TY - JOUR A1 - Kuhlmann, Sabine T1 - Administrative Reforms in the Intergovernmental Setting BT - Impacts on Multi-Level Governance from a Comparative Perspective JF - Multi-Level Governance: The Missing Linkages (Critical Perspectives on International Public Sector Management) N2 - Purpose This chapter is aimed at contributing to the question of how institutional reforms affect multi-level governance (MLG) capacities and thus the performance of public task fulfillment with a particular focus on the local level of government in England, France, and Germany. Methodology/approach Drawing on concepts of institutional evaluation, we analytically distinguish six dimensions of impact assessment: vertical coordination; horizontal coordination; efficiency/savings; effectiveness/quality; political accountability/democratic control; equity of service standards. Methodologically, we rely on document analysis and expert judgments that could be gleaned from case studies in the three countries and a comprehensive evaluation of the available secondary data in the respective national and local contexts. Findings Institutional reforms in the intergovernmental setting have exerted a significant influence on task fulfillment and the performance of service delivery. Irrespective of whether MLG practice corresponds to type I or type II, task devolution (decentralization/de-concentration) furthers the interlocal variation and makes the equity of service delivery shrink. There is a general tendency of improved horizontal/MLG type I coordination capacities, especially after political decentralization, less in the case of administrative decentralization. However, decentralization often entails considerable additional costs which sometimes overload local governments. Research implications The distinction between multi-purpose territorial organization/MLG I and single-purpose functional organization/MLG II provides a suitable analytical frame for institutional evaluation and impact assessment of reforms in the intergovernmental setting. Furthermore, comparative research into the relationship between MLG and institutional reforms is needed to reveal the explanatory power of intervening factors, such as the local budgetary and staff situation, local policy preferences, and political interests in conjunction with the salience of the transferred tasks. Practical implications The findings provide evidence on the causal relationship between specific types of (vertical) institutional reforms, performance, and task-related characteristics. Policy-makers and government actors may use this information when drafting institutional reform programs and determining the allocation of public tasks in the intergovernmental setting. Social implications In general, the euphoric expectations placed upon decentralization strategies in modern societies cannot straightforwardly be justified. Our findings show that any type of task transfer to lower levels of government exacerbates existing disparities or creates new ones. However, the integration of tasks within multi-functional, politically accountable local governments may help to improve MLG type I coordination in favor of local communities and territorially based societal actors, while the opposite may be said with regard to de-concentration and the strengthening of MLG type II coordination. Originality/value The chapter addresses a missing linkage in the existing MLG literature which has hitherto predominantly been focused on the political decision-making and on the implementation of reforms in the intergovernmental settings of European countries, whereas the impact of such reforms and of their consequences for MLG has remained largely ignored. KW - Public administration KW - decentralization KW - institutional reforms KW - local governments KW - intergovernmental setting Y1 - 2015 SN - 978-1-78441-874-8 (print) SN - 978-1-78441-873-1 (epub) U6 - https://doi.org/10.1108/S2045-794420150000004008 SN - 2045-7944 SN - 2045-7952 VL - 4 SP - 183 EP - 215 PB - Emerald Group Publishing Limited CY - Bingley ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Kuhlmann, Sabine ED - Wang, Yukai ED - Färber, Gisela T1 - Local Government in Germany BT - Key Features and Current Reforms T2 - Comparative Studies on Vertical Administration Reforms in China and Germany (Speyerer Forschungsberichte ; 285) KW - China KW - Deutschland KW - Verwaltungsreform KW - China KW - Germany KW - administrative reform Y1 - 2016 SN - 978-3-941738-23-2 SP - 51 EP - 67 PB - Deutsches Forschungsinstitut für öffentliche Verwaltung CY - Speyer ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Jann, Werner ED - Lægreid, Per ED - Cristensen, Tom T1 - Accountability, performance and legitimacy in the welfare state BT - If accountability is the answer, what was the question? T2 - The Routledge Handbook to Accountability and Welfare State Reforms in Europe N2 - Accountability is one of the most widely discussed concepts of public administration research and teaching in the last decade. But why is this case? Obviously accountability is, like its counterpart transparency, a “magic concept”, and an indispensable part of the prominent and omnipresent discourse on “good governance” as well as a significant element in debates about public sector reform. The same holds true for performance, which has been a magic and contested concept ever since New Public Management (NPM) entered the discourse about “modern” processes and structures of the public sector. But the third term in the title of this paper, legitimacy, even though it is one of the basic concepts of political science and democracy and is at the heart of Max Weber's theory of bureaucracy, has been surprisingly absent from current debates about the challenges of modern public administration, and for that sake also about the future of the welfare state. This chapter argues that different concepts of legitimacy lie at the heart of most debates about accountability and performance (input, output and throughput legitimacy), and that a better understanding of the relationships between accountability, performance and legitimacy can clarify some of the puzzles of contemporary research. Y1 - 2016 SN - 978-1-4724-7059-1 (print) SN - 978-1-315-61271-3 (epub) SP - 31 EP - 44 PB - Routledge CY - London ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Kroll, Alexander A1 - Krause, Tobias A1 - Vogel, Dominik A1 - Proeller, Isabella T1 - Was bestimmt die Reformbereitschaft von Führungskräften in der Ministerialverwaltung? JF - Verwaltung & Management : VM ; Zeitschrift für moderne Verwaltung N2 - Bestehende Forschung hat gezeigt, dass die Reformbereitschaft von Führungskräften eine wichtige Voraussetzung für die erfolgreiche Umsetzung von Veränderungsprojekten ist. Dieser Artikel geht der Frage nach, wie erklärt werden kann, warum einige Führungskräfte in der öffentlichen Verwaltung reformbereiter sind als andere. Er greift dabei auf eine Führungskräftebefragung aus dem Jahr 2010 zurück, die auf den Einschätzungen von 351 Verwaltungsmanagern aus der Ministerialverwaltung von Bund und Ländern basiert. Eine statistische Analyse dieser Daten kommt zu dem Ergebnis, dass die typische reformbereite Führungskraft intrinsisch motiviert ist, auf eine aufgabenorientierte Führung setzt sowie Arbeitserfahrung außerhalb der öffentlichen Verwaltung und keine juristische Ausbildung besitzt. Sie arbeitet auf oberer Hierarchieebene, ist jedoch eher mit Fach- als mit Führungsaufgaben beschäftigt. Der Artikel vertieft und erläutert diese Befunde sowie deren Implikationen für die Verwaltungspraxis. KW - Reformbereitschaft KW - Führung KW - Ministerialverwaltung Y1 - 2012 U6 - https://doi.org/10.5771/0947-9856-2012-2-75 SN - 0947-9856 (print & online) VL - 18 IS - 2 SP - 75 EP - 80 PB - Nomos CY - Baden-Baden ER - TY - GEN A1 - Borgnäs, Kajsa T1 - The Policy Influence of Sustainability Indicators BT - Examining Use and Influence of Indicators in German Sustainability Policy Making N2 - In 2002 Germany adopted an ambitious national sustainability strategy, covering all three sustainability spheres and circling around 21 key indicators. The strategy stands out because of its relative stability over five consecutive government constellations, its high status and increasingly coercive nature. This article analyses the strategy's role in the policy process, focusing on the use and influence of indicators as a central steering tool. Contrasting rationalist and constructivist perspectives on the role of knowledge in policy, two factors, namely the level of consensus about policy goals and the institutional setting of the indicators, are found to explain differences in use and influence both across indicators and over time. Moreover, the study argues that the indicators have been part of a continuous process of ‘structuring’ in which conceptual and instrumental use together help structure the sustainability challenge in such a way that it becomes more manageable for government policy. T3 - Zweitveröffentlichungen der Universität Potsdam : Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaftliche Reihe - 76 Y1 - 2016 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-96342 SP - 1 EP - 20 ER -