:Education supply in universities of most European countries has for the last ten years become a strategic matter. At present, French universities consider education supply as an investment. But they do not utilize all incentive mechanisms in order to drive their strategies.At the beginning of the year 2006, the public sector reform will tend to impose performance measurements of research and educational activities, in order to improve organizational efficiency. The aim of this reform in the French context is to provide driving elements to increase internal efficiency, social and economic impact of higher education system and to reinforce international attractiveness of public education institutions. The substitution of resources management by result management involves an agent's performance responsibility measurement. Evaluation becomes a central factor and is articulated with incentives system. The weakening of the property right system drives project bearers to maximize their utility instead of their incomes. In such a context, the understanding of individual strategies permits to understand constraints of management within universities, and to take into account the impact of stakeholders who take part in the value generation process. The major risk is to constraint the utility function of projects bearers by increasing their burden and their motivation. The result could be the limitation of the number of projects, and as well, the
Tackling the key topics of reform and modernization, this important new book systematically examines performance in public management systems. The authors present this seminal subject in an informative and accessible manner, tackling some of the most important themes.Performance Management in the Public Sector takes as its point of departure a broad definition of performance to redefine major and basic mechanisms in public administration, both theoretically and in practice. The book:situates performance in some of the current public management debates; discusses the many definitions of 'performance' and how it has become one of the contested agendas of public management; examines measurement, incorporation and use of performance information; and explores the challenges and future directions of performance management.A must-read for any student or practitioner of public management, this core text will prove invaluable to anyone wanting to improve their understanding of performance management in the public sector. John Halligan is Research Professor of Government and Public Administration at the University of Canberra, Australia. His research interests are comparative public governance and management, performance management and public sector reform.May 2010 | Hardback: 978-0-415-37104-9; £85.00 DISCOUNT PRICE £68.00 €77.00Paperback: 978-0-415-37105-6 £25.99 DISCOUNT PRICE £21.00 €24.00For more information visit: www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415371056/
Several authors have documented a shift from traditional bureaucracies to collaborative arrangements with joint public and private involvement. This article studies the impact of this shift on accountability. We conclude from our explorative case analysis of Public— Private Partnership (PPP) policy in Flanders (Belgium) that there is an accountability paradox. Many prominent players in the policy arena point to serious shortcomings in the accountability of complex PPPs. Yet, with the introduction of PPPs, the number of accountability mechanisms did increase rather than decrease. This remarkable inconsistency between accountability as a tool and as a result is the main focus of this article. How can we avoid that accountability gets lost in the diffusion of public and private responsibilities? Points for practitioners Most research concludes that there is something wrong with accountability in PPPs. Our empirical analysis confirms in general this negative interpretation. The respondents share important concerns about how accountability works nowadays in practice. We therefore state that: the shift towards PPPs erodes the traditional notion of accountability; it entails new tools of accountability with a strong emphasis on performance; these tools, however, do not counterbalance the eroded traditional notion of accountability. Yet, they also share a remarkable optimism about the accountability potential of PPPs. With the necessary modifications (minor or major) a balance between the democratic, constitutional and performance functions of accountability can be found.
Public services are often provided in markets where both public and private providers operate. Irrespective of ownership status, public services ought to be accessible regardless of clients' race, gender, ethnicity, or age. However, as theories of statistical discrimination and cream skimming suggest, market-based incentives may lead service providers to focus on non-minority clients because they perceive them as easier-to-serve and therefore less costly. This may lead to discrimination and hence jeopardizes equal access. In this study, we ask whether private, for-profit providers are more likely to discriminate on ethnic grounds compared to publicly owned providers. We implement a field experiment within the Flemish elderly care market by sending out email requests with either a Flemish or a Maghrebian name to all public and privately owned nursing homes. For overall response rates, no statistically significant differences between senders were found. However, we do find that privately owned facilities are about 20 percentage points less likely to provide information on how to enroll when the request is send from a Maghrebian name alias, and blinded coders perceive the information sent to the Maghrebian alias as less comprehensive. In publicly owned facilities, no such differences exist. We conclude that a public-private difference does exist, but that the mechanism of discrimination is subtler than expected. Rather than directly refusing to respond, nursing homes increase administrative burdens and learning costs for minority applicants.
Public sector reforms regularly include a performance measurement dimension (Pollitt and Bouckaert, 2004). In doing so, performance measurement and the supply of performance information are taken for granted. Availability of performance measurement -the fundament of most New Public Management (NPM) reforms -is assumed, and reforms are built on this unsteady foundation. How realistic is this? In fact, performance measurement is a complex process that requires attention in its own right. A performance measurement policy is needed before a performance management policy may be set up.A good insight in the organisational characteristics that foster performance measurement is crucial in order to set up a performance measurement policy. Therefore, a theory of the factors that make organisations measure is needed. In this study, performance measurement is the dependent variable. Six hypotheses on why organisations measure are tested, based on a survey within the Ministry of the Flemish Community, Belgium. Organisational characteristics are related to the adoption and implementation of performance measurement.The article is structured along the variables and the hypotheses. Most of the theory therefore, is embedded in the discussion of the hypotheses. The first paragraph is a description of performance measurement. Performance measurement is a fuzzy concept, with different people adhering substantially different meanings to it. This section shows how the subject is dealt with in this article. Next, we shortly describe the methodology of the survey. Thirdly, the dependent variables are presented. The dependent variables are performance measurement adoption and performance measurement implementation. Fourthly, by bringing in the independent variables six hypotheses may be put. Finally, there is a conclusion with some implications for practice and theory.
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