Bureaucratic Performance Research Articles

The Performance Evaluation System in Pakistan’s Civil Service

While achieving economic growth anddevelopment are dependent on the performance of the bureaucracy, there is a growing inability in Pakistan to objectivelyevaluate this performance. In this article, we examine performance evaluations systems that can be applied to developingcountry bureaucracies and find that the best system in the Pakistani context is the SMART performance evaluation system. We then analyze the present Pakistani system and compare it to an example of a SMART system and find that the disconnect between the actual performance of the civil service and the measurement of this performance by the performance evaluation report (PER) in Pakistan, has discouraged optimal performance. The article also looks at the perceptions of senior civil servants themselves on what they perceive as the shortcomings of the performance evaluation management system in Pakistan as well as their opinions on a potential SMART performance evaluations system. The article recommends an immediate re-evaluation of the present performance management where the re-evaluation initiatives must be tempered with the realization that the present system has been established not to optimize bureaucratic performance but rather to sustain the present system of patronage and power.

The Relationship Between Short-Term Political Appointments and Bureaucratic Performance: The Case of Recess Appointments in the United States

The Relationship Between Short-Term Political Appointments and Bureaucratic Performance: The Case of Recess Appointments in the United States

Transformational Leadership in the City of Yogyakarta During Herry Zudianto’s Era

Political and governmental transformation that took place after the 1998 reformation brought the necessity for the bureaucracy to make self improvement. Bureaucratic performance in providing public services became the main focus. In this framework, leadership is the significant factor in performing a series of government innovation. This study aims to describe the implementation of transformational leadership to create an innovative government in Yogyakarta during Herry Zudianto’s Era. The category of this study is a qualitative research. The data used is primary data that was obtained by interview, questionnaire, and observation, and secondary data obtained with the technique of data collection documentation. The results showed that Herry Zudianto has the criteria of transformative leadership in doing government innovation with characteristics of the four dimensions, namely idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration. Transformational leadership by contextual style according to the demands of the contemporary socio-politics has implications for the occurrence of a change of two organizational entities, namely organizational culture and innovation in policy implementation. Keywords: transformational leadership, government’s innovation, governments of Yogyakarta

Policy Feedback and the Politics of Administration

This article surveys the policy feedback framework developed in political science and clarifies its implications for public administration. A feedback perspective encourages us to ask how policy implementation transforms the webs of political relations that constitute governance. Administrators play a key role in shaping the political conditions of bureaucratic performance and the organization of power in the broader polity. At the same time, this perspective underscores that policies are more than just objects of administrative action. Policies are political forces in their own right that can alter key components of administration, including phenomena such as organizational capacity, structures, routines, authorities, motivations and cultures. These sorts of administrative themes have received little attention in policy feedback research, just as the political effects of policies have been overlooked in public administration studies. Bridging these perspectives offers a basis for exciting new agendas and advances in public administration research.

The bureaucratic performance of development in colonial and post-colonial Tanzania

This article examines change and continuity in development measures concerning cassava in a poor Tanzanian region over a period of 80 years. It shows ambivalent and dubious ways of reasoning about the causes of and solutions to poverty related to these measures, and argues that the persistence of such problematic arguments is understandable if one considers their political usefulness. Local officials have always had to safeguard their own viability in the eyes of their superiors in the administration, as well as those of local audiences. For them, “development” has become a focus of political performances that serve to reinforce their legitimacy.

Refugee performance: Encounters with alterity

ABSTRACT In 2006 there were 9.9 million refugees worldwide, as defined by the United Nations 1951 Convention, and 32.9 million persons of concern. In a comprehensive review of settlement programmes in Australia, the Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC) concluded that there was an urgent need for targeted settlement assistance towards this group if they are to achieve full and active participation in society, and further research should be undertaken to track the progress of humanitarian entrants in the future (DIAC, 2009). The emotional, psychological and experiential impact of war and displacement on refugees has significant and long-lasting implications for both the individuals involved and the broader communities in which they live. Performers, theatre activists and human rights workers have for some time been interested in working with refugees. However, the category of refugee performance can be seen to create an essentialist frame from which the extrication of practice is almost impossible. The article will explore the performing of refugee representation through an examination of two examples of practice, one a small-scale theatre project in Queensland, Australia, the other a multifaceted arts project in the United Kingdom involving theatre, community photography and a combustible 25-metre sculpture. In the article, I will argue that the effort to construct a discourse about refugee performance is enmeshed in an unwavering paradox. Put simply, how may practice deal with refugee stories when the stories themselves (bureaucratic performance, personal stories as victimhood, suffering as spectacle) make an encounter with alterity more elusive?

Do they all perform alike? An examination of perceived performance, citizen satisfaction and trust with US federal agencies

What drives citizen satisfaction and trust with US federal government agencies? Are these determinants constant across agencies, or do they differ? In this article, we examine elements of citizen perceived performance as determinants of satisfaction and trust in federal agencies using a multi-year, cross-sectional, multi-agency sample of respondents. Focusing on six high-incidence federal agencies experienced by a large cross-section of American citizens, we observe differences in the determinants of satisfaction and trust, which include perceptions of the quality of the services experienced and the information provided, demographic factors, citizen expectations, and e-government adoption. We discuss these differences, with a particular focus on the implications of these findings for the practice of performance benchmarking. Given that one central objective of a variety of recent federal initiatives has been to better measure bureaucratic performance with the goal of improving the quality of services delivered to citizens through benchmarking, these findings highlight the complexity of government efforts to realize this goal. In conclusion, suggestions for improving cross-agency benchmarking are provided. Points for practitioners The key finding in this article for public administration and management practitioners relates to the difficulties inherent in identifying benchmarking partners, and thus in effectively benchmarking performance across agencies with the goal of identifying best practices useful in improving performance. These difficulties arise from the differential nature of what determines citizen satisfaction across agencies with different missions, purposes and goals. An alternative strategy for identifying benchmarking partners based on similarities in satisfaction determinants — what we call ‘benchmark partner selection by determinants’ — is discussed.

The Paradox of Agency Responsiveness: A Federal FOIA Experiment

In this paper we evaluate the relationship between political control and bureaucratic performance using information requested by researchers via Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests and congress via congressional committee requests. The information requested was the same, and the timing of requests was similar. We find modest evidence of a relationship between agency politicization and a lack of responsiveness to requests for information from the public and Congress. Politicized agencies are slower to respond to requests even when controlling for agency size and workload. There is little evidence, however, that these agencies are more likely to respond poorly when they do respond. The difficulties in responding appear to be due to poor performance of the FOIA offices, either because political actors focus more on other agency activities or because of poorer management agency-wide. We conclude that efforts to make agencies responsive to elected officials may hurt management performance.

Beyond the fear of discretion: Flexibility, performance, and accountability in the management of regulatory bureaucracies

AbstractThis study explores the implications of different approaches to performance management for inspection work and regulatory outcomes. It assesses to what extent variations in methods for controlling discretion explain why in some cases regulatory inspectors limit themselves to the narrow boundaries of their formal mandate, while in other cases they work collaboratively with inspected firms and other organizations to develop innovative strategies that solve complex regulatory and business problems. After reviewing alternative approaches to the management of discretion, I present a natural experiment that offered an opportunity for controlled comparisons of two current attempts to reconcile bureaucratic performance with accountability: New Public Management and Experimentalist Governance. Case comparisons in the area of labor inspection in Brazil – involving severance payments, fraudulent cooperatives, and safety in construction – suggest that these two approaches to the management of regulatory bureaucracies produce considerably different inspection strategies and regulatory outcomes. The different accountability mechanisms and investigation strategies inspired by each of these approaches create different sets of incentives with direct effects on inspectors' motivation and their ability to resolve compliance problems.

Bureaucratic Performance and Control in British Politics: Asylum Policy 1994–2007

There is a wealth of research into time series dynamics of bureaucratic control in the federal presidential system of the US, but no equivalent investigation in unitary parliamentary systems. This article proposes an approach for measurement of the effect of political interventions on bureaucratic outputs in British politics. It throws some light on tools of bureaucratic control that are associated with the fusion of legislative and executive powers in Britain's Westminster system. In contrast to the US, political control in the form of oversight or appointments is not required because government is able to intervene directly in bureaucratic activities through legislative, executive and administrative controls. It uses Box-Tiao time series models to analyse administration of the UK asylum system by the Immigration and Nationality Directorate of the Home Office.

The Politics of Presidential Appointments: Political Control and Bureaucratic Performance by David E. Lewis

The Politics of Presidential Appointments: Political Control and Bureaucratic Performance <i>by David E. Lewis</i>

Measurement and Public Service Motivation: New Insights, Old Questions

ABSTRACT This article reviews some recent research from political science that speaks to the public service motivation (PSM) literature. Specifically, it discusses research that describes new measures of bureaucratic ideology and agency performance. These new measures might usefully be employed in the PSM literature and a discussion of them highlights some potential pitfalls in PSM research more generally.

Gubernatorial elections and attitudes toward the police: State elections as focusing events

Traditional views hold that citizens’ attitudes toward the police are driven by local concerns. We contend that public attitudes toward the police are also responsive to systematic and periodic state-level political factors. We show that state elections as a focusing event alter periodically the determinants of attitudes toward the police. Using an ordered logistic regression model and data from national public policy surveys from 1998 and 1999, we find that gubernatorial elections have a significant effect on the state/police relationship. State elections create conditions that separate the bureaucratic and partisan functions of the state government. In turn, the bureaucratic performance of the state government is less related to police approval, while partisan contestation for control of the governor office (control of the state) is significantly and positively related to police approval. During gubernatorial election years, attitudes toward the state government account for more of the variation in police attitudes.

The Politics of Presidential Appointments: Political Control and Bureaucratic Performance, by David E. Lewis, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006, 293 pp., $60.00 hardcover, $24.95 paperback

<i>The Politics of Presidential Appointments: Political Control and Bureaucratic Performance</i>, by David E. Lewis, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006, 293 pp., $60.00 hardcover, $24.95 paperback

The Politics of Presidential Appointments: Political Control and Bureaucratic Performance. By David E. Lewis. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008. 312p. $66.00 cloth, $27.95 paper.

An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content.

Administrative Procedures and Bureaucratic Performance: Is Federal Rule-making "Ossified"?

We provide the first empirical assessment of the ossification thesis, the widely accepted notion that procedural constraints on federal agencies have greatly hindered the ability of those agencies to formulate policy through notice and comment rulemaking. Using data that covers all active federal rule-writing agencies from 1983 to 2006, our results largely disconfirm the ossification thesis. Agencies appear readily able to issue a sizeable number of rules, and to do so relatively quickly. Indeed, our empirical results suggest that procedural constraints may actually speed up the promulgation of rules, though our model suggests that this positive effect may decline, or even reverse, as proposed rules age. We conclude that procedural constraints do not appear to unduly interfere with the ability of federal agencies to act, or in most cases, to act in a timely manner.

The politics of presidential appointments: political control and bureaucratic performance

List of Illustrations ix Acknowledgments xiii Chapter 1: Politicization in Theory and Practice 1 Chapter 2: The Nature and History of the Modern Personnel System 11 Chapter 3: Why, When, and Where Do Presidents Politicize the Bureaucracy? 51 Chapter 4: The Pattern of Politicization: A Quantitative Overview 80 Chapter 5: The Pattern of Politicization: A Closer Quantitative Analysis 103 Chapter 6: Politicization and Performance: The Case of the Federal Emergency Management Agency 141 Chapter 7: Politicization and Performance: The Larger Pattern 172 Chapter 8: Learning the Lessons of Politicization 202 Notes 221 List of Interviews 265 References 267 Index 283

Bureaucracy and Financial Markets

SUMMARYRecent research on financial market development has focused on the nature of the legal system. The law and finance literature, however, exclusively focuses on the abuse of management power as a major cause of shareholder expropriation. We examine the role of the administrative capability of the state in providing and guaranteeing the institutional foundations for financial market development. The characteristic feature of bureaucracy is predictable, calculable and methodical performance. Our analysis of the linkage between bureaucratic quality and financial market development confirms our hypothesis that arm's length finance not only needs a reliable legal environment, but also bureaucratic effectiveness (1) We provide evidence that state bureaucratic performance plays a crucial role in determining financial market development; (2) We find that legal origin plays an indirect role, as it affects the financial market development through the channel of the quality of state bureaucratic performance, but it does not exert a direct and independent effect.

Administrative Procedures and Bureaucratic Performance: Is Federal Rulemaking 'Ossified'?

We provide the first empirical assessment of the ossification thesis, the widely accepted notion that procedural constraints on federal agencies have greatly hindered the ability of those agencies to formulate policy through notice and comment rulemaking. Using data that covers all active federal rule-writing agencies from 1983 to 2006, our results largely disconfirm the ossification thesis. Agencies appear readily able to issue a sizeable number of rules, and to do so relatively quickly. Indeed, our empirical results suggest that procedural constraints may actually speed up the promulgation of rules, though our model suggests that this positive effect may decline, or even reverse, as proposed rules age. We conclude that procedural constraints do not appear to unduly interfere with the ability of federal agencies to act, or in most cases, to act in a timely manner.

The Politics of Presidential Appointments: Political Control and Bureaucratic Performance – By David E. Lewis

Presidential Studies QuarterlyVolume 38, Issue 4 p. 761-762 The Politics of Presidential Appointments: Political Control and Bureaucratic Performance – By David E. Lewis Patrick Roberts, Patrick Roberts Virginia TechSearch for more papers by this author Patrick Roberts, Patrick Roberts Virginia TechSearch for more papers by this author First published: 13 October 2008 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1741-5705.2008.02677.xRead the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL No abstract is available for this article. Volume38, Issue4December 2008Pages 761-762 RelatedInformation