Nepal is going through a major socio-economic transition in rural areas and hence in forest management practices, leading to changes in and evolution of new forest-people relationships. Community forests are experiencing an ecological transition resulting a new pattern of growth, regeneration and diversity in forest composition. The ecological transition of forest corresponds to the shifting local

Land tenure security plays an important role in agricultural production systems. The objective of this paper is to empirically assess the impact of land tenure security through customary law on agricultural productivity in Burkina Faso. We use panel data from 15,627 agricultural households over the period 2019–2021. Four propensity score matching methods are used: the nearest neighbor method, the stratification

Rural commons globally are facing environmental, demographic, and economic changes that challenge their sustainability. In addition, political and regulatory burdens can complicate the running of communal enterprises that provide income and livelihoods for community members, young and old. When these challenges combine with the cultural changes driven by globalization, youth in rural areas– especially

Interest in radical solutions to embedding Green Infrastructure (GI) into the built environment are at an all-time high. With land value often preventing more mundane forms of GI, key actors, such as planners, developers, architects and others, are increasingly exploring novel methods for embedding the features. This innovation involves a surge in green roofs, living walls and other systems which enables

Peatlands drained for agriculture are among the most intensive sources of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the land-use sector. Policy decisions on the most effective strategies to reduce GHG emissions in line with Paris Agreement goals, alongside strategies that can halt any ongoing soil and biodiversity losses, are hindered by a lack of understanding on how proposed mitigation measures are likely

Global fisheries face a significant crisis, including overexploitation of fishing grounds, marine pollution, and climate change impacts. This paper aims to assess the effects of climate change impa...

The imperative to halt global warming extends beyond human boundaries, intertwining with the urgent need to achieve net-zero emissions. To this end, the Paris Agreement (PA) states that all Parties...

The paper connects the literature on equity in public management with smart cities and explores the effects on the equity of digital projects in multicultural smart cities. We studied four ongoing ...

This article examines the underlying mechanism by which both internal and external drivers affect public managers’ innovative behaviour within digital service organisations.Twenty-three semi-struct...

Many low-income households in the US miss out on social safety net benefits because of the information, compliance, and psychological costs associated with take-up of government assistance. Yet, the empirical evidence on the impact of learning and psychological costs on take-up, and how to reduce them, is mixed. Leaning on an administrative burden framework, this paper measures the role of reducing

Group GIS-based Decision Support Systems (GGDSSs) have been used as effective tools to involve a particular group of individuals in the process of assessing alternative lands/locations for a particular use. Multiple Models-Multiple Users GGDSSs refer to the systems in which each decision maker may use a different decision model in the group assessment process. The variety and dynamic nature of individual

Blockchain is employed as a technology holding a solutionist promise, while at the same time, it is hard for the promissory blockchain applications to become realized. Not only is the blockchain protocol itself not foolproof, but when we move from “blockchain in general” to “blockchain in particular,” we see that new governance structures and ways of collaborating need to be developed to make blockchain

How does contracting out affect service performance? Evidence to date is mixed. We argue that this is partially due to prior studies focusing often on whether – not how – services are contracted. Yet, how services are contracted matters. In particular, we argue that whether users pay user fees for services to contractors affects efficiency. Where they do, contractor revenue depends on user satisfaction

ABSTRACT We present an inductive, citizen-driven appraoch to identify stereotypes of public sector worekrs across the United States, Canada, the Netherlands and South Korea (Study 1: n=918; Study 2: n=3,042). Contrary to common negative portrayals, we idetify two positive stereotypes across countries — having job security and serving society; and one neutral/negative stereotype — going home on time

ABSTRACT Drawing on signalling theory, this study explores the daily cues provided by leaders to promote ethical voice, specifically examining the impact of ethical vision communication as the primary cue. We also investigate the moderating effect of LMX ambivalence as a secondary cue, and how this effect can be diminished by daily interpersonal justice. Our seven-day daily diary study, which involved

From the time a city is first subdivided, its structure of lots act as a precursor to all future redevelopment, forming the spatial bounds of land ownership that force buildings to develop and evolve in their place. It is therefore critical for planning systems that intend to contain urban sprawl to encourage the lot superstructure to adapt to the emerging needs of a city. This study assesses the role

Family farms play a key role in food production, natural resources stewardship, and economic development in the United States (US). Therefore, family farms' resilience (i.e., their capacity to deal with disturbances or shocks and recover from their negative impacts) is crucial for sustainability goals. The COVID-19 crisis posed several challenges to already strained family farms opening an opportunity

Green infrastructure supports residential choice, provides sustainable transport and contributes to liveable neighbourhoods. This study investigates the value of green infrastructure, defined as built environment features (e.g., green spaces, beaches), facilities (e.g., fitness equipment in parks) and sustainable transport infrastructure (e.g., heavy rail, light rail and bus), to property prices in

The national quality framework (NQF) has been implemented to improve the safety and quality of alcohol and other drug (AOD) treatment and provide a nationally consistent approach to treatment quality in Australia. At the same time, concerns have been raised that, in the absence of appropriate regulatory structures to support the NQF, the quality and safety of AOD treatment services cannot be guaranteed

Scholarly evidence of transparency's beneficial effects on trust and perceptions of corruption remains debated and confined to the study of public administration. We contribute to this debate by extending the study of its effects to transparency legislation concerning members of parliament (MPs), political parties, and business interest groups. In an online experiment conducted in Ireland with 1373

Environmental and land use policy literature asserts the need for more holistic, participatory and co-designed forms of governance for the sustainable management of natural resources. Co-design is also increasingly recognised by government as a useful approach but is often applied with varying degrees of success. The purpose of this paper is to assess recent examples of policy co-design across three

The objective of this paper is to estimate the capitalization of CAP subsidies into both rental prices and land values in the EU. We use FADN data at regional level for the period 1989–2016 and apply a dynamic panel approach (GMM estimator) to estimate the capitalization effect of coupled direct payments (CDPs), decoupled direct payments (DDPs) and rural development measures at EU level. The estimated

Land-based mitigation technologies and practices (LMTs) reduce GHG emissions associated with land use and/or enhance terrestrial GHG sinks. This article investigates capacity gaps to successfully facilitate LMT adoption and/or scaling in the regions of Latin America, Europe, North America, sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia. We look at LMTs such as agricultural land management, agroforestry, bioenergy

After decades of sprawl and car-dependent urban developments, especially on the peripheries of metropolitan areas, new policies are being oriented towards more efficient and sustainable mobility. In the process of change towards more sustainable mobility patterns in peripheral areas, commuter railways must play a predominant role because of their capacity and speed. The main aim of this paper is to

Jurisdictions around the world are experiencing an increasing demand for formation of three-dimensional (3D) real property units, especially in the presence of vertical mixed-use developments. Since traditional real property formation is only in two dimensions (2D), jurisdictions are on different steps (levels) of transforming 2D real property legislation into 3D real property legislation. The objective

We leverage the sharp drop in unemployment insurance (UI) benefits following the expiration of the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation program to estimate the consumption smoothing effect of UI. The $600/week decline in supplemental UI benefits is estimated to reduce total food spending by 9.7% and the odds of having food sufficiency by 6.0%. The estimate for food spending translates to a marginal

I compile novel data measuring county-level travel distances to abortion facilities and resident abortion rates from 2009 through 2020. Using these data, I implement a difference-in-difference research design measuring the effects of driving distance to the nearest abortion facility on abortions and births. The results indicate large but diminishing effects: an increase from 0 to 100 miles is estimated

The suicide rate in the United States has risen nearly 40% since 2000. This increase is puzzling because suicide rates had been falling for decades at the end of the 20th century. In this paper, we review important facts about the changing rate of suicide. General trends do not tell the story of important differences across groups—suicide rates rose substantially among middle-aged persons between 2005

Visitation in prison is associated with a low recidivism rate after release, but the causality is not clear. This paper tries to estimate the effect of visitation experience on the recidivism outcome of state prisoners in Missouri, using an instrumental variable approach. The instrumental variable used for identification is the distance from a prison to an address before incarceration. The results

In this paper, we estimate the impact on employment of the 2021 Child Tax Credit (CTC) expansion, which increased the size of the benefit, made it fully refundable, and allowed for monthly receipt. We harness exogenous variation in monthly CTC eligibility by comparing employment among caregivers to that of childless workers before and after monthly payments commenced on July 15, 2021, using event study

ABSTRACT In order to explore the strengths and weaknesses of democracies in mitigating climate change, this article presents a review of more than two decades of research on the democracy-climate nexus. It studies 72 identified articles and book chapters in which correlation analyses between indicators of democracy and climate policy performances have been conducted. The review confirms that democracies

Accurate and up-to-date mapping of mangrove habitats is crucial for effective conservation and management strategies and policies. As a reply to the comparative assessment realized by Acosta et al. (2023) to the last map produced by the Mexican Mangrove Monitoring System (MMMS) and the conclusions resulting from it, we provide a comprehensive response addressing the concerns raised. We acknowledge

Grasslands provide a wide variety of public and private environmental benefits arising from ecosystem services. At the same time, grassland ecosystems are being irreversibly altered. To protect grassland ecosystems and services, many policies have been introduced to encourage private grassland owners and users to adopt management practices to conserve and enhance ecosystem services. However, because

Practices of stakeholder engagement vary widely across voluntary sustainability standard setters. This study examines how the sponsorship structure of standard setters affects the diversity of stakeholders included in consultations and the influence of stakeholder input on standards. I compare six sustainability standard setters through an original dataset of 7945 stakeholder comments submitted during

One of the fundamental rules of effective communication is to “know your audience.” When engaging farmers in conservation in the U.S. and elsewhere where their participation is voluntary, communication should start with the fundamental recognition that farmers are heterogeneous in many ways; their attitudes, values, and motivations, as well as their farms’ biophysical and economic characteristics,

ABSTRACT Scholarly attention in innovation in the public sector is growing rapidly, provoking analytical complexity. We developed a systematic literature review about Public Sector Innovation (PSI), analysing 169 articles published between 2001 and 2021, using PRISMA. We present a comprehensive approach to PSI testing and empirically develop an analytical framework based on the most common combinations

Few scholars have dedicated their attention to the role of think tanks as policy experts within captured states. We investigate how, why, and to what extent think tanks are used in the captured states in the Western Balkans. Our assumption was that think tanks could become party to the processes of “capture”. However, original findings from focus group and interviews with think tankers show that think

Forest restoration has gained traction as a solution to mitigate climate change, contribute to biodiversity conservation, and support forest livelihoods. Yet there is limited evidence on the spatial locations where restoration is most likely to occur. In landscapes that primarily contain private properties, assessing the likelihood of restoration can be informed by understanding the enabling and limiting

Land-use conflicts are increasing in number and intensity. In conflicts involving power imbalances and structural asymmetries, actors may attempt to frame the conflict in a manner that would put it on the political agenda, sometimes causing an escalation of the conflict and extending the possibilities of new coalition partners. Consequently, this study aims to analyze the spread of conflict escalation

What explains the levels and diversity of stakeholder participation in public commenting on bureaucratic policymaking? We examine a novel dataset on a stakeholder engagement mechanism recently introduced by the European Commission containing information about 1258 events organized between 2016 and 2019. We highlight the importance of administrative acts' characteristics and acknowledge the role of

ABSTRACT This article explores scaling deep through transformative learning in Public Sector Innovation Labs (PSI labs) as a pathway to increase the impacts of their work. Using literature review and participatory action research with two PSI labs in Vancouver and Auckland, we provide descriptions of how they enact transformative learning and scaling deep. A shared ambition for transformative innovation

ABSTRACT This study examines annual changes in U.S. federal employee perceptions of their organization’s performance appraisal process to assess whether improvements in the fairness of the process and the quality of feedback received increase the motivational effects of these employee performance management systems. Analysing ten years of the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey data, we find that employee

Scholars have unveiled how and why administrative burdens perpetuate inequity in access to government benefits. However, less is known about the tools public managers can use to reduce burdens and disparities in program access. We partner with a local government in the U.S. to investigate whether a reduction in documentation requirements increased equity by promoting access for “underserved” small

In Asia, Africa, and Latin America, complex drivers of deforestation have sparked mandatory and voluntary initiatives, including moratorium policies, zero-deforestation pledges and certification systems. The impacts of these different commitments, which aim to reduce deforestation, have yet to be documented or analytically scrutinized. Using South Sumatra as a case study, we used the Institutional

We provide a selective survey of the literature on discrimination by criminal justice agents, and argue for a taxonomy of harms that differs from conventional approaches. Discrimination can be self-defeating if it reduces welfare among targets of discrimination while serving no legitimate purpose for the discriminating party. Even if a legitimate purpose is served, discrimination can be deliberative

Forest plantation areas across the globe are increasing in size and in 2019 Eucalyptus monocultures in Brazil covered 6.97 million hectares (0.8%). These monocultures hardly provide ecosystem services and do not support wildlife habitats. A transition towards more sustainable Eucalyptus plantations is urgently needed to support the provisioning of ecosystem services and conserve biodiversity. This

ABSTRACT As local governments increasingly use data to improve sustainability outcomes, this research explores how institutional conditions may assist such efforts. To that end, it tests several hypotheses based on two prominent organizational theories: rational choice and sociological institutionalism. Using the original data that surveys how U.S. cities collect and use performance data when managing

ABSTRACT Our goal was to analyse the effects of performance funding in the specific conditions of Czech and Slovak institutions of higher education, based on the assumption that the key motive for introducing performance funding is to increase accountability. The article confirms that NPM tools still co-exist with other reform trajectories and framings and provides a detailed explanation of how performance

“Global Commissions of Inquiry” have usually been associated with the multilateral initiatives of governments and international organizations. However, various styles of “global commission” have emerged over time. During the COVID-19 pandemic, global commissions have been a key aspect of the COVID-19 international policy landscape, quickly emerging, in 2020 and 2021, to corral knowledge and evidence

The current work explores three potential facilitators of judicial performance. Participants in a state-wide survey of judicial officers (response rate = 33.9 percent) completed self-report measures of self-efficacy, prosocial impact, and self-legitimacy as well as subjectively perceived performance. Objective performance data collected by the state court administrative office were then merged with

Land governance requires coherence not only in terms of policies but also between its governance functions to achieve the desired goals. In this study, we focus on the functions that direct influence land use (boundary setting and resource appropriation; project formulation and financing; and monitoring, evaluation, and learning), which are expected to form a feedback loop necessary for adaptive co-management

ABSTRACT Governments are greatly concerned about cybersecurity, yet most public managers perceive their organization as technologically vulnerable and have little knowledge of past cyber-incidents. Both vulnerability perceptions and knowledge of past exposure are known to affect innovativeness but evidence is mixed and context-dependent. Using a three-year nationally representative pooled dataset of

Policy advice has been the subject of ongoing research in the policy sciences as it raises fundamental issues about what constitutes policy knowledge, expertise, and their effects on policymaking. This introduction reviews the existing literature on the subject and introduces the themes motivating the articles in the issue. It highlights the need to consider several key subjects in the topic in the

In the face of the complexities of problem-solving , experts are gaining centrality in policymaking (Weiss, 1979). At the same time, they are increasingly challenged in their legitimacy, which is not only technical but also political. Challenges to the legitimacy of experts suggest that other types of legitimacy are important for policymaking. Issues of legitimacy are particularly important for sound

Change communication is a critical dimension for leading digital transformation. Existing literature predominantly theorizes change communication as part of the earliest stages of the transformation, but how it evolves over time to remain relevant in this context is understudied. We address this shortcoming through a four-year study of a digital transformation initiative in a local government's health

ABSTRACT Public service motivation (PSM) is a resource that energizes individuals to do good for others and society. However, it is unclear when and how PSM is associated with performance: Does PSM work as a booster to amplify the positive role of job resources for work engagement and performance? Or does PSM help sustain high performance by buffering against experienced cynicism resulting from job

How do public employees respond to organizational identity threats? The present study investigates how public employees make sense of and react to threatening events that may call into question organization's core attributes and status. Using social identity theory and the appraisal theory of emotions, we develop a model in which organizational identity induced by negative media coverage threat provokes

As a design science, public administration is focused on addressing real-world problems. However, within public administration argument and evidence on the relevance of academic research to practice agendas is equivocal. We investigate the “academic–practitioner divide” using computational social science techniques to identify the topics of “academic,” “academic–practitioner,” and practitioner corpora

Public management scholars argue that collective action problems (e.g., incentives to free-ride on the efforts of others or shirk agreements) threaten the feasibility of intergovernmental cooperation. Drawing on collective action theory, this article examines factors associated with overcoming free-riding incentives and provides evidence challenging the idea that governments are prone to such strategic