Latest Resources
Think Tanks and Public Policies in Latin America
Book, Latin America and the Carribean, Political Parties, Public Administration, Academic/Think Tank, Civil SocietyThis book comes out of the “Think tanks and public policies: Global Dynamics and Local Specifications” conference hosted in Buenos Aires on the 21st and 22nd of February, 2006. It is a collection of essays and chapters touching on themes, and coming directly, from the conference. It's goal is to enable politicians, specialists and citizens of...
Public Deliberation: A Manager’s Guide to Citizen Engagement
Civil Society, Democracy, Political Parties, Public Administration, Report, Civil SocietyIn the United States, municipalities, states, and regions are coming to recognize that democratic governance can be revitalized through new opportunities and spaces for citizen participation. Governments are responding to rising pressure for democratic reform through a range of innovations that create new channels of engagement with the public and share decision making with citizens. The...
Open Data Study
Civil Society, Political Parties, Public Administration, Report, Civil SocietySubstantial social and economic gains can be made from opening government data to the public. The combination of geographic, budget, demographic, services, education, and other data, publicly available in an open format on the web, promises to improve services as well as create future economic growth. The report finds that in both the US and UK, a three-tiered drive was at play. The three...
Democratic Reforms, Foreign Aid and Production Inefficiency
Article / Working Paper, Democracy, Political Parties, Public Administration, Academic/Think TankThis paper uses a theoretical model and employs panel data techniques to answer a simple question: what is the impact of foreign aid on the production inefficiency of the recipient country conditional on its political governance. We define inefficiency as the distance between the actual production and its potential level given the available input resources and technology. Much of the recent...
Ethnic Structure, Inequality and Governance in the Public Sector in Switzerland
Article / Working Paper, Europe and CIS, Human Rights, Political Parties, Public Administration, Other UN AgencyThe paper begins with a description of the ethnic structures and cleavages in Switzerland and their development. It then provides an overview of the Swiss political system and its institutional elements of political integration. Finally, the scope and limits of these arrangements are discussed through an analysis of their effects on minority representation and equality. Switzerland is one of...
The growth of public health expenditures in OECD countries: do government ideology and electoral motives matter?
Article / Working Paper, Europe and CIS, Political Parties, Public Administration, Academic/Think TankThis paper empirically evaluates whether government ideology and electoral motives influenced the growth of public health expenditures in 18 OECD countries over the 1971-2004 period. The results suggest that incumbents behaved opportunistically and increased the growth of public health expenditures in election...
Demanding Good Governance: Lessons from Social Accountability Initiatives in Africa
Africa, Book, Civil Society, Democracy, Governance and Gender, Human Rights, Political Parties, Public Administration, Inter-Governmental Organization, Civil SocietySocial accountability refers to the wide range of citizen actions to hold the state to account, as well as actions on the part of government, media, and other actors that promote or facilitate these efforts. Social accountability strategies and tools help empower ordinary citizens to exercise their inherent rights to hold governments accountable for the use of public funds and how they exercise...
Progress in Public Management in the Middle East and North Africa
Arab States, E-Governance, Governance and Gender, Land Governance, Political Parties, Public Administration, Report, Inter-Governmental OrganizationArab states have been actively reforming public management systems over the past five years. There are pockets of good practice that, if adopted by all countries in the region, would yield an enabling environment for economic growth and social development. The 300-page report includes country case studies and datasets for nine countries from the region and covers nine topics of public...