Changing Budgeting Administration in International Organizations: Budgetary Pressures, Complex Principals and Administrative Leadership

Patz, Ronny; Goetz, Klaus H.

doi:10.1057/978-1-349-94977-9_6

Cited by 25 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 30 publications

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“…In recent years, trust funds for multi‐bi aid have multiplied (Reinsberg, ), and the availability of voluntary resources has become central to the funding of international action, challenging the multilateral nature and execution of international public policies (Graham, , , ). Accordingly, resource mobilization has become a key administrative task, whether in the UN system (Patz and Goetz, ) or in the EU (Patz and Goetz, ). In fact, some IOs’ core purpose is the mobilization or management of funds.…”

Section: Resource Diversificationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Bureaucracy can at best partly contain the strains on the core budgeting processes resulting from financial crises (Eckhard, Patz and Schmidt, ; Hüfner, ) or the challenges of finding agreement among complex principals (cf. Patz and Goetz, ). Below the surface of seemingly stable and routinized budgeting procedures, there are a host of new types of complementary arrangements and organizational solutions through which IOs deal with budget pressure and resource diversification.…”

Section: Organizational Differentiationmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Resourcing International Organizations: Resource Diversification, Organizational Differentiation, and Administrative Governance

Goetz

Patz

2017

Global Policy

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This article introduces, summarizes and contextualizes the key questions and findings of a special issue of Global Policy on the resourcing of international organizations (IOs). The article sets out trends in the financial resources available to IOs; discusses their organizational consequences; and highlights analytical implications for the study of IOs. We discuss resource diversification associated with growing complexity of the origins and types of funding available to IOs; the importance of non-state actors in IO funding; and contestation over the classification of resources. Resource diversification encourages organizational differentiation, manifested in major shifts in resource-related actor constellations and their impact on the autonomy of IOs; adjustments to budgeting procedures; and functional differentiation within IOs and the emergence of new types of IOs that are partly driven by resourcing. These observations invite an analytical perspective in the study of IOs that pays systematic attention to the administrative governance dimension of IOs; the entrepreneurial character of many IOs; and organizational fields as a focus of analysis. Read together, the 11 contributions to the special issue underline that paying attention to their resourcing can advance our understanding of IOs.At a time when newly elected US President Donald Trump announces severe budget cuts to the United Nations system, the relevance of resourcing for the functioning of international organizations (IOs) can be in no doubt. It has long been recognized that access to financial and other resources is critical to the evolution of IOs and to the realization of their global policy ambitions (Wright, 1957). Complaints from the leadership of IOs about inadequate resources also have a long tradition, and the mismatch between IO mandates, as set by member states, and available resources to carry out those mandates effectively is a recurrent concern (see Annan, 1993, for the UN). Some IOs, such as the African Union (Engel, 2015) or UNRWA (Bocco, 2010) appear to suffer from chronic underfunding. Others have a long history of repeated funding 'crises', typically brought about by either the unexpected partial withholding of member state contributions (for the United Nations see Claude, 1964;Taylor, 1991; for UNESCO see H€ ufner, 2017;. In other cases, resource mismatch has been the result of unforeseen demands on IO budgets, as in the case of refugee crises or natural or man-made disasters (McDermott, 2000). In view of these challenges, the need to reform UN financing and resource politics has been recognized and many proposals have been put forward over the years (see Muttukumaru, 2016 for a present-day reform proposal).A central finding of this special issue is that there are several critical issues that matter when studying the resourcing of IOs, beyond the overall levels of funding available and the details of resource allocation. Among these issues are:(1) the mix of sources of funding, namely, who provides the finances of IOs; (2...

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Section: Resource Diversificationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Organizational Differentiationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Resourcing International Organizations: Resource Diversification, Organizational Differentiation, and Administrative Governance

Goetz

Patz

2017

Global Policy

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“…Combining longitudinal case studies of UN agencies with a data set of funding rules, she finds that the introduction of more flexible funding rules emerged primarily as a response to member state disagreements over the acceptability of rising costs, and over the political substance of UN programmes. Patz and Goetz () focus on the effects of changes in the financial basis of IPAs. The authors show how efforts to secure sufficient funding in times of increasing budget pressure can trigger specific administrative reactions.…”

Section: State Of the Art: Studying Management Change In Ipasmentioning

confidence: 99%

Learning from the Commission case: The comparative study of management change in international public administrations

Ege

2019

Public Administration

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Despite the growing importance attributed to organizational performance in global governance, management change in international public administrations (IPAs) is still poorly understood. In particular, the lack of comparative analyses that cover a broader range of management areas limits our descriptive knowledge about the direction and intensity of management change in IPAs. Without such knowledge, however, refining existing theories about the causes and consequences of change is difficult. Based on the reforms of the European Commission, the article reviews available studies about managerial change in IPAs to identify pertinent topics, available knowledge and gaps in the literature. Aiming to narrow these gaps, empirical data on three IPAs are presented to show in which areas and to what degree the management changed over time in these cases and to illustrate how multi‐dimensional managerial change can be studied comparatively in future research more generally.

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“…Eichenauer and Reinsberg,; Graham, ; Sridhar and Woods, ), the consequences of the increasing financial dependency of IOs for their internal functioning is less prominent. Notable exceptions include the study of Patz and , who focus on the effects of changes in the financial basis of IPAs. They show how efforts to secure sufficient funding trigger specific administrative reactions to increasing budget pressures.…”

Section: Staff Autonomy In Times Of Contested Financial Resourcesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Precarious staffing is only one aspect of the general trend associated with the increasing ‘voluntarization’ of funding (Patz and Goetz, ). If it is no longer the collective principal, but instead multiple principals in the form of a small number of public and non‐state donors who ‘pay the piper’ and can therefore ‘call the tune’ oligarchically, this has important implications for the fulfillment of the public mandate of the IO.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

How Financial Resources Affect the Autonomy of International Public Administrations

Ege

Bauer

2017

Global Policy

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Voluntary contributions -often earmarked for specific purposes -have become an indispensable source of revenue for international organizations (IOs) and the UN organizations in particular. While the reasons for this trend are regularly studied, its effects on the internal functioning of the organization (especially on the 'international public administration' (IPA) as the organization's secretariat) remain unclear. Given this gap, we study the consequences of increasing financial dependence for the autonomy of IPA staff. Using financial and personnel data of 15 UN agencies over time, our results are in line with the intuitive expectation that more financial resources in the form of voluntary contributions increase the number of staff. We also find evidence, however, that the more an organization depends on voluntary resources (within its broader financial portfolio), the more it reduces the ratio of permanent staff among its total workforce in the subsequent years. The underlying adaption of IPAs' recruitment and career structures to growing financial insecurities has important implications for the autonomy of international bureaucrats and needs to be considered also in terms of its long-term impact on administrative professionalism and organizational performance. Policy Implications• The UN organizations are generally responsive to changes in their fiscal environment. The increasing dependence on voluntary funding leads them to adjust their staffing practices by reducing 'long-term liabilities' in the form of permanent staff.• The observed trend has potentially negative consequences for IPAs' ability to fulfill their mandate because the institutional memory and policy expertise of staff suffers.• Changing staffing patterns may also impair the performance of IPAs as it becomes more difficult for them to attract qualified personnel and keep their current staff motivated.

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Changing Budgeting Administration in International Organizations: Budgetary Pressures, Complex Principals and Administrative Leadership

Cited by 25 publications

References 30 publications

Resourcing International Organizations: Resource Diversification, Organizational Differentiation, and Administrative Governance

Resourcing International Organizations: Resource Diversification, Organizational Differentiation, and Administrative Governance

Learning from the Commission case: The comparative study of management change in international public administrations

How Financial Resources Affect the Autonomy of International Public Administrations

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