Category: Data

“The Effect of Transparency on Trust in Government”

New from Stephan Grimmelikhuijsen, Gregory Porumbescu, Boram Hong and Tobin Im:

Transparency is considered a key value for trustworthy governments. However, the effect of transparency on citizens’ trust across national cultures is overlooked in current research. This article compares the effect of transparency on trust in government in the Netherlands and South Korea. The effect is investigated in two similar series of three experiments. The authors hypothesize that the effect of transparency differs because the countries have different cultural values regarding power distance and short- and long-term orientation. Results reveal similar patterns in both countries: transparency has a subdued and sometimes negative effect on trust in government. However, the negative effect in South Korea is much stronger. The difference in the magnitude of transparency’s effect suggests that national cultural values play a significant role in how people perceive and appreciate government transparency.

The new federal performance system

New from Don Moynihan:

In this report, Professor Moynihan describes the evolution of the federal performance management system over the past 20 years since the passage of the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 (GPRA). He reports recent progress in achieving meaningful performance results within targeted pro­grams and describes anticipated future changes over the next few years as a result of the new requirements of the GPRA Modernization Act of 2010, which significantly amended the earlier law.

The report grew out of a December 2012 forum on the future of the federal performance management system, which was jointly sponsored by the IBM Center for The Business of Government and the National Academy of Public Administration. Participants represented a wide range of stakeholders and perspectives in the system, including key staff members from the Office of Management and Budget, Congress, and federal agencies. Participants discussed their perspectives and insights on key components of the Modernization Act, including strategic plan­ning, program management, program evaluation, financial and performance reporting, and budgeting.

A significant challenge uncovered by forum participants was the need to ensure that the many procedural requirements in the new law do not overwhelm federal agencies in such a way that agency leaders focus on compliance rather than on improving performance.

In response to these challenges and related research conducted by Dr. Moynihan and others, the report offers six recommenda­tions that emphasize actions that can be taken to ensure that the new system improves performance as agencies implement the requirements of the new law.

Political constraint data updated

In the email from Witold Henisz:

You are receiving this email as you are one of over 7,500 unique users of the Political Constraint Database. I have just posted the 2013 release with data up to and including 2012 (as compared to the 2010 release which included data to 2007). To access the new release, please proceed to the following website http://mgmt5.wharton.upenn.edu/henisz/POLCON/ContactInfo.html NB: Contact information is collected only to send these periodic notices regarding newly available data.

Thank you for your interest in this data and please continue to forward to me any data anomalies or inconsistencies that you identify. Much of the expansion in coverage was made possible by users who identified sources for election results that I had previously been unable to find.

As always, the data is available without charge but I do request that all users cite the following publication:

Henisz, W. J. 2000. The Institutional Environment for Economic Growth. Economics and Politics, 12(1): 1-31.

Best,

Witold.