29 January 2008

Call for papers: The Comparative Analysis of Local Government Performance Measurement Systems: A Global Perspective

Call for papers: The Comparative Analysis of Local Government Performance Measurement Systems: A Global Perspective

A special issue of International Journal of Public Sector Performance Management

Across the globe, local governments and their brethren regional and national governments, are facing the growing prospect of undertaking performance measurement and management. Extensive research has been conducted over the last two decades on understanding the evolution of performance measurement systems (PMSs), their adoption and, in some cases their effectiveness, both subjective and objective (see, for example, Poister, 2003). More recently, progress has been made in understanding challenges in measuring and comparing bureaucracies across countries at the national level (see, for example, Van de Walle, 2005, 2006).

The next stage or evolution in this arena of interest is the comparison of local government performance and bureaucracy. This is particularly important given the continuing push by many international agencies for devolution or decentralisation of government functions (for example, OECD, 2001). In order to address this lack of a unifying framework, this call for papers seeks work that will build our theoretical, conceptual and empirical understanding of the functioning of local government performance measurement systems and benchmarking efforts across countries and the potential implications of the functioning of such systems on comparisons across countries.

Specifically, we are seeking papers that include, but are not limited to, the following topics:
  • Comparing performance measurement systems across local governments
  • Discussion and analysis of cross-national benchmarking projects concerning local governments
  • Theoretical issues connected to the comparison of local public sector performance across countries
  • Consequences at the policy and managerial level of cross-national comparisons
  • Performance measurement in local and regional government in the reporting process to the EU (accountability for funds).
Important Dates
Submission of full paper before: 1 June, 2008
Notification of acceptance before: 15 August, 2008
Submission of final and revised manuscripts: 1 November, 2008

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