Drivers of Autonomy of Public Agencies in Italy

Abstract

The creation of agencies has been and still is a widespread trend in the public sector: governments in many countries often establish semi‐autonomous single‐purpose organizations to carry out a wide range of functions and tasks. The trend to autonomization is problematic as it affects public sector's governance: several bodies operate partly autonomously from the core elective government, and are sometimes loosely coupled with their ‘parent’ administration. Consequently, analysing the drivers of agencies’ autonomy is a crucial issue for public management. This paper, in the light of some major contributions in organizational science, assumes that agencies’ autonomy is influenced by factors that affect post‐delegation relationships: agencies’ structure, culture and nature of the tasks executed. The study was aimed at testing a range of hypotheses about the autonomy of public agencies, using for this purpose the so‐far not investigated case of Italy–much in the spirit of the accumulation of knowledge in an area of public management. Results do not provide any strikingly counter‐intuitive finding, but a mix of confirmations and disconfirmations of previous findings that allow a finer‐grained analysis on the determinants of agency autonomy.

Agencification revisited: trends in consolidation of central government administration in Europe

“…In Italy, the reform inspired by the UK’s Next Steps Initiative was introduced in 1999. It included, in particular, the setting up of four new fiscal agencies in the policy domain of the finance ministry (Barbieri et al., 2013). Agencification also became an important element on the agendas of international organizations (the World Bank, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and European Union (EU)) in supporting the transition in developing economies and post-socialist countries of Central and Eastern Europe (Sosay and Zenginobuz, 2005).…”

Balancing financial autonomy and control in agencification

“…This autonomy also represents the extent to which financial decisions can be made in an agency. Barbieri et al (2013, p. 35) mention strategic and operational financial autonomy. Strategic financial autonomy refers to the possibility of performing the same activities without having to conform to rules set by the parent ministry and without having to rely upon the parent ministry’s prior approval.…”

“…Several studies have discussed financial autonomy in the contexts of western countries (e.g. Barbieri et al , 2013; James et al , 2016; Pollitt et al , 2004; Smullen, 2004; Verhoest et al , 2010). However, little research has been done on the practices of financial autonomy in agencies from developing country settings.…”

Erklärungsfaktoren für die Managementautonomie in kommunalen Mehrheitsbeteiligungen

“…Untersuchungen deuten aber darauf hin, dass diese Dimensionen für die Agenturen eine Insgesamt unterscheiden die Forscher einige Ländercluster, die aufgrund ihrer Reformhistorie als relativ ähnlich klassifiziert werden können Aulich et al 2010;Painter und Peters 2010;Pollitt und Bouckaert 2004;Barbieri et al 2013;Bach 2014;Verhoest et al 2014 (Verhoest et al 2014: 13). Skandinavische Länder statten ihre Agenturen mit einer deutlich größeren, strategischen Personalautonomie aus, dahinter folgen kontinentaleuropäische Agenturen (Verhoest et al 2014: 13;Bach 2014: 291ff.…”