The Impact of Fiscal Crisis on Public Administration Reforms in Europe

Abstract

The world economy continues to grapple with the aftermath of the deepest and most widespread recession in over half a century. The global financial and economic crisis, followed by fiscal crisis, led most Western governments to plan and implement austerity measures in order to cope with the concurrent problems of lower revenues and high public deficit and debt. This did not only influence the delivery and quality of public services, but also the way public administration itself functions. Even though the economic figures show signs of restoring economic growth, the influence of fiscal stress on public administration and management is likely to continue for several years to come. This special issue aims to identify both systemic reform trends in public administration as well as changes in patterns of public management occurring during the retrenchment and immediate years following the cutbacks. Fiscal crisis can provide an opportunity for policy change since it delegitimizes long-standing policies underpinning the status quo. Europe offers an interesting context for examining the impact of the fiscal crisis on public administration because it involves countries which were hit by the fiscal crisis to a different degree. The large-scale comparison of 14 European countries presented in this issue allows us to conclude that more substantial reforms were carried out in countries most severely hit by the crisis and/or where administrative reforms were conditioned by the international financial assistance. That is why the articles in this issue look at the countries which were hit the hardest by the crisis, including Estonia, Italy, Ireland and Latvia. At the same time, fiscal crisis and changes in public administration do not necessarily go hand in hand. Although the popular saying calls for not wasting "a good crisis" and using it for carrying out long-awaited changes and structural reforms, several academics have noted that because of the time pressure involved in curbing budget deficits, policy makers' attention has been diverted from comprehensive and time-consuming preparation and implementation of structural reforms. The argumentation for and against the reforms during the era of fiscal crisis presents a central puzzle that this special issue addresses. The main claims around this puzzle are outlined below.

Enhancing Sustainability Transparency in Local Governments—An Empirical Research in Europe

“…Their proximity to citizens, the volume of resources and services they manage and the high levels of debt and deficit caused by the public financial crisis in many industrialised countries [7,8] make this level of government of particular interest in studies of sustainability, which has economic, social and environmental repercussions for public entities [9][10][11]. The question of LG activity is also very significant in research into government transparency on sustainability, an issue that is of major interest to many elements of society [12,13].…”

Persistent public management reform: an egregore of liberal authoritarianism?

“…Politicians were therefore able to look at other countries and draw the conclusion it was not NPM that was at fault, but the way one sector of the economy was privileged over others. This allowed the reintroduction of regulations and oversight, but with a PV framework (see, for example, Randma-Liiv & Kickert, 2017).…”

Understanding Large Scale Policy Change National Policy Reform Under External Constraints - The Case of Hungary

“…Accordingly, in the Hungarian case: the deviation from the public reforms prescribed by EU policy models and values in the post-2010 period is well explained by the particular socio-economic, political, and administrative factors and the form of the political executive. These features are embodied in the emerging stream of public administration applied-research agendas on EU influence on public sector reform (Ongaro, 2014;Kickert and Randma-Liiv, 2017).…”

“…Still, under certain conditions -that is called conjuncture, critical juncture or more commonly, the window of opportunity -a big change that departs from the historical path can be possible (Wilsford 1994;Capoccia and Kelemen, 2007). The window of opportunity -in the form of an economic crisis -delegitimizes previous arrangements and policies (Kickert and Randma-Liiv, 2017), therefore it is considered by the literature as an independent variable facilitating policy change. When policy change comes, than the historical context -i.e.…”

“…The particular socio-economic, political, and administrative factors and the form of the political executive are all relevant in explain the outcomes. These features are embodied in the emerging stream of public administration applied-research agendas on EU influence on public sector reform(Ongaro, 2014;Kickert and Randma-Liiv, 2017). This article argues that it is worthwhile to amend and refine policy transfer theories with the findings of this study: socio-economic structures and key political decision makers' reform ownership is crucial in the explanation of the different trajectories Hungary and Latvia displayed during their fiscal consolidation and reform under external constraints.…”