Contemporary universities have many different tasks. Next to the traditional research and teaching mission, universities are also expected to engage in other activities that create social value. A... Show moreContemporary universities have many different tasks. Next to the traditional research and teaching mission, universities are also expected to engage in other activities that create social value. A balance between these different tasks varies across higher education systems, institutions, and individuals. This chapter examines the position of international staff on this landscape of different missions. International mobility is usually associated with research excellence. In this chapter we empirically examine the difference between local and international staff to test this image about international staff. The analysis shows that international staff is indeed significantly more oriented towards research and less on teaching, both in their intrinsic interest and time investment. Difference with respect to ‘third mission’ activities is small. International staff is equally or even more active in activities like patenting or creating spin-off companies. On the other hand, they are underrepresented in activities that are embedded in a local context, such as serving on expert committees or undertaking consultancy work. This triggers a question about an optimal engagement of international staff in the diversity of missions. Show less
Expertise is the raison d'etre of regulatory agencies. Regulatory agencies are created to generate regulatory policy solutions that are based on technical data and scientific knowledge. However,... Show moreExpertise is the raison d'etre of regulatory agencies. Regulatory agencies are created to generate regulatory policy solutions that are based on technical data and scientific knowledge. However, regulatory agencies' technical activities - i.e., the ways in which scientific knowledge and technical data are used in regulatory policy-making - can vary considerably. While the extant literature has provided relevant insights into how and why regulatory agencies arrive at conflicting technical conclusions, its potential could be unlocked by (1) integrating the novel theoretical insights from bureaucratic reputation theory to explain agency technical conduct and their effort to legitimize their activities; (2) considering a multi-disciplinary research agenda that suggests focusing on the influence of expert knowledge in regulatory policy-making; (3) addressing the challenges that regulatory agencies face to provide neutral bureaucratic competencies and expertise amidst the rise of populism and democratic backsliding. Show less
Political science in the Netherlands has a long tradition and a history of institutionalization. It developed as a broad discipline, together with public administration, and grew into separate... Show morePolitical science in the Netherlands has a long tradition and a history of institutionalization. It developed as a broad discipline, together with public administration, and grew into separate research and education programmes. Does this segmented nature of political science appear in the external activities of those scholars concerned? Or is the overall consensus-style and neo-corporatist (‘polder’) advisory system in which political scientists are placed a more important determinant? What about developments in the policy advisory system itself, pressures on institutions and trends in the environment and their consequences for the supply and demand of scholarly political science advice? These are the central questions we examine in this chapter. We first present the development of the discipline in the country. Then we look at the main features and trends of the advisory system and the niche occupied by political scientists. As we will show on the basis of the survey results, political scientists in the Netherlands gauge their visibility and their social and political impact as relatively high, and a large majority of them engage in advisory activities. Our findings also highlight that the effects of the segmented structure of political science on the type of advisory role are relatively limited. Show less
This chapter focuses on the evaluation of public policy and administration. Institutionalized for decades in many places worldwide, policy evaluation has become a routinized and professionalized... Show moreThis chapter focuses on the evaluation of public policy and administration. Institutionalized for decades in many places worldwide, policy evaluation has become a routinized and professionalized activity. However, assessing the performance of public agencies and the impact of the policies they implement is a highly political endeavor. As part of the executive branch and directly subordinate to governments, public agencies can be scrutinized and evaluated as an extension of political struggles. On the other hand, public agencies also use evaluation to advance their own objectives. This chapter examines the issues attached to the evaluation of public policies and administrative activity in relation to power games within and across the branches of government. It reveals how politicians and public servants can make strategic use of policy evaluations, as well as how this instrument serves not only reflexive and oversight purposes, but also agenda-setting ambitions. The chapter then presents an overview of the controlling, defensive and proactive functions of evaluation in policy struggles. Drawing upon these developments, the chapter underlines just how far from neutral evaluations can be in the politico-administrative game. Show less
This chapter focuses on the consultation approaches and tools government have at their disposal to manage the agenda-setting phase and organize consultation process and, in this way, shape the... Show moreThis chapter focuses on the consultation approaches and tools government have at their disposal to manage the agenda-setting phase and organize consultation process and, in this way, shape the participation and formulation of policy demands by external stakeholders. It outlines three types of consultation approaches: open, closed, and hybrid. The chapter then describes the strategies and motives that clarify preferences for certain consultation tools and approaches, addressing these questions from the perspectives of policymakers as well as external stakeholders. When designing consultation processes, determining specific approaches, and selecting particular tools, a central point of attention involves the extent to which they create an equal playing field among external stakeholders. This notion can be related to the treatment of policy participants and the way in which their input is processed, as well as to the open nature of the process and the ease of participation. The chapter finally addresses these two key characteristics of consultation processes and their fairness and inclusiveness. Show less
This chapter reviews the agenda-setting potential and influence of a particular group of evaluation-related tools governments often resort to in the agenda-setting stage. Particular evaluation... Show moreThis chapter reviews the agenda-setting potential and influence of a particular group of evaluation-related tools governments often resort to in the agenda-setting stage. Particular evaluation tools play an important analytical role in setting up and managing the agendas of governments. The chapter discusses the agenda-setting role of three in-house tools: budget reviews, policy reviews, and sunset reviews. It also discusses their major attributes, their underpinning rational assumptions, and the way they have been institutionalized and routinized in countries' evaluation systems and reflect on the conditions that foster or jeopardize their agenda-setting impact. The chapter describes different empirical examples from various countries. A pragmatic approach to evaluation requirements, varying from case to case, seems to prevail with recent attempts, particularly at the sub-state level, to establish the level of administrative burdens as a decisive criterion for the intensity of evaluation activities. Show less
Starting from the paradox that successive waves of reforms have jeopardized the functional coherence of better regulation as a horizontal policy, this chapter highlights the challenge of meta... Show moreStarting from the paradox that successive waves of reforms have jeopardized the functional coherence of better regulation as a horizontal policy, this chapter highlights the challenge of meta-design of different appraisal procedures and institutions. Indeed, among countries with a long tradition of regulatory management systems, there is an evident proliferation of diverse better regulation objectives pursued by oversight bodies with different mandates. In order to capture the institutional coordination design in specific countries, we identified different theoretical scenarios, ranging from hierarchical coordination to ad hoc, extemporaneous coordination. By way of example, this typology has been applied to analyze how in the UK and the Netherlands better regulation policy tools, procedures and institutions are coordinated. Our analysis revealed some major differences. We show that the UK government lies closer to the hierarchical coordination extreme than the Dutch government. The latter traditionally tends to rely on positive modes of coordination, although informally the neoliberal goal of business deregulation still has a central position in the practices of the Dutch government. Besides these differences, the two governments display similarities in the use of performance metrics to reduce business compliance costs. Yet, whereas business impact targets are established through legislation in the UK, the pivotal role of the Standard Cost Model in the Netherlands is rather informal. Neither of the countries seem to have developed a strategy of coordination in terms of problem solving, which would entail the deployment of particular appraisal tools and institutions depending on a specific issue at stake. Show less
The institutional development of European Union (EU) agencies is striking. Over the past decades, forty-six EU agencies have been established to support the European Commission and member states in... Show moreThe institutional development of European Union (EU) agencies is striking. Over the past decades, forty-six EU agencies have been established to support the European Commission and member states in their regulatory and executive tasks. Today, EU agencies are a vital part of the EU’s administrative capacity. EU agencies have received considerable scholarly attention that used a myriad of theoretical approaches—ranging from institutional, organizational, and bureaucratic reputation to interest group theories—to explain why EU agencies have been created; how they develop over time; whether they are wielders of supranational or intergovernmental power; how they legitimize themselves and cultivate a positive bureaucratic reputation; and how they form alliances or insulate themselves from specific stakeholders. This chapter reviews the rise of EU agencies and introduces a selection of theoretical perspectives that have been used by EU agency scholars to study EU-level agencification and EU agency behaviour, regulatory processes, and outputs. Show less
