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This chapter on academic publishing covers the origins of the field; the impact of the two major drivers of change—the printing press and the Internet—on the spread of knowledge; Open Access; the monograph; university presses; academic libraries; commercial academic publishers; trade publishers and the cross-over book; peer review; journals; HE textbook publishing. It looks at all these areas through the lens of change, stressing the need for greater connectivity between the various communities of practice involved in the academic publishing field, and underlines the historic and existing collaborative and innovative strengths it contains.

The debate on accountability within the public sector has been lively in the past decade. Significant progress has been made in developing conceptual frameworks and typologies for characterizing different features and functions of accountability. However, there is a lack of sector specific adjustment of such frameworks. In this chapter we present a framework for analyzing accountability within health care. The chapter makes use of the concept of “accountability regime” to signify the combination of different accountability forms, directions and functions at any given point in time. We show that reforms can introduce new forms of accountability, change existing accountability relations or change the relative importance of different accountability forms. They may also change the dominant direction and shift the balance between different functions of accountability. The chapter further suggests that developments in accountability regimes are best analyzed with a combination of top-down and bottom up perspectives and that there is a need to develop research strategies to support this aim.

Accountability in regulation will never reach a state of ‘perfection’ and stability, but will remain, given competing values and shifting priorities, in a state of continued tension and fluidity. In other words, debates require transparency regarding the very different ideas concerning the appropriate means and ends of accountability. This article develops this argument in three steps. First, it considers the background to contemporary debates surrounding accountability, pointing to traditional concerns as well as to a change in context captured by discussions about ‘polycentric’ or ‘decentred’ regulation. Second, this article points to key components of any regulatory regime over which demands of accountability are commonly asserted, and to four ways of considering institutional design and accountability. Third, and finally, this article suggests that debates on whether the rise of the regulatory state has led to a decline or rise of accountability and transparency are misplaced.

In employer-provided pension plans and individual retirement saving accounts, contributions over the working lifetime are used to purchase assets that are drawn down after retirement. In contrast, public pension systems typically use pay-as-you-go (PAYG) finance. With PAYG finance, current revenue to the program – which may be derived from a tax on payroll or from general taxation, – is used to finance current pension expenditure. Such a pension program is therefore a form of tax-and-transfer system, akin to other elements of the public welfare program. Given these general issues, this article describes an actuarial-based system and contrasts it with an explicitly redistributive program. It then delineates four dimensions in which public pension systems diverge from this actuarial benchmark, providing actual illustrations for OECD countries. The next section considers the limited empirical evidence on whether, in practice, deviations from an actuarial basis to the public pension system actually affect household behaviour.

This article examines what reforms have been proposed, what they are intended to accomplish, and how they are working out. The result of the survey and analysis conducted is somewhat messy if informative. The amount and quality of information available in different countries varies enormously. Failed reforms have often been ignored by researchers, biasing the existing reports in a positive direction. Reforms have been in place for different amounts of time in different countries, and some have been only partly implemented, adding to the difficulty of comparing them. Finally, the large number of countries engaged in such reforms has led to some selectivity in the presentation, making the results less than neat. This article then illustrates an interim report on an ongoing set of processes in a limited number of countries, based on the literature and on first-hand observations offered by scholars and practitioners in a number of countries.

Although numerous scholars claim the eminent demise of bureaucracy, this article argues that bureaucracy will not only survive in the twenty-first century but will flourish. The core of the argument is that the large-scale tasks that government must perform—national defense, a social welfare system, political monitoring of the economy, etc.—will remain key functions of governments in the twenty-first century and that bureaucracies, likely public but possibly private, will continue to be the most effective way to do these tasks. Bureaucracy has weathered other calls for its demise before; current efforts are likely to meet similar fates. After a brief discussion of definitions and the meaning of bureaucracy, the major sections of this article deal with six challenges to bureaucracy. Some of these challenges are intellectual; others are part of real-world ongoing reform efforts in a variety of countries.

The advent of neo-corporatism has been a rare occurrence among advanced capitalist liberal democracies—and virtually unheard of elsewhere. Of the twenty or so original members of that club of rich countries, the OECD, only about one-third have managed to practice it for any length of time, despite the demonstrable benefits that this mode of interest intermediation has had for many aspects of macroeconomic performance from the end of the Second World War until the end of the 1970s. The most pervasive reason for this has been the opposition of organized business interests. Only under exceptional conditions of a “balance of class forces” between capital and labor has it emerged and persisted at the national level.

Although it is conventional in political science to distinguish between political parties and interest groups, in practice the distinction is less clear. The conventional definitions suggest that political parties seek to capture power; interest groups aspire to influence public policy. Even the names of political parties make it obvious, however, that in practice this distinction is not absolute. The linkage in the UK between Labour parties and unions is usually clear. In the United States, the Minnesota branch of the Democratic Party is still called the Democratic Farm Labor Party. Farmers' parties used to be fairly common although as in the Swedish case they have generally adopted labels that are more encompassing such as, to continue the Swedish example, the Center Party. Parties do not call themselves “The Business Party” but are often described as such. What does this mean? On what basis is it reasonable to identify a party as the business party? There are a number of different indicators that can be used.

Business groups combine empirically a variety of features that have fascinated researchers from a range of disciplines. However, debate and theorizing, both generally and in relation to politics, are unlikely to progress unless the features of interest are organized in different disciplines which are clearly distinguished from each other. At a minimum, distinctions are necessary among three types of business groups—informal, pyramidal, and diversified—and the theoretical approaches associated with each. Much of this article, especially the analysis of business groups as objects of policy, focuses on the diversification dimension. Yet, not all groups pursue equally politicized strategies. Business groups vary over time, across countries, and within countries in terms of what could be called degrees of political intimacy.

This article proceeds in several steps to analyze business politics in Latin America. The second section briefly reviews a general conceptual framework that distinguishes the sources of business preferences as well as a range of ways that business influences policy-makers. The third section takes these analytic building blocks and incorporates them into an examination of the dynamic, strategic interaction between business and government. This section develops the portfolio analysis of the range of political investments that business in Latin America typically employs, including lobbying, campaign finance, business associations, personal networks, and corruption.

Several broad generalizations about the nature of business representation in Washington would command general agreement. First, business representation is organizationally fragmented and competitive. Second, there is no hierarchical relationship between business organizations. Third, peak and trade organizations are not the only source of business representation in Washington. Large corporations increasingly have their own “in-house” lobbyists in a governmental affairs unit; although, this trend varies by industry and firm size, there was a marked increase between 1991 and 2001 across industries in the emphasis firms placed upon hiring in-house lobbyists. Fourth, business groups are often part of short-lived coalitions that can link businesses with other types of organizations or pit one group of businesses against another.

In the last decade, many leading universities throughout the world have modified their mission and vision statements to emphasize community service and broader societal aspirations. Examining the case of Canada within the global system of higher education, this chapter explores the community engagement approaches of Canadian postsecondary institutions. Following an analysis of the communities within and surrounding campuses and a summary of key stakeholders, it outlines the unique history of extension faculties and the special relationships with Indigenous peoples and linguistic minorities that have become pivotal to community engagement strategies. The chapter emphasizes lessons from the Canadian context that may serve global university leaders. It concludes with a synopsis of challenges and threats to navigate in the pursuit of effective and enriching university–community relationships.

This article aims to characterize French and German public administration and management, outline their specific reform trajectories, and indicate the influence both systems have had abroad. It begins by highlighting some characteristic traditions of the German and French systems. This is followed by an overview of important reform trajectories in each country, which highlights factors that have shaped the national administrative systems. The final section focuses on the influence of Germany and France on foreign public administrations.

Few observers would dispute the fact that radical changes have been attempted in the funding and organization of public services in most developed countries. Increasingly the trend is said to be away from ‘outmoded traditional ways of organizing and conducting public business towards up-to-date, state-of-the-art methods and styles’. Such change is thought to have had implications for employment relations. The aim of this article is to present a critical overview of recent debates about the nature and consequences of public sector restructuring. It first describes some of the main characteristics of public service organizations and how these have been largely embedded in national-level institutions and policy traditions. Furthermore, this article analyses the forces that have driven restructuring and looks at how change has been associated with attempts to reshape public services through privatization and management reform.

The combination of expanded participation in higher education and changing state financing and governance policies is transforming the nature and activities of research universities in many OECD countries. Historically, their strategic autonomy as discrete organizational actors and ability to develop distinctive competitive competences differed considerably between national higher education systems. Three main types of university can be distinguished in these terms: Hollow, State-Chartered, and Corporate. Limited formal delegation of authority over academic staff and other resources and responsibility for scientific and financial performance to the managers of hollow-like universities is leading to the emergence of a fourth type: State-guided. The increasing intensification of pseudo-market competition for resources and prestige between state-chartered universities together with greater state steering of research priorities is reducing their strategic independence. The growing use of performance-based funding and standardized research evaluation systems by many states encourages imitation strategies and increases tensions between university management and academics pursuing extra-institutional scientific goals.

The topic of public service partnerships has clear substantive importance. Governments all over the world are increasing their dependence upon collaborative partnerships to delivery public services. This article reviews literature written in the crevice between the espoused benefits of collaborative service partnerships and the reality that they are difficult to create, sustain, and use to mobilize resources in ways that create positive results. According to this article, the literature exploring the collaborative public service delivery is diverse. This reflects the variation found in the field, as practitioners use an increasingly wide array of tools to work on complex, public problems. What has resulted is a disparate literature with two distinct streams of inquiry — one focusing on collaboration itself, the other on the consequences these new service arrangements have on organizations and citizens. This article reveals some fundamental issues unresolved in the ongoing scholarly inquiry.

The basic structure of the Oxbridge type evolved historically as a federal set of multi-disciplinary and largely self-governing colleges. Each set was balanced between competition and cooperation. A distinct feature is that teaching is divided between the university role of organizing and examining taught courses, and the college role of organizing the attendant processes of student learning, especially via the system of tutorials/supervisions, a form of apprenticeship in critical thinking. University policy is strongly influenced by faculty assemblies. This formula is now under pressure from greater dependence on government research funding, and from new performance criteria in evaluation. There are fears that new forms of state control will result in a decline of autonomy, and so the capacity for academic initiative, as universities as a whole become more market-driven.

This chapter discusses the context of nonprofit organizations, which are under pressure to demonstrate how they act for the benefit of the public in transparent ways with obvious impact. It notes that questions of ownership and accountability have combined in nonprofit corporate governance, and that the effect aims to address stakeholder relationships and corporate governance systems more effectively. It argues that nonprofit governance theories represent a wide range of lenses that can support environmental contingencies and the increased hybridization of corporate forms and business models within the nonprofit sector, as well as promoting accountability. The chapter also determines whether increased state and societal regulation will tend to improve corporate governance practices or create a mess that allows governance mediocrity.

This article is about corporate social responsibility (CSR) and aims to distinguish different types of CSR–government relationship and to understand these in the context of broader state roles and government–business relations. It investigates these relationships comparatively, historically, and in terms of new institutionalism. It does so comparatively by investigating CSR and government in four types of political system on the assumption that CSR reflects features of respective national business systems, or varieties of capitalism, in which government roles are critical. Thus it considers CSR in the USA, in Europe, in the transitional economies of East Asia, Eastern Europe, and South Africa, and globally. The article's special focus on the USA is justified because, although business responsibilities have long existed throughout the world, in America the concept of CSR emerged as a basis for reflection on its relation to the wider purpose of the firm in the context of institutions of governance.