Cabinet Level Research Articles

AT THE EDGE OF CHAOS: THE ESSENTIALS OF RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT FOR THE COMMUNITY'S COLLEGE

Propelled by the constant ferment of ideas and possibilities in the institution and in the surrounding community, the Brookhaven College approach to resource development is presented in terms of primary assumptions (premises), organizational model (structures), external and internal linkages (leveraging), and working methods (operations). The president s perspective brings dimension and supports the characterization of resource development as the progenitor of concepts and partnerships while providing insights from current projects at the college. Emphasis is placed on permitting the operation to act as a convenor of college resources and expertise, linking public and private funding as well as internal and external constituents, and providing access and involvement at the cabinet level. Preserving the visionary capacities and freedom to develop new ideas and connections without burdening the office with major operational responsibilities has yielded significant returns on the investment of college resources.

Efforts to elevate EPA to cabinet level raise concerns

Congressional efforts to elevate the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to presidential cabinet level ran into some opposition during a September 21 hearing of the House of Representatives' Subcommittee on Energy Policy, Natural Resources, and Regulatory Affairs.While House Science Committee Chair Sherwood Boehlert (R‐N.Y) testified in favor of a “clean” bill that does not get bogged down with potentially controversial amendments, others said that legislation elevating the $7.5‐billion‐a‐year agency should include requirements for the EPA to improve substantively its operations in several areas, such as its use of sound science and economic analyses.

Reform of government and the future performance of national surveys

The assumption of this paper is that Governments pursue the following strategic objectives with respect to geospatial information, as produced by National Surveys (including Cadastres): 1. for its own purposes, i.e. to govern, it must be assured of unlimited and efficient access to National Survey material; 2. society should have the broadest possible “free”, but not “cost free”, access to the products and services of National Surveys because this increases “positive externalities” for society as a whole; and 3. the products and services of National Surveys, including Cadastres, should, in a planned fashion, become independent of government subsidies. The article argues that under the constraints of those objectives, the regulatory environment of the Public Service (in parliamentary democracies), is counterproductive to the requirements for economic efficiency in pricing and distribution of national survey products and services. Because National Surveys and Cadastres are natural monopolies, the arguments are based on economic theory of the regulation of natural monopolies. Due to the introduction of Information and Communications Technology (ICT), the client community has ubiquitous access to survey and geospatial data processing technology, as well as a growing supply of commercially available substitutes for the products and services of the conventional natural monopolies. Hence, the paper first defines the product and services content of the natural monopoly in the modern ICT and Geospatial Data Infrastructure dominated environment for the case of a National Mapping Agency (NMA) which includes, in this case, the Cadastral Surveying and Mapping. Having defined the products and services in the natural monopoly, all other (value-added) products and services are by definition placed in the free competitive market. The paper goes on to demonstrate that it is in the interest of society that the NMA or Cadastre competes in this market in order to realize economies of scope. The “parity-principle formula for bottleneck service pricing” (Baumol, Ordover & Willig, 1997. Parity pricing and its critics: a necessary condition for efficiency in the provision of the bottleneck services to competitors. Yale Journal of Regulation) provides the necessary and sufficient condition under which a level playing field can be created for all competitors that require the monopolist's (NMAs) assets for the value-added production in the free market. However, an independent regulator must supervise the application of this principle. Next, the issue of pricing is dealt with in light of meeting the policies on maximum output and diminishing subsidy. As the government has set the broadest possible distribution as a strategic goal, the NMA will have to act as an output maximiser as opposed to a profit maximiser. Output will therefore have to be set at a point where economic profit is not negative, and this will determine the unit price. These criteria lead to a set of management objectives and an accountability framework for NMAs. It is only at that point that the discussion on the desirability of more independence from the Public Service regulations, of which privatisation is the extreme form, becomes meaningful. The article concludes that outright privatisation, that is, placing the assets of the NMA and all decision-making power over them in the hands of private individuals, is in conflict with the first strategic objective. Furthermore that a regulated monopoly and output maximisation are unattractive conditions for potential franchisers, concessionaires or management contractors. Hence an appropriate solution would be to put the organization at arms-length from government within the accountability framework developed but established in commercial law and without tax benefits. A Cabinet level Minister must be the politically accountable regulator of the “level playing field” and the pricing policy.

A Virtual Government Documents Reference Collection

World Wide Web technology has reached the highest levels of U.S. government. Many changes are taking place at the federal level of government. Every cabinet level agency has a homepage and subordinate agencies are making gains in this new technology on a daily basis. This article highlights the web sites of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government. Well known government publications which are found in any traditional government documents reference collection are noted and recommended for both bookmarking and local web site development. The downside of electronic access is discussed as well.

Allègre Reenergizes Research Ministry

PARIS-- France's newly elected Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin last week named geochemist Claude AllA¨gre to head a new Ministry of National Education, Research, and Technology. He also reinstated science to Cabinet level. AllA¨gre has been good friends with Jospin since their days at the University of Paris in the late 1950s, when the pair devoted their leisure hours to basketball and political activism, and he has also been a longtime Jospin adviser on science and education.

Clinton's Cabinet Changes for Science Agencies Raise Questions on Reforming Energy and Defense

This article describes the cabinet level changes for the Departments of Energy and Defense. (AIP)

Stop Bashing the Bureaucracy

We live in a time when the federal bureaucracy seems to have reached a new low in public esteem. Bashing it is the order of the day. As might be expected, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has come in for its share of criticism. In the House, a freshman member, Representative Charlie Norwood, R-GA, comments, continue to believe the best solution for OSHA is to close it down and spread every employee there out into the 50 states never to be allowed to return inside the Beltway. He continues, lot of these federal agencies have been in my life and in my pocket book and in my family's life and in my friends' life for a long time, and it gives one great pleasure to fight `em back' (Victor, 1995, p. 2001). A story circulates (falsely) that OSHA bureaucrats have issued a regulation prohibiting dentists from giving extracted teeth to children, thus making the tooth fairy superfluous (Victor, 1995, p. 1999)! Some of these members are not fixed on particular agencies but feel that the federal government itself has become too large and that it needs a general down-sizing. This is the feeling of a dedicated group of Republican freshman members of the House. Calling themselves the Federalists, they have stipulated a great reluctance to vote for any budget resolution that does not eliminate cabinet level departments (Browning, 1995, pp. 2414). While times are difficult, this is not the first, nor will it be the last, for bureaucracy bashing by members of Congress. This diversion has a long history in the United States. As early as 1866 California Senator James A. McDougall proclaimed: City of Washington is filled with officials who have new duties to perform, offices to be made for them. You may go to any of the departments of the government and walk through during business hours, and you will not find one clerk in five who has any business to do except smoke a cigar and enjoy conversation with his friends (Boykin, 1961, p. 34). Commentary In May of 1879, Samuel Sunset Cox of New York delivered his speech in the House: Mr. Speaker, let any member of the House go through the government departments and look in the open doors; and except for women who work faithfully, he will find a good many clerks, when not engaged in reading newspapers, talking politics and spitting tobacco juice. There is no man in all the world like a government clerk for splendid spitting. There never were clerks or persons who could excel them in the flux of their salivary glands! No country, sir, rejoices in such great prairies, wonderful rivers, high mountains, and such a great people as in our own beloved land; but in one thing, sir, we surpass the world and ourselves. Our clerks can spit higher, spit farther, and spit more than any people on the face of the Earth-and get more pay for the performance! I still except the ladies from this salivary achievement (Boykin, 1961, pp. 3-4). During the famous 80th Congress (1947-1949), Senator Alexander Wiley, R-WI, sent a letter to every member of the Congress asking for 'tales from their collection of humor. (Wiley, 1947, p. xxiii.). Some of these dealt with bureaucracy. For example, Representative Howard H. Buffet R-Neb. offered a story taken from the days of the frontier: General Custer sent a message to Sitting Bull and said he would like to have him come in for a conference; that he had some men coming from Washington and he wanted Sitting Bull to talk to those men and work out a settlement. Sitting Bull sent back a message to Custer and said, `Chief Yellow Hair,' he said, `I believe you and I would trust you, and I would have a conference with you but,' he said, `you have men coming from Washington. All men from Washington,' said Sitting Bull, `are liars' (Wiley, 1947, p. 170). Buffet allowed that though it had been a long time, am curiously reminded of that story by current happenings (Wiley, 1947, p. …

Tail Wags Dog?

It is clear from Andrew Lawler's article “DOE labs: Is evolution enough?” (News & Comment, [14 June, p. 1577][1]) that many of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) labs have lost their raison d'etre, and I am uncomfortable with the idea that the labs themselves are trying to find new missions in order to survive. This is like the tail wagging the dog. Contrast the state of DOE's research missions with that of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). NIH has clearly defined, focused objectives that have wide public support, as witnessed by current increases in funding. The DOE, at the cabinet level, should develop specific missions for its labs, and those that don't fit the DOE's mandate should be transferred to other, relevant government, academic, or private entities. Once the missions are clearly defined, only then should the question of lab closings or consolidations be addressed. The time for bold, decisive action is now. To delay is to allow the labs to wander off in diverse, aimless directions, seeking only to survive, not thrive. [1]: /lookup/volpage/273/1576

A DEFENCE OF FREQUENT MINISTERIAL TURNOVER

The frequency with which British ministers are transferred between departments incurs considerable adverse comment. It is generally held to have a prejudicial effect upon government. However, much of the criticism is misdirected and predicated upon questionable assumptions. There are cogent (if rarely voiced) arguments in favour of relatively rapid ministerial turnover. Within departments short‐stay ministers are in a stronger position than conventional wisdom allows. At the cabinet level they are less likely to adopt a narrow, departmentally oriented approach at the expense of wider considerations. The party management function of ministerial reshuffles, though much disparaged, plays an essential part in effective government, promoting ministerial vitality and assisting in the achievement of the legislative programme. The preponderance of career politicians in the House of Commons accentuates the pressures for rapid ministerial turnover, the need for which is, paradoxically, further increased by the same party being in office for a prolonged period.

The 1992 Regulatory Moratorium: Did It Make a Difference?

History of Presidential Involvement in Rulemaking Since the Roosevelt administration and the recommendations of the Brownlow Commission, presidents have attempted to assert more control over regulatory agencies. Although in the past the appointment power was a mechanism used by presidents to oversee agencies, it has not provided an adequate amount of control over many agency actions. Bureaucratic advantages such as knowledge, history, and seniority put the chief executive at a disadvantage vis-a-vis the large executive branch. Moe (1985a) states that presidents began to combat this by strengthening the institutional presidency, which consists of the White House, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and other executive offices (e.g., Council of Economic Advisors). Recent research posits that the president can rely more on the loyalty of these inner parts of the executive branch than the individual cabinet level agencies. Moves by the Reagan administration to politicize the bureaucracy by placing loyal soldiers in many positions was another mechanism to assert control (Moe, 1985a). Many of these mechanisms were an attempt to control the bureaucracy. The issuing of regulations may be the most important function of many agencies because these regulations constitute the setting of policy and the development of law. During the 1970s, presidents imposed procedural constraints on rulemaking, such as requiring inflation-impact statements and environmental-impact statements, to facilitate closer review of regulation development by the White House. The Carter administration first formalized presidential regulatory review with Executive Order 12044. Executive Order 12044 dealt with general policy goals and criteria, the agencies' internal regulatory procedures, regulatory analysis (specifically for major regulations with an impact of over $100 million), and the review of existing regulations. The Regulatory Analysis Review Group (RARG), made up of representatives of OMB, the Council of Economic Advisors, several cabinet departments, and other White House offices, had the responsibility for implementing this order and coordinating interagency review. Executive Order 12044 met with some success in getting agencies to conduct more detailed analysis of regulatory actions (Tolchin and Tolchin, 1983). But, this order was only the beginning of the more active assault on regulations that occurred during the Reagan administration. Presidential involvement in regulation came to the forefront of policy making during the Reagan administration (Duffy, 1993). One of President Reagan's first acts as president was the issuance of Executive Order 12291. This order did a number of things including suspending or postponing a large number of regulations issued by agencies at the end of the Carter administration, requiring agencies to publish semi-annual regulatory agendas of those actions they expected to publish, setting up the presidential Task Force on Regulatory Relief to be chaired by Vice President Bush (an early precursor to the Competitiveness Council), and establishing a routine mechanism for OMB review of agency regulations. In addition, control of regulatory review was placed in the newly created Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) within OMB. This office was created by the promulgation of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1980, enacted during the end of the Carter administration. This move by the Reagan administration basically developed a central clearinghouse for agency regulations (Benda and Levine, 1985). Probably the most important component of Executive Order 12291 was the requirement that agencies complete Regulatory Impact Analyses (RIAs) for all major regulations. The RIA had to apply cost-benefit analysis requiring the benefits of a regulation to outweigh its costs. OMB had enormous discretion in terms of these requirements and could waive them if desired. This would most likely occur if the action reduced regulatory burden. …

Political Parties, Factions, and Corruption in Thailand

The first reason [for the coup] is the act of corruption. The national administrative party [i.e. the civilian government] has taken the opportunity to make use of its political posts and authority to vigorously and unprecedentedly seek benefit for itself and its companions. It has become normal practice for most of the cabinet ministers to seek money to build up their status and wealth in order to support their political power base. During the consideration of potential large-and medium-scale projects, politicians at the government level played a role in pushing for them to materialize by claiming that the public will benefit from each project. In fact, it is only a sophisticated way to seek benefits. Despite knowledge of extensive corruption among the politicians at the Cabinet level and among government officials and certain high-ranking state enterprise officials, the prime minister as head of the government has not seriously attempted to solve the problem. Moreover, the prime minister has even committed such inappropriate acts himself, by claiming various reasons to conceal corruption…. Corruption has escalated quickly and vigorously, beyond anyone's ability to stop its spread…

Struggling with Integrated Environmental Policy: The EPA Experience

Because of the interrelating, cross‐media character of many environmental problems, development of comprehensive and coherent policies for their abatement or management is difficult. This is particularly true where, as in the United States, there has been a strong tendency to focus on single issues of complex problems. Nowhere is this problem of policy and program integration more difficult than in the Environmental Protection Agency. This article uses the lead contamination issue to illustrate the obstacles to integration of policy and procedure even for a single environmental pollutant. Given the holistic and ramifying character of environmental problems, how can appropriate policies and regulations be developed in a political system characterized by sectoral, specialized structure and special interest clientele? At the time of this writing, the effects of elevating the EPA to a cabinet level department cannot fully be foreseen. The expansion of EPA to the administration of nonregulatory responsibilities will doubtless bring new problems of policy to this agency. Problems of program integration may increase unless EPA is authorized to devise and adapt more effective integrative procedures.

Shutting Out the Evil: Nativism and Narcotics Control in the United States

The general public in the United States has been inundated during the 1980s and early 1990s with information about narcotics abuse, trafficking, and control. From journalists, politicians, law enforcement officials, and the medical community, the American populace ascertained that illicit drug use and trading have recently become among the nation's most intractable problems. Repeatedly, those sources reported that the consumption of cocaine, especially “crack”, had reached epidemic proportions, that drug-related violence overran the country's major cities, that youths should (according to First Lady Nancy Reagan) “just say no” to the purveyors of addictive substances, and that Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush had declared war on drugs. Americans learned too that only partial gains had been made against narcotics abuse and trafficking. Such a realization proved difficult for them to fathom following the 1988 presidential election campaign with its antidrug rhetoric, after the enactment by Congress of the Omnibus Drug Act of 1988 (which created a cabinet level “drug czar”—the director of the office of National Drug Control Policy in the Executive Office of the President), and given the stormy two-year tenure of William Bennett in that post. Of greater concern by 1991, evaluations of the nation's antinarcotics endeavors by the press, government authorities, and other informed observers indicated that the fundamental strategy of drug control was in dispute. Notwithstanding compelling arguments which insisted that the narcotics problem would continue until the domestic demand for drugs ended, federal government efforts have generally sought to eliminate foreign narcotics production and the smuggling of those substances into the United States.

Managing Institutionalization of Strategic Decision Support for the Egyptian Cabinet

Our approach to managing institutionalization has evolved from the implementation of 28 large projects in Egypt. The projects were part of a program initiated by the Cabinet of Egypt late in 1985. The aim of the program is to improve strategic decision making at the cabinet level. Projects were driven by macro strategic issues or needs for management and technological development in establishing decision support systems (DSS) in different ministries, sectors, and governorates. The systems supported debt management, public sector performance evaluation, customs reform, energy pricing, and general performance administrative decision making. Our experience with the introduction, development, and use of these systems suggests that managing institutionalization is as important as model building. It should be an explicit, complementary, and integrated process that accompanies system development and model building.

Bills introduced to give EPA Cabinet status

Sen. David F. Durenberger (R.-Minn.) and six other Senators have introduced a bill that would raise the Environmental Protection Agency to Cabinet-level status. In proposing the legislation June 28, Durenberger said: issue of environmental protection needs to be moved up on our national agenda right along with education and other domestic issues. We want the next President directly involved. Rep. James J. Florio (D.-N.J.) introduced a nearly identical bill in the House just two days later. The idea is an excellent proposal, says EPA Administrator Lee M. Thomas. He sees it as a way that the agency's voice could be heard on all policy issues. The idea of raising EPA to Cabinet level has been discussed before but this is the first time legislation has been introduced. John H. Chafee (R.-R.I.), one of the Senate cosponsors, gives a number of reasons why the environment rates this level of importance. Most other countries place responsibility ...

Taking regulation out of politics: The case of the civil aviation authority

A public and rather unseemly battle between British Airways and British Caledonian over route transfers was resolved at Cabinet level. The Civil Aviation Authority found itself caught in the political crossfire. Was that inevitable? Is it possible to regulate an industry, as the Authority was set up to do, at arm's length from the political arena?

Federal Education at the Cabinet Level

Federal Education at the Cabinet Level

Decision making in the National Health Service.

One of the complaints made by clinicians since reorganisation of the National Health Service is the failure of the administration to make decisions. They contrast this with the comparative ease with which decisions were made before the reorganisation and still are made in private practice. The answer to this is twofold. Firstly, it is much easier to make decisions in private practice, where you can define the type of work you intend doing and can restrict the patients coming to see you on the assumption that somebody else will deal with those you do not wish to see. This ability to choose which patient to treat and which to reject does not apply in countries where private patients form a larger part of the whole than they do here, and where the costs are paid by some insurance body which will lay down complicated rules about who is eligible for treatment. In other words the freedom of the doctor to make decisions even in private practice is conditional on alternative facilities being available for those patients who are rejected. So the reason why decisions are more difficult in the National Health Service (NHS) than in private practice is because the NHS cannot turn patients away. Secondly, the reason why reorganisation is seen as a particular bogey is because each reorganisation usually has as one of its main aims to increase specific pressures on the clinician. Thus the Lloyd George Act of 1911 establishing the panel1 meant that any family doctor who accepted panel patients had a continuing obligation to them, an obligation that had not previously existed. The Act which led to the introduction of the NHS in 1948 extended this to the whole family and every citizen of Britain when they need medical treatment.2 The 1973 Act extended the service to in? clude the former local health authority services so that the district health authority of today has a responsibility also for preventive medicine.3 The 1982 reorganisation was different in that it did not extend the responsibilities of the service so much as change and, I believe, improve the organisational structure,4 but it is still too early to evaluate this. It is worth noting that the obligations laid on the general dental practitioner are appreciably different from those laid on the general medical practitioner in that the dentists do not have continuing re? sponsibility for a patient who has completed a course of treat? ment, and therefore they do not suffer from the same sort of pressure. Clearly there are different types of pressure on different clinicians. I want to consider primarily the way in which decisions are made within and concerning the NHS, starting at Cabinet level, because it is here that the major decisions are made?decisions that are the outcome of discussions with other members of the cabinet in the light of political pressures from the whole popula? tion. The sorts of decisions include, for example, the proportion of the gross national product to be spent on the NHS and the proportion likely to be spent on health in the private sector. Figure 1 shows that the proportion of the gross national product

International Relations/Social Theory in a Small State: An Analysis of the Thought of Dantés Bellegarde

L'Idée, quand elle s'estcompletement incorporée à l'êtremoral, devient aussi impulsiveque le sentiment, se transformeon peut dire en sentiment.— D. Bellegarde.Louis-Dantès Bellegarde, (1877-1966), is acknowledged generally to have been the most significant and influential diplomat produced by the Republic of Haiti in this century. His first diplomatic assignment came fortuitously at age forty-four, when President Philippe-Sudre Dartiguenave appointed him on an impulse to the Paris legation, the Holy See, and to the League of Nations in 1921. In that period, he also served as a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration (The Hague), and was the Honorary President of the Second Pan-African Congress held under the aegis of W. E. B. DuBois. Previously, from age twenty-seven, he had occupied high governmental positions at the sub-cabinet and then cabinet level, primarily in the fields of education and agriculture. His formal training had been in law, banking, and commerce. That particular training was to serve him well, but color his perspective. The League's Council named him to the Commission of Slavery and Forced Labour in 1924. In 1927, he was a special guest at the Fourth Pan-African Congress held in New York. Later, in 1930, President Louis-Eugène Roy appointed him anew to France and the League of Nations where again he created a sensation.

International Relations/Social Theory in a Small State: An Analysis of the Thought of Dantés Bellegarde

L'Idée, quand elle s'estcompletement incorporée à l'êtremoral, devient aussi impulsiveque le sentiment, se transformeon peut dire en sentiment.— D. Bellegarde.Louis-Dantès Bellegarde, (1877-1966), is acknowledged generally to have been the most significant and influential diplomat produced by the Republic of Haiti in this century. His first diplomatic assignment came fortuitously at age forty-four, when President Philippe-Sudre Dartiguenave appointed him on an impulse to the Paris legation, the Holy See, and to the League of Nations in 1921. In that period, he also served as a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration (The Hague), and was the Honorary President of the Second Pan-African Congress held under the aegis of W. E. B. DuBois. Previously, from age twenty-seven, he had occupied high governmental positions at the sub-cabinet and then cabinet level, primarily in the fields of education and agriculture. His formal training had been in law, banking, and commerce. That particular training was to serve him well, but color his perspective. The League's Council named him to the Commission of Slavery and Forced Labour in 1924. In 1927, he was a special guest at the Fourth Pan-African Congress held in New York. Later, in 1930, President Louis-Eugène Roy appointed him anew to France and the League of Nations where again he created a sensation.