The GOVERNANCE blog

Governance: An international journal of policy, administration and institutions

Archive for August 2010

How US defense transformation went wrong

President George W. Bush entered office promising radical transformation of the US military — and put a seasoned leader, Donald Rumsfeld, in charge of the effort.  But the concept of transformation was “eviscerated and undercut” and the change effort ultimately failed.  In the current issue of Governance (July 2010), Tim Came and Colin Campbell examine why.  Their detailed study — The Dynamics of Top-Down Organizational Change: Donald Rumsfeld’s Campaign to Transform the U.S. Defense Department — draws on interviews with almost seventy defense policymakers and close observers.  The authors say that the case study may help “avoid vulnerabilities commonly attending the change campaigns so often encountered in the turnover between democratic governments.”  Read the article.

Erratum: Institutional affiliations for the authors were inadvertently reversed in publication.  The correct affilations are Tim Came (University of British Columbia) and Colin Campbell (University of British Columbia and University of Sydney).  We apologize for the error.

Written by governancejournal

August 17, 2010 at 2:30 pm

Posted in Current issue

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When do local governance arrangements promote democratic outcomes?

In the current issue of Governance (July 2010), Matteo Bassoli of Bocconi University categorizes recent innovations in local governance and defines two “ideal types” — network governance arrangements and participatory governance arrangements.  Drawing on case studies in local governance from the Province of Milan, Bassoli shows how their impact on democratic outcomes is shaped by six factors.  Poorly designed local governance arrangements “constantly raise threats to local democracy,” says Bassoli.  His analytic scheme bridges  disparate literatures on local governance and suggests when democratic outcomes are most likely to be promoted.  Read the article.

Written by governancejournal

August 10, 2010 at 1:46 pm

Posted in Current issue

Tagged with democracy, , ,