http://repub.eur.nl/res/aut/15232/ List of Publications en http://repub.eur.nl/static-eur/img/logo.png http://repub.eur.nl http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/34967/ 2013-01-01T00:00:00Z Effective health system reform requires support from health care professionals. However, many studies show an increasing discontent among health care professionals toward certain government policies. When professionals resist implementing policies, this may have serious consequences for policy effectiveness. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/38541/ 2013-01-01T00:00:00Z Abstract. This paper analyses determinants of public managers´ internal and external use of performance information. Using a sample of over 3100 top public sector executives in six European countries, we find evidence for significant country variations, with a more limited use of performance information in France and Germany. It was also found that the use of performance information is mainly determined by organizational factors rather than managers’ individual socio-demographic characteristics. The analysis also found considerable differences in patterns of use between policy fields and a lower use of performance indicators in central government ministries. Finally, the implementation of performance management instruments in an organization has an overall strong effect on the actual use of performance information. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/38545/ 2013-01-01T00:00:00Z Abstract. Scholarship of trust in institutions has tended to see trust and distrust as opposites on one continuum. Theoretical advances have challenged this view, and now consider trust and distrust as different constructs, and thus, as constructs with different characteristics and partly different determinants. Current empirical research on trust in government has yet done little to incorporate these findings, and has largely continued to rely on traditional survey items assuming a trust-distrust continuum. We rely on the literature in organisation studies and political science to argue in favor of measuring citizen trust and distrust as distinct concepts and discuss future research challenges. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/38785/ 2013-01-01T00:00:00Z Introducing choice and competition in public services was supposed to put citizens in the “driver’s seat”, making them in charge of their service provision. Introducing choice often is indeed beneficial for citizens. However, it sometimes also leads to increased inequality among citizens. This chapter provides an overview of the background, facilitators and pitfalls of choice, illustrated using empirical studies from various sectors (such as education, healthcare and utilities) in various countries. We conclude by arguing that policymakers should make informed decisions regarding choice. Introducing choice can benefit public services, but one should remain cautious for its potential negative effects. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/37293/ 2012-09-18T00:00:00Z Background: Effective health system reform requires support from health care professionals. However, many studies show an increasing discontent among health care professionals toward certain government policies. When professionals resist implementing policies, this may have serious consequences for policy effectiveness. Objective: To develop and test a model for explaining resistance of health professionals to implement policies, based on three dimensions: societal benefits (such as improving efficiency), patient benefits (such as improving quality for individual patients) and personal benefits for professionals (for example increased income or fewer administrative burdens). Methods: We conduct a survey among 1317 Dutch psychologists, psychotherapists and psychiatrists in 2010 who had to implement a new policy: Diagnosis Related Groups (DRGs). The dependent variable is professionals' resistance to implement these DRGs. As independent variables we develop scales to measure perceived societal benefits, patient benefits and personal benefits. Socio-demographic variables are also included. Results: The model worked adequately in that the three benefit dimensions, together with control variables, explained 43% of the variance in resistance to implement DRGs. Results indicate that health professionals were overall quite resistant towards the policy. The main reason was widespread belief that DRGs neither contribute to care quality nor help to control costs (low societal benefits). Resistance can also be explained by fears for one's personal status, income, and administrative burdens. Professionals furthermore doubt whether the policy is beneficial for patients, although this dimension is the least influential, which was unexpected. Perceived effects on patient choice, furthermore, do not contribute to willingness or resistance to work with DRGs. These insights can help in understanding why health care professionals embrace or resist the implementation of particular policies. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/32805/ 2012-06-28T00:00:00Z Rede, uitgesproken op 28 juni 2012 bij de aanvaarding van het ambt van Persoonlijk Hoogleraar ‘Vergelijkende Bestuurskunde’ bij de opleiding Bestuurskunde van de Faculteit der Sociale Wetenschappen van de Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/32774/ 2012-05-14T00:00:00Z Is there evidence for the emergence of ‘two-track’ public services, where the wealthiest, best- informed and most assertive customers get the best quality service? In this paper, we use public opinion data of citizen complaint behavior from 2000 and 2004 towards services of general interest in 15 EU countries to provide a first examination of the ‘two-track’ public services hypothesis. The findings only partly support the expectation that socio-economic factors did have a negative impact over time on citizen complaints. While education did not have such an effect, age did. However, these results should be regarded as provisional for various reasons. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/38981/ 2012-03-01T00:00:00Z Abstract In the European Union (EU), as in most of the developed and also developing world, reforms and particularly liberalization of public services were introduced during the last decades, aiming to increase citizen and consumer satisfaction. However, the reforms have not achieved all the results that were expected as regards citizens’ behaviour and satisfaction. Regulators all over the world aim to improve the analysis and understanding of real consumers’ decisions and perceptions, and incorporating them into regulatory policies. In this context, the main objective of this report is to analyze longitudinal trends, as well as socio-economic differences, in citizen satisfaction, perception and reported behaviour toward public services in the EU. To do so, firstly the main empirical contributions of the existing literature on this topic are described. Then, based on data from Eurobarometers, trends and differences in satisfaction and reported behaviour (use, complaining and exercising choice) towards public services in the EU Member Countries are analyzed. The results obtained reflect the key role of different socioeconomic characteristics (as sex, age, education, employment and area of residence) in determining both behaviour and satisfaction towards public services. Some groups show better results in the use of the services and decision making, are more able to express voice and exercise choice and, as a result, tend to obtain higher satisfaction. However, other socioeconomic groups, as the elderly, the lower educated and those unemployed show worse results both in expressing voice and choice and in maximizing their satisfaction, thus reflecting their particular vulnerability as consumers of the liberalized public services. Citizens’ heterogeneity as consumers and aspects conditioning vulnerability are a great challenge for public services regulation, and should be incorporated into the European regulatory policies if the achievement of more efficient markets aims to be compatible with the maintenance of social cohesion. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/38985/ 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z Abstract We examine the relationship between a range of New Public Management (NPM) practices and citizens’ perceptions of service efficiency, responsiveness, equity and effectiveness in English local governments. We find that public-private relationships have a negative relationship with citizens’ perceptions of all four dimensions of local service performance, but that an entrepreneurial strategic orientation exhibits a positive association with all four. Performance management is also likely to positively rather than negatively influence citizens’ perceptions of local public services. Further analysis revealed that the impact of NPM practices varies according to the level of socio-economic disadvantage confronted by local governments. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/39175/ 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z Policy responses to the financial crisis can be divided into cyclical and anti-cyclical approaches. The former advocates reducing public spending in times of financial constraints. The latter approach advocates public spending to boost the economy. Using multinomial multilevel analysis on public opinion data from more than 20,000 respondents in the 27 EU member countries, we test a model for citizen preferences between reducing spending or savings in public services, and investing in measures to boost the economy. We look at individual- and country-level determinants of attitudes to savings in public services, and concentrate on four groups of explanations: political disaffection, ideology, self-interest, and macro-economic conditions. It was found that political disaffection, as well as the respondent’s age, education and political orientation have the strongest effects on preferences. Macro-economic variables, such as a country’s government deficit level, public debt or public expenditure have, surprisingly, no effect on citizens’ financial policy preferences. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/39176/ 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z This study has been compiled as an internationally comparative contribution to the parliamentary inquiry by the Dutch Senate into the effects of privatization and agencification on the relationship between citizens and the (national) government. Knowledge on this topic is scarce and scattered across different sources. Therefore, this paper consists of three different sections. Each section deals with a different question and uses different sources. In this overview we summarize the main findings of the three sections. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/25533/ 2011-04-06T00:00:00Z Surveys of citizen satisfaction with local public services have become widespread, with the results increasingly used to reorganize services, to allocate budgets, and to hold managers accountable. But evidence from a split-ballot experiment that we conducted suggests that the order of questions in a citizen survey has important effects on reported satisfaction with specific public services as well as overall citizen satisfaction. Moreover, the correlations of specific service ratings with overall satisfaction, and thus the identification of key drivers of overall satisfaction, also turn out to be highly sensitive to question order. These findings are in line with research on priming and question order effects in the survey methodology literature, but these effects have not been carefully examined before in the context of citizen surveys and public administration research. Policy and management implications of these finding are discussed. © 2011 The Authors. Public Administration http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/23009/ 2011-03-25T00:00:00Z This first COCOPS Working Paper outlines the background to the COCOPS project. It introduces the concept of New Public Management (NPM) both as a set of managerial innovations in the public sector and as a set of new ideas about the role of government. The Paper presents an overview of the state of the art of evaluating the impact of NPM and we argue that there are a number of major gaps in current studies on the impact of NPM reforms. These include limited coverage of European countries and an overall lack of cross-national research, a limited empirical base in many assessments of NPM, and a tendency to focus on specific elements of NPM-style reforms or specific policy sectors rather than on public sector reforms in general. Furthermore, we identify two unintended effects of NPM-style reforms that severely impact the public sector of the future’s ability to build and sustain social cohesion. One is the fragmentation of the public sector; the other consists of effects of the reforms on equity. Innovative practices have to provide an answer to these two challenges. We end this working paper by collating the first tentative empirical evidence of emerging models for the governance of public services beyond NPM, including outcome-based approaches and whole-of-government models, and reflect on the implications of the financial crisis for these developments. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/31564/ 2011-01-01T00:00:00Z The transfer of responsibilities from central to local government has often been justified on the grounds of efficiency and democracy under the principle of subsidiarity. The existing models for mapping local government power in Europe, however, are often insufficiently detailed to allow an in-depth comparison, and little is known about the level of citizen support for increasing the responsibilities of local government. This paper attempts to expand this knowledge base by using financial local government data and opinion data from the European Values Study to analyse these questions. It relates the level of local government responsibilities in Europe to the level of citizen support for increasing local government responsibilities. These findings are then used to develop a research agenda on local government measurement, and to reflect on the difficulties facing the European comparative local government researcher. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/39018/ 2011-01-01T00:00:00Z Good governance speelt een belangrijke rol in het ontwikkelingsbeleid. Er wordt veel hulpgeld ingezet voor steun aan anti-corruptiemaatregelen, steun aan democratiseringsprocessen, aan het verbeteren van het functioneren van de overheid, en het aantal governance indicatoren is enorm toegenomen. Deze indicatoren lijken ook een toenemende rol te spelen bij hulpallocatie. Maar er vallen verschillende kanttekeningen bij deze ontwikkelingen te plaatsen. De indicatoren zijn namelijk verre van waardevrij, en reflecteren een bepaalde visie op good governance, die bovendien in verandering is. In deze bijdrage gaan we op basis van de zich uitbreidende literatuur eerst na wat donoren verstaan onder ‘good governance’ en hoe dit gemeten wordt. Daarna gaan we na of good governance inderdaad van belang is voor ontwikkeling en wat de ervaringen tot nu toe zijn met het bevorderen van good governance, en de waardenspanningen die hiermee samengaan. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/39019/ 2011-01-01T00:00:00Z The chapters in this book have all in some way focused on new steering instruments in the public sector, or on how governments, often in collaboration with other actors, attempt to achieve integrated results and broad social outcomes. The trend away from the traditional and NPM-style prescriptions, the latter of which often resulted in a certain degree of fragmentation and a loss of steering capacity (Terry, 2005), is visible in a wide range of areas, both on the delivery level, and on the more strategic level. This has put the need to coordinate the public sector and to find new ways of steering firmly on the agenda (Bouckaert et al., 2010; Braun, 2008). http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/39021/ 2011-01-01T00:00:00Z New Public Management has been around for a quarter of a century in European public sectors, yet despite the movement’s emphasis on indicators and evidence, there have been surprisingly few encompassing evaluations. In this paper, we provide an overview of academic evaluation and impact studies of entire NPM-style reform programmes. We distinguish between two sets of NPM-style changes and reforms. One is that of specific managerial innovations within public organisations. The other consists of changes to the role of government and citizens as a result of NPM ideas. We conclude that a majority of academic research has focused on the first set of changes, while approaches to the second set has been mainly of a critical nature with relatively limited attention for empirical studies. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/39174/ 2011-01-01T00:00:00Z Concerns about failed and fragile states have put state- and nation-building firmly on the academic and policy agenda, but the crucial role of public services in this process has remained underexplored. The 1960s and '70s generated a substantial set of literature that is largely missing from current writing. It identified state penetration, standardisation and accommodation as key processes in the state- and nation-building sequence. This article analyses these three processes in Western Europe in the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries, and the role of public services therein, to explore how they may help us to understand the success and failure of state- and nation-building in developing countries and fragile states. © The Authors 2011. Development Policy Review http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/20627/ 2010-07-09T00:00:00Z In this article we develop a contingency approach to representative bureaucracy. We argue that representative bureaucracy is a multidimensional and changing concept, and that in the academic and policy debate on representative bureaucracy three different dimensions are intermingled: power, equal opportunities and diversity. These dimensions not only reflect a particular view on the role of the state and the relation between the state and citizens, they also diverge in the motives for making the bureaucracy representative. Even the conception of what representation means can be totally different. We conclude that modern diversity management approaches alone may not contribute to nation-building because these mainly emphasize organizational performance. Approaches to representative bureaucracy in nation-building must also be built on moral arguments and underline the exemplary role of the state. In addition, the political viability of managerial and moral approaches needs to be taken into account through acknowledging political realities and existing distributions of power in society. Points for practitioners Through using a contingency approach we show how representative bureaucracy has been used as a political and administrative answer to quite different social, political and administrative problems and challenges. Through analysing these contingencies, this article contributes to nation-builders' quest for a fitting concept of representative bureaucracy in the contexts in which they are working. The instruments used to make the bureaucracy representative need to be aligned with dominant conceptions of the state, politics, and citizens. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/19223/ 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z This literature review explores the concept of emergence in public governance, and the need for building anticipative capacity in public organisations. The purpose of this review is to explore how public organisations can deal with issues that emerge in their environment. Emerging issues are characterised by a great deal of complexity and uncertainty, and therefore create challenges for static public governance arrangements. Dealing with emerging issues requires that organisations and systems build anticipative capacities. The literature review summarises recent but also less recent organisation theory focusing on organisational improvisation and on complex governance arrangements. This literature presents an alternative way of both analysing organisations and of organising beyond static and highly proceduralised or systemised conceptions. New organisational arrangements to cope with emergence sometimes appear counterintuitive, and they sometimes appear to defy the rules of economy, efficiency, democracy and the rule of law. As is evident from Bourgon’s ‘New Synthesis’ framework, an organisation or system that facilitates emergence needs to make a trade-off with other objectives. While such arrangements are good at anticipating change and at detecting trends, they come with challenges to the performance, compliance, and the resilience of the public sector. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/39008/ 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z The Lyons Inquiry into Local Government has introduced the English local government community to the concept of ‘place-shaping’. Place-shaping refers to the new role for local governments in promoting the well-being of communities and citizens. The processes of place-shaping are remarkably similar to the processes of nation-building. This paper uses Stein Rokkan’s thinking on nation-building in Western Europe to analyse place-shaping. It focuses on the penetration and standardisation processes and underlines the importance of integrating peripheries, defining boundaries, and creating identities. In essence, it is argued that place-shaping is really about the repolitisation of English local authorities. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/39012/ 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z In deze bijdrage onderzoeken we waar vertrouwen en wantrouwen in justitie vandaan komen. Meer bepaald kijken we naar de invloed van vertrouwdheid van burgers met het justitiesysteem op het vertrouwen. Hieruit blijkt dat het hebben van concrete ervaring met justitie niet tot een positievere opinie leidt. Contact met justitie lijkt in sommige gevallen zelfs te leiden tot een negatievere houding, zeker voor wat betreft evaluaties van de efficiëntie van justitie. Vervolgens exploreren we alternatieve verklaringsmodellen voor het vertrouwen aan de hand van gegevens uit de European Social Survey in 20 landen. Deze bevestigen de onbehagenhypothese en tonen dat mensen die ontevreden zijn met hun eigen leven en geen vertrouwen hebben in hun medemensen minder vertrouwen hebben in justitie. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/39014/ 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z Policy makers frequently invoked restoring the public sector’s legitimacy as one of the main motivations for public sector reform in the 1980s and ‘90s. Low or declining public trust in government and a decline of the public sector’s legitimacy (perceived or real) became a central motivation for public sector reform efforts, notably NPM-style reforms. In this chapter we first show how trust and legitimacy entered the reform agenda and became important motivations for public sector reform programmes in the 1990s. Creating congruence between what public services citizens really wanted and the services the public sector provided was seen as the key to regaining the public trust. In this first part, we also examine whether the basic assumption of declining trust was correct and whether NPM reforms have eventually contributed to restoring trust. In a second part, we elaborate on the apparent irony that NPM wanted to re-establish the public trust by introducing distrust-based control and compliance mechanisms. We show that this is not necessarily a contradiction by distinguishing between three different types of trust and by outlining NPM’s effect on these three types of trust. We end by discussing the re-emergence of trust-based steering concepts in public management. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/39017/ 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z In this chapter, we challenge the assumption of a direct relationship between the existence and availability of information, and its use in decisions. We will do so by integrating three different sets of literature. Other chapters in this book stress organisations’ capacities and capabilities to produce a turnaround, or refer to contextual factors that make a turnaround difficult. Our basic argument is that the fact that information exists does not mean it will also be used by those in charge. A first set of arguments comes from a somewhat more recent field of study looking at the actual use of performance information by decision makers in the public sector (Van Dooren & Van de Walle, 2008). The second part will focus on structural and organisational factors that may facilitate or complicate the diffusion of information through an organisation. The third part will briefly introduce psychological factors that make that certain pieces of information are excluded from consideration in decision making. We will subsequently integrate this information and distil the major trends. We end by discussing the implication of our findings on public organisations’ ability to connect knowledge to performance. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/17081/ 2009-07-07T00:00:00Z In this paper, we argue that representative bureaucracy is a changing concept, and that in the academic and policy debate on representative bureaucracy in fact three different debates are intermingled. While the debate on representative bureaucracy in Public Administration is generally situated within wider debates about tensions between bureaucracy and democracy, this is only part of the story. We argue that discussions and scholarship on representative bureaucracy in fact employ three different concepts of representative bureaucracy. The reasons for making the bureaucracy representative in these three rival concepts are quite divergent, and even the conception of what representativity means is totally different. These rival concepts reflect a particular view on the role of the state and the relation between states and citizens. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/15893/ 2009-05-01T00:00:00Z The justice system is not one of the most trusted institutions in the UK. While most citizens consider it fair, they also think it is out of touch in specific cases, and many consider it relatively inefficient. The UK is not alone. Many governments throughout Europe and the wider world are worried about low levels of public trust in the justice system. These worries are reignited with every (minor) scandal or heavily mediatised case. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/16866/ 2009-05-01T00:00:00Z Public confidence in the Criminal Justice System has been found to be relatively low compared to public confidence in many other institutions. This lack of confidence has been attributed, in part, to low public understanding of how the courts work. Greater experience with the justice system is often suggested as a way to increase confidence in its fairness, efficiency and effectiveness. In this article, therefore, we first explore the difficulties of assessing attitudes towards the Criminal Justice System and then, distinguishing between four types of experience, we use a multivariate model controlling for socio-demographic characteristics to map the effect of experience on evaluations of the fairness, efficiency and effectiveness of the criminal courts. Experience is found to have only a marginal effect on these evaluations. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/15891/ 2009-01-01T00:00:00Z Public confidence in the justice system is relatively low compared to that in many other institutions. Part of this lack of confidence has been attributed to a low public understanding of how the justice system really works. Experience with the justice system is often identified as a way to remedy outdated opinions. In this article we explore the potential effects of experience on attitudes towards the Criminal Justice System in England and Wales. Distinguishing between four types of experience, we map the effect of experience on evaluations of the fairness, efficiency and effectiveness of the justice system. Experience was found to only have a marginal effect on these evaluations in a multivariate model controlling for socio-demographic characteristics. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/15894/ 2009-01-01T00:00:00Z Measuring and comparing the overall performance of countries’ public sectors requires agreement on definitions and objectives of government. I argue that such an agreement is about finding a consensus rather about finding better definitions. Measuring government requires a number of leaps of faith, where certain definitions, assumptions and statistics are accepted as good enough for measurement and comparison. The political science and economic research community have a different tradition of dealing with such agreements and leaps of faith, and this is reflected in their approaches to measuring and comparing the performance of public sectors. The implications of these traditions are particularly visible in the usefulness of measurement and indicators for policy makers. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/17070/ 2009-01-01T00:00:00Z http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/17084/ 2009-01-01T00:00:00Z Concerns about failed and fragile states have put state- and nation-building firmly on the academic and policy agenda. The crucial role of public services in this process has remained under-explored. The 1960s and 70s generated a substantial set of literature on state- and nation-building that is largely absent from current writings that focus on developing countries. This literature, mainly focusing on Western European countries, identified state penetration, standardisation, and accommodation as key processes in the state- and nation-building sequence. In this paper we analyse these processes of state- and nation-building in Western Europe in the 17th-19th centuries, and the role of public services therein, to explore how they may help us to understand the success and failure of state- and nation-building in developing countries and fragile states. We end with a number of key lessons and questions for international donors. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/17094/ 2009-01-01T00:00:00Z The justice system is not one of the most trusted institutions in the UK. While most citizens consider it fair, they also think it is out of touch in specific cases, and many consider it relatively inefficient. The UK is not alone. Many governments throughout Europe and the wider world are worried about low levels of public trust in the justice system. These worries are reignited with every (minor) scandal or heavily mediatised case. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/13609/ 2008-10-06T00:00:00Z Performance information has long permeated the public sector. The actual use of performance information however has long been taken for granted. This book is one of the first to bring together an international team of acclaimed academics focusing on how and whether politicians, public officials, and citizens use public sector performance information. Combining practical experience with academic analysis this book explores the social and organizational dynamics of performance indicators. It moves beyond the technicalities of measurement and indicators and looks at how performance information is changing the public sector. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/13606/ 2008-10-01T00:00:00Z In this article, we focus on the difficulties in evaluating the performance of so-called services of general interest. These services generally include such services as water and electricity supply, telephony, postal services, and public transport, where providers are subjected to certain universal service obligations. Because of the tensions between European internal market requirements and these universal service obligations, there exists considerable debate on the criteria to be used to evaluate the performance of these services. In addition, the status of these public services as ‘public’ or ‘essential’ services is disputed. Rankings of the performance of these services will always reflect a certain dominant definition of performance. Ranking schemes as a result both reflect and create performance. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/15973/ 2008-08-29T00:00:00Z In this article, we focus on the difficulties in evaluating the performance of so-called services of general interest. These services generally include such services as water and electricity supply, telephony, postal services, and public transport, where providers are subjected to certain universal service obligations. Because of the tensions between European internal market requirements and these universal service obligations, there exists considerable debate on the criteria to be used to evaluate the performance of these services. In addition, the status of these public services as "public" or "essential" services is disputed. Rankings of the performance of these services will always reflect a certain dominant definition of performance. Ranking schemes as a result both reflect and create performance. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/13611/ 2008-08-01T00:00:00Z http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/13610/ 2008-07-15T00:00:00Z Motivation in Public Management: The Call of Public Service joins a long-standing debate about what drives the behavior of government employees and others who are engaged in the public's business. For many centuries, public service was considered a noble calling and, more recently, a profession. During the latter part of the 20th century, however, many scholars called into question both the reality and desirability of a public service ethic. This book draws upon a substantial and growing body of evidence from across disciplines in the social, behavioral, and natural sciences. It asks and answers key questions about the extent to which behavior is fundamentally self- or other-regarding. To paraphrase James Madison, "public servants are not angels," but neither are they self-aggrandizing opportunists. The evidence presented in this volume offers a compelling case that motivation theory should be grounded not only in rational choice models, but altruistic and prosocial perspectives as well. In addition to reviewing evidence from many disciplines, the volume extensively reviews research in public management conducted under the rubric of "public service motivation". The volume is a comprehensive guide to history, methodology, empirical research, and institutional and managerial implications of research on public service motivation. As the contributors illustrate, the implications transcend particular sectors or countries. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/13323/ 2008-07-01T00:00:00Z In the first section we briefly present some of the available survey material on citizens’ perception of public sector corruption in Belgium. Using data from a general survey administered in Flanders (Northern part of Belgium) in 2003, we subsequently analyze determinants of general perceptions of corruption and unethical behavior. We show that these perceptions are to a large extent influenced by feelings of political alienation and general attitudes towards government. It is therefore difficult to distinguish cause and effect between trust in government and perceptions of corruption. We then will show that general perceptions of corruption should not be seen as an expression of individual experience. Parallels become apparent with how citizens evaluate government services, where a disconnection seems to exist between generally positive personal bureaucratic encounters and more negative attitudes towards public services in general. We end by reviewing possibilities for avoiding ‘contamination’ of perceptions of corruption by general attitudes towards government, and for developing indicators that better measure actual corruption. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/13608/ 2008-07-01T00:00:00Z Since the 1960s, ombudsmanship has become increasingly popular. Although there is a great deal of literature on ombudsmen, existing research rarely focuses on the people who actually use the ombudsman’s services. This article examines those who seek the help of ombudsmen in Belgium, and asks whether ombudsmen’s intervention has a noticeable effect on citizens’ confidence in government and public administration. Based on three surveys of 626 complainants, our analysis suggests that we should not see the ombudsman in Belgium as merely an instrument to help citizens but that they can also function as “change agents” and provide early warnings of problems in public administration. The role of ombudsmen in directly strengthening trust in government is limited at best. Furthermore, it seems that the profile of ombudsman complainants is skewed; our findings indicate that the socially disadvantaged are less likely to use the institution. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/13607/ 2008-03-01T00:00:00Z Concerns with declining public trust in government have become a permanent element of the contemporary political discourse. This concern also extends to levels of citizens’ trust in the public administration and public services. Trust is said to be declining, and this decline is generally seen as detrimental to public service delivery. In this article, we examine the main elements in this discussion, review the existing international survey data and summarise the main findings for OECD countries. Citizens’ trust in the public sector is found to fluctuate, and the data generally do not show consistently declining levels of trust. Furthermore, in some countries there simply is insufficient data to come to any conclusions at all about time trends in citizen trust in the public sector. Points for practitioners This article summarises some of the survey material on citizens’ trust in the public administration. It allows practitioners to compare trends in public trust in their country across time and space. The findings lead us to reject the hypothesis of a universal decline of trust in the public sector. The article warns against using opinion poll results without considering context. The long-term and comparative perspective on citizens’ trust in the public sector is all too often absent from the policy discourse that is frequently based on assumptions and ad-hoc approaches. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/13605/ 2008-01-01T00:00:00Z Purpose of this paper: A number of studies and indicators have ranked European countries in terms of the performance of their public sectors. This paper demonstrates there are important conceptual problems with such rankings and comparisons. Design/methodology/approach: Using the existing indicators, the paper first shows how European countries’ public sectors are ranked. It then goes on to show how conceptual problems with these indicators may lead to incorrect conclusions. Findings: Countries’ public sector performance cannot be summarised using a single indicator because of our inability to define ‘the public sector’ and the disagreement on what it means for public sectors to perform. Practical implications: Despite increasing demand and supply in policy circles for international public sector indicators, the existing ones are unreliable. What is original / value of paper? This paper extends the assessment of international public sector indicators beyond a mere technical evaluation.