement in South Africa and the application of Supply Chain Management as a strategic policy strategic instrument, the South African public procurement system still faces several challenges and has been strongly criticised. This paper aims to understand the current public procurement environment in South Africa, its dilemmas and challenges, and to propose that public procurement be refocused towards a strategically placed business process, implemented by well-trained and competent procurement officials. The purpose is to provide a theoretical foundation as well as practical guidance regarding the role of public procurement in the South African public sector. The methodology involved an intensive literature study and document analysis to evaluate various official policy documents and official publications to determine the status of South African public procurement. The study found that the majority of challenges faced by public procurement in South Africa can probably be attributed to the implementation of the system, rather than to the system itself. In the shorter and longer term, the public procurement system in South Africa will have no choice but to emerge as a stronger, more resilient, streamlined and efficient provider of goods and services for the greater good of all.