Service provision by local governments can be delivered using in-house bureaucracies, private firms, and partnerships with other governments or the not-forprofit sector. This production decision has been a major focus of discussion among scholars, practitioners and political agents for the last quarter of a century. The transaction costs framework is an important tool to analyse decisions regarding the production of local services. In this paper, the authors employ this framework to analyse service delivery in Portugal and find that service characteristics and the local political environment play a key role in local officials' choice among the three governance mechanisms to deliver public services. KEY WORDS: Service delivery, transaction costs, governance mechanismsDue to their level of proximity and periodic transfers of competences from the national government, local governments in Portugal gained importance over the past two decades as service providers. Their functional responsibilities have been extended significantly over several areas including water supply, promotion of regional development, solid waste collection, emergency management, health care, education, and land use management, among many others. To cope with all these challenges, local governments changed from a general, multi-purpose organisation to a complex network of relationships with other public bodies, private agents, and not-for-profit organisations.

No abstract

Public Administration is forced to strike a balance between efficiency and democracy in defining its agenda and course of action. One of the characteristics of Public Administration is that all decisions must reflect democratic values, in addition to being efficient. Nevertheless, administrative reform, motivated by financial stress, tends to highlight the importance of financial performance while overlooking the democratic and political aspects of public management. This research seeks to analyze the link and tension between efficiency and democracy in light of the latest global financial crisis. The paper uses a quantitative approach and collects data from Portuguese local governments to test the argument of an inverse linear relationship between financial performance and democratic procedures. Findings confirm Waldo's argument (1948) of an inverse relationship while the evidence gathered shows that the financial crisis increased the negative effect of democratic procedures on financial performance. Keywords: democracy; financial crises; local governments.Democracia vs. eficiência: como alcançar equilíbrio em tempo de crise financeira A administração pública é forçada a encontrar um equilíbrio entre eficiência e democracia na definição da sua agenda e curso de ação. Uma das características da administração pública é que todas as decisões devem refletir valores democráticos, para além de serem eficientes. No entanto, a reforma administrativa, motivada por dificuldades financeiras, tende a destacar a importância do desempenho financeiro, em detrimento dos aspetos democráticos nas políticas de gestão pública. Esta pesquisa visa analisar a relação e tensão entre a eficiência e a democracia à luz da mais recente crise financeira global. O trabalho utiliza uma abordagem quantitativa e recolhe dados de governos locais portugueses para testar o argumento de uma relação linear inversa de desempenho financeiro e procedimentos democráticos. Os resultados confirmam o argumento de uma relação inversa, definida por Waldo (1948). Adicionalmente, os resultados também permitem concluir que a crise financeira evidenciou o efeito negativo dos procedimentos democráticos no desempenho financeiro. Palavras-chave: democracia; crise financeira; governos locais.Democracia vs. eficiencia: como buscar un equilibrio en tiempos de crisis financiera La administración pública se ve obligada, en el decurso de su acción, a encontrar un equilibrio entre la eficiencia y la. Una de las características de la administración pública es que, además de ser eficiente, todas las decisiones deben reflejar los valores democráticos. Sin embargo, la reforma administrativa, motivada por el estrés financiero, tiende a poner de relieve la importancia de los resultados financieros, pasando por alto los aspectos democráticos y políticos de la gestión pública. Esta investigación busca analizar la relación y la tensión entre la eficiencia y la democracia en el decurso de la reciente crisis financiera global. El trabajo utiliza un enfoque cuantitativo y recoge dat...

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

This work contributes to the literature on water governance by attempting to provide an answer to the question of what are the differences in efficiency of alternative governance arrangements of water utilities. We test hypotheses derived from property rights, principal-agent, and transaction costs theories using a comprehensive database of 260 water utility systems provided by the Portuguese Regulatory Authority of Water and Waste Services. Using endogenous switching regression models estimated through maximum likelihood, the study is designed in two steps. First, we investigate differences in efficiency between in-house options and externalization and find that in-house solutions as a set (direct provision and municipal companies) are more efficient than externalization options (mixed companies and concessions). Second, we test differences in efficiency within both in-house and externalization solutions, and fail to find statistically significant differences in efficiency between in-house bureaucracies and municipal companies and between mixed companies and concessions.