Public Governance. A Blueprint for Political Action and Better Government

This paper sets forth a comprehensive viewpoint about how Public Governance should be assessed and worked-out, by making three contributions to the subject matter. Firstly, it provides the semantics by which this field of learning and practice may become operational in Political Science. Next, a four-tiered framework of analysis is laid bare, which deals with architecture, covenants and safeguards, collective action, and deviant behavior. Afterwards, and focusing on conflict systems, we give heed to the underlying logic of Public Governance, which stems from a network built up around the mechanisms of participation, contest and safeguarding

International Nonregimes: A Research Agenda1

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/146934/1/j.1468-2486.2007.00672.x.pd

Perspectivas sociais e dominação simbólica: a presença política das mulheres entre Iris Marion Young e Pierre Bourdieu

O artigo trata da participação política das mulheres e de sua presença no poder político. Nessa temática, discute a tensão entre o potencial emancipacionista prometido pela incorporação de múltiplas perspectivas ao debate político e a ação reprodutora do campo. Partindo das causas que, a nosso ver, são responsáveis pela relativa ausência de mulheres dos círculos decisórios e por seu "desinteresse" pela política, discutimos as perspectivas orientadas, de uma forma ou de outra, para a solução (melhoramento) dessa situação. O artigo organiza-se em três seções. Na primeira, defende-se a posição de que a via mais promissora para justificar a necessidade de presença das mulheres passa pelo entendimento de que os espaços de deliberação devem abrigar uma pluralidade de perspectivas sociais relevantes - um conceito associado, sobretudo, à obra da teórica estadunidense Iris Marion Young. Na segunda, discute-se alguns problemas desse conceito, em especial, certa ingenuidade que marca um ideal dele derivado: a geração de um espaço plural de discussão e de tomada de decisão em função da adoção de cotas eleitorais. Utiliza-se o conceito de "campo", extraído da obra de Pierre Bourdieu, para depurar as idéias de Young dessa ingenuidade. Na terceira seção, introduz-se um elemento adicional: a distinção, apresentada por Nancy Fraser, entre "políticas afirmativas" e "políticas transformadoras". Conclui-se, de forma preliminar, com um balanço dos limites e das potencialidades de uma política baseada na defesa da ampliação da presença de "perspectivas sociais"

Changing intergovernmental relations and urban economic development

Three transformations are occurring at present in OECD countries: (1) economic systems are undergoing structural adjustments, (2) the role of government with regard to the economy is being redefined, and (3) the relations among different levels of government as well as between public and private institutions are being revamped. The central question of this paper is what are the impacts of changing intergovernmental relations on planning and implementing urban economic development programmes. Appropriate initiatives necessarily involve a wide range of policies and institutions. The public efforts to confront local economic problems constitute the hub of activities of numerous governmental and quasi-governmental institutions.

Associations, active citizenship, and the quality of democracy in Brazil and Mexico

In many Third Wave democracies large classes of people experience diminished forms of citizenship. The systematic exclusion from mandated public goods and services significantly injures the citizenship and life chances of entire social groups. In democratic theory civil associations have a fundamental role to play in reversing this reality. One strand of theory, known as civic engagement, suggests that associations empower their members to engage in public politics, hold state officials to account, claim public services, and thereby improve the quality of democracy. Empirical demonstration of the argument is surprisingly rare, however, and limited to affluent democracies. In this article, we use original survey data for two large cities in Third Wave democracies-So Paulo and Mexico City-to explore this argument in a novel way. We focus on the extent to which participation in associations (or associationalism) increases "active citizenship"aEuro"the effort to negotiate directly with state agents access to goods and services legally mandated for public provision, such as healthcare, sanitation, and security-rather than civic engagement, which encompasses any voluntary and public spirited activity. We examine separately associationalism's impact on the quality of citizenship, a dimension that varies independently from the level of active citizenship, by assessing differences in the types of citizenship practices individuals use to obtain access to vital goods and services. To interpret the findings, and identify possible causal pathways, the paper moves back-and-forth between two major research traditions that are rarely brought into dialogue: civic engagement and comparative historical studies of democratization