The role universities can play in supporting the state sector

Over recent decades most of the developed world has invested significantly in lifting the proportion of the population that has a tertiary education, with a view to increasing what is commonly referred to as human capital. The OECD defines human capital as ‘the knowledge, skills, competencies and attributes embodied in individuals that facilitate the creation of personal, social and economic well-being’ (OECD, 2001) New Zealand spends around 1% of its the proportion of the population with a GDP on tertiary education (OECD, tertiary qualification over the past couple 2014) and has seen a significant rise in the proportion of the population with a tertiary qualification over the past couple of decades. In 1991, 8.2% of the working-age population had a degree at bachelor’s level or higher (Statistics New Zealand, 1991). By 2013 this had risen to 26.1%. In 1991, having a degree was a way of differentiating oneself to an employer; now it is an expectation for many jobs, including an increasing number in the state sector. This article considers the educational profile of the state sector’s employees at the time of the 2013 census, and examines the ways universities are contributing to this profile and to lifting the human capital available to the state sector. • Chris Whelan is the Executive Director of Universities New Zealand – Te Päkai Tara

Decentralisation: does the New Zealand local government system measure up?

Decentralisation continues to be well received as a strategy for improving the governance of countries and delivering more responsive and efficient services. Cheerleaders include multilateral agencies like the World Bank and developed countries, like England, which seek to reverse years of centralisation. Evaluating the effectiveness of decentralised models raises the question of what it means to be ‘decentralised’, and how decentralisation itself is measured. This article describes the World Bank’s diagnostic framework for assessing decentralisation and applies the framework to the New Zealand local government system.&nbsp

The open government partnership: what are the challenges and opportunities for New Zealand?

In November 2013 New Zealand signed up to the Open Government Partnership (OGP), which was established in 2011 and comprises 63 nations. The OGP operates as a partnership on two levels: nationally, as a partnership between governments and civil society organisations to effect reforms in various areas; and internationally between nations sharing ideas and good practice and collaborating in areas of transparency, integrity and public safety.&nbsp

The policy worker and the professor: understanding how New Zealand policy workers utilise academic research

How do policy workers actually use academic research and advice? While there are several recent studies regarding this question from other Westminster jurisdictions, similar academic studies have been rare in New Zealand. So far, most of the local research in this field has been conducted by the prime minister’s chief science advisor and the Office of the Prime Minister’s Science Advisory Committee, with the particular instrumental purpose of improving the government’s ministries and agencies’ ‘use of evidence in both the formation and evaluation of policy’. However, none of these studies have asked how, and to what extent, policy workers in government are utilising academic research in their everyday work. • Karl Löfgren is Associate Professor in the School of Government, Victoria University of Wellington. Donatella Cavagnoli was a researcher with the School of Government, Victoria University of Wellington

The role and importance of long-term fiscal planning

There is reason to hope that long-term fiscal planning can still be effective in New Zealand.IntroductionMany countries now require the regular publication of longterm fiscal projections, looking at the potential long-term costs of government spending programmes. In New Zealand, section 26N of the Public Finance Act 1989 (as amended in 2004) requires the Treasury to publish a Statement on the Long-Term Fiscal Position at least every four years. Under the act, such statements must look out at least 40 years. Their contents are the responsibility of the secretary to the Treasury (rather than the minister of finance), and the Treasury is required to use ‘its best professional judgments’ in assessing the fiscal outlook and potential risks.It is also obliged under the act to ensure that ‘all significant assumptions underlying any projections’ are included in the statement. Aside from these parameters, the act is silent on the matters to be covered, giving the Treasury considerable flexibility over the process employed to produce such documents, including the nature and extent of any consultation with external experts, the wider policy community and interested stakeholders. Since the requirement for such statements was introduced in 2004 the Treasury has published three reports. The most recent of these – Affording Our Future – was released in July 2013. Against this backdrop, this article considers:the nature of long-term fiscal planning; why long-term fiscal planning is important; why a legislative requirement for such planning is desirable; whether long-term fiscal planning actually achieves its goals; some of the uncertainties involved in long-term fiscal planning; and the potential for long-term planning in areas beyond fiscal ones

Reflections and outlook for the New Zealand ETS: must uncertain times mean uncertain measures?

This article discusses the development and performance of New Zealand\u27s emissions trading scheme since the report of the Emissions Trading Scheme Review Panel in 2011. Introduction The New Zealand emissions trading scheme (ETS) was introduced by legislation in 2008. The legislated objectives as stated in section 3 of the Climate Change Response Act 2002 are to ‘support and encourage global efforts to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases by (i) assisting New Zealand to meet its international obligations under the [UNFCCC] Convention and the [Kyoto] Protocol; and (ii) reducing New Zealand’s net emissions of those gases to below business-as-usual levels’. Beyond this, the New Zealand government has confirmed three objectives for the ETS: help New Zealand to deliver its ‘fair share’ of international action to reduce emissions, including meeting any international obligations; deliver emission relations in the most cost-effective manner; support efforts to maximise the long-term resilience of the New Zealand economy at least cost. ........ This article discusses the development and performance of the scheme since the report of the Emissions Trading Scheme Review Panel in 2011. In particular, the article presents the results of a survey undertaken by the authors in April 2013 of stakeholders’ perception of the scheme and its performance. The survey was designed and administered by the authors using FluidSurveys software

Modeling the adoption and use of social media by nonprofit organizations

This study examines what drives organizational adoption and use of social media through a model built around four key factors - strategy, capacity, governance, and environment. Using Twitter, Facebook, and other data on 100 large US nonprofit organizations, the model is employed to examine the determinants of three key facets of social media utilization: 1) adoption, 2) frequency of use, and 3) dialogue. We find that organizational strategies, capacities, governance features, and external pressures all play a part in these social media adoption and utilization outcomes. Through its integrated, multi-disciplinary theoretical perspective, this study thus helps foster understanding of which types of organizations are able and willing to adopt and juggle multiple social media accounts, to use those accounts to communicate more frequently with their external publics, and to build relationships with those publics through the sending of dialogic messages.Comment: Seungahn Nah and Gregory D. Saxton. (in press). Modeling the adoption and use of social media by nonprofit organizations. New Media & Society, forthcomin

Third sector accounting and accountability in Australia: anything but a level playing field

This research report seeks to understand why some Australian not-for-profit organisations make voluntary financial disclosures beyond their basic statutory obligations. Introduction This paper surveys previous work on voluntary information disclosures in accounting reports of Australian Not-for-Profit organisations (NFPs). This is new research and is a part of a project to evolve a comprehensive explanation of why Australian NFPs disclose what they do disclose; and to capture and explain patterns of variations between NFPs between what they regard to disclose and the type of information they disclose. To accomplish this, first some background information about the NFP sector are considered. Then, the Australian NFP sector is reviewed. Third, the information needs of some key stakeholders are briefly discussed. Next, the research methodology where a literature survey which looks at not just disclosures to NFPs but to the commercial sector that are plausibly &nbsp

User costs and informal payments for care in the largest maternity hospital in Kathmandu, Nepal

Background: Maternity care costs in Nepal include formal and informal payment. Formal include for example the cost for blood or drugs; Informal payments can be voluntary such as gratitude payments, or bribes which patients are ‘expected’ to pay to get decent care or any care at all. One problem is that these payments are missing from formal accounts and they are not taken into account in health-policy decision-making. The aim of the present study was to estimate out-of-pocket expenses (formal/informal) for delivery care in the largest government maternity hospital in Kathmandu, Nepal and establish factors that affect informal costs. Methods: We used mixed-methods approach. We used questionnaire-based interviews with 234 women who had delivered in this hospital followed by semi-structured in-depth interviews with sub-sample of ten couples. SPSS software was used for analysis and cross tabulations and chi square tests, binary logistic regression were performed. Results: Women occurred various costs during a hospital confinement. The qualitative data suggested that some, but not all had started to save prior to the delivery. There is a significant association between making informal payments and whether or not the birth was planned to be in hospital or whether it was an emergency, p=0.025, ANC visits, p=0.008, woman’s occupation,p=0.025 and husband’s employment, p=0.022. Logistic regression suggested four factors associated with making informal payments, indicating a possible socio-economic link with ability to make informal payments. Conclusions: Although informal payments around birth itself were not substantial, such payments are very common. Better understanding of informal payments is important as the illegal status of unofficial health care payments means that it is difficult to establish the prevalence of this phenomenon. Moreover it forms a part of the private health expenditure rarely included in the national health statistics, they create perverse incentives, potentially reduce motivation for reform and will provide information about economic barriers to care