Does Agency Autonomy Foster Public Participation?

Abstract

Allocation of public resources is an area in which considerations of both economic efficiency and democratic legitimacy are likely to be present. Public administrators are often blamed for being too devoted to the norms of bureaucratic ethos, such as efficiency, effectiveness, and top‐down control, and less so to the norms of democratic ethos, such as inclusiveness and bottom‐up decision making. This article examines whether managers in agencies with greater budget autonomy are more likely to include the public when allocating resources. Because participation offers an opportunity for agencies to enhance the legitimacy of their decisions, it is expected that the value of citizen input will increase with the degree of agency autonomy. Using data on the practices of citizen participation in budgeting in two state departments—transportation and environment—this study finds that agencies with a higher degree of autonomy tend to be more open to public comment than agencies with more centralized budget processes.

Translating participatory budgeting in Russia: the roles of inscriptions and inscriptors

“…Although providing incomplete pictures, the PB inscriptions played a vital role in making local actors accept PB. In this regard, our observations challenge previous literature presentations of tensions between democratic, bureaucratic and NPM ideologies throughout PB implementation 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 (Ariely, 2013;Im et al, 2014;Nabatchi, 2010;Neshkova, 2014;Nyamori et al, 2012). We argue that, without bureaucratic and NPM allies, the further potentially surprising translation of PB was not possible in our case.…”

“…searching for particular indicators' fulfillment through citizens' initiatives). The language of such inscriptions was barely understandable to the citizenry, characterizing bureaucratic means taking over (Irvin & Stansbury, 2004) and challenging participants' education and expertise (Hong, 2015;Neshkova, 2014). Despite the positive democratic rhetoric, PB played only a symbolic role in this phase, where citizens' initiatives were highly constrained but well justified by the organizers via inscriptions.…”

Citizen Participation in Budgeting: A Trade‐Off between Knowledge and Inclusiveness?

“…On the other hand, scholars have also addressed the challenges of public participation, which often arise from a lack of knowledge or expertise among participating citizens (Cleveland 1985). Budgetary decision making sometimes requires professional knowledge and an ability to understand technical information (Neshkova 2014); this could create barriers to citizen participation. Citizens who lack professional expertise are generally less likely to participate and often lack the self-confi dence needed to publicly air their opinions (Abers 2000).…”

Administrative traditions and citizen participation in public policy: a comparative study of France, Germany, the UK and Norway

“…Furthermore, public managers' perceptions of the importance of providing voice for citizens may also impact upon the propensity to employ citizen participation methods. Research suggests that some public organizations and managers are better at involving citizens in the policy process than others (Neshkova 2014). Some countries too may be more committed and better equipped to encouraging the participation of citizens in public policy-making, and this may reflect administrative tradition (Yetanoet al 2010).…”