Summaries of current academic research in the field of public management that is most pertinent to practitioners, policy advisors, and policy makers.

Competition and Outsourcing

• Mutek, Michael. "Government Concerns over Contractor Team Formation: Is the Message Consistent?" The Procurement Lawyer (Winter 2005) 3-8.
• Brown, Trevor L., and Matthew Potoski. "Managing the Public Service Market." Public Administration Review (November/December 2004) 656-668.

Human Capital

• Bingham, Lisa Blomgren, Tina Nabatchi, and Rosemary O'Leary. "New Governance: Practices and Processes for Stakeholder and Citizen Participation in the Work of Government." Public Administration Review (September/October 2005) 547-558.
• Becton, J. Bret, Leslie Meows, Rachel Tears, Michael Charles and Ralph Ioimo. "Can Citizen Police Academies Influence Citizens' Beliefs and Perceptions?" Public Management (May 2005) 20-23.
• Clark, Doug. "Customer Service: Back to Basics is Better." Public Management (December 2004) 6-9.
• Fernandez, Sergio, Craig R. Smith and Jeffrey B. Wenger. "Employment, privatization, and managerial choice: Does contracting out reduce public sector employment?" Journal of Policy Analysis and Management Volume 26, Issue 1 (Winter 2007) 57-77.
  This paper will be of interest to local government practitioners as well as lawmakers who make decisions affecting public service provision at the local level. The authors study local governments across the country and make a seemingly obvious finding: more government outsourcing leads to fewer government employees. One interesting result they do find is "a compositional shift toward more part-time public sector employment."
• Hansen, Morten T., and Nitin Nohria. "How to Build Collaborative Advantage." MIT Sloan Management Review (Fall 2004) 22-30.

Performance Measurement and Management

• Heinrich, Carolyn J. "The four pillars of high performance: How robust organizations achieve extraordinary results; High-performance government: Structure, leadership, incentives" (Book Reviews) Journal of Policy Analysis and Management Vol. 25, No. 2 (Spring 2006) 499-503.
• Fernandez, Sergio and Hal G. Rainey. "Managing Successful Organizational Change in the Public Sector." Public Administration Review (Mar/Apr 2006) 168: 9.
• Moynihan, Donald P. "Managing for Results in State Government: Evaluating a Decade of Reform." Public Administration Review Vol. 66 No.1 (January/February 2006) 77-89.
• Spencer, Margaret Beale, Elizabeth Noll, and Elaine Cassidy. "Monetary Incentives in Support of Academic Achievement: Results of a Randomized Field Trial Involving High-Achieving, Low-Resource, Ethnically Diverse Urban Adolescents." Evaluation Review (June 2005) 199-222.
• Budding, Richard and Ron Zimmer. "Student Achievement in Charter Schools: A Complex Picture." Journal of Policy Analysis and Management No. 2 (2005) 351-371.
• Hanushek, Erin A., and Margaret E. Raymond. "Does School Accountability Lead to Improved Student Performance?" Journal of Policy Analysis and Management No. 2 (2005) 297-327.
• Whitaker, Gordon, Margaret Henderson, and Lydian Altman-Sauer. "Collaboration Calls for Mutual Accountability." Public Management (December 2004) 16-20.
• Clark, Doug. "Customer Service: Back to Basics is Better." Public Management (December 2004) 6-9.
• Brown, Trevor L., and Matthew Potoski. "Managing the Public Service Market." Public Administration Review (Nov/Dec 2004) 656-668.
• Sampson, R.C. "R&D Alliances and Firm Performance: The Impact of Technological Diversity and Alliance Organization on Innovation." (working paper 2004) in MIT Sloan Management Review: Maximizing Innovation in Alliances (Fall 2004) 5-6.
• Grell, Jan M. and Gary Gappert. "The Future of Governance in the United States: 1992-2002." The Annals of the American Academy , Vol. 522 (July 1992) 67-78.

Networked Government

• Cuellar, Allison Evans, Larkin S. McReynolds and Gail A. Wasserman. "A Cure for Crime: Can Mental Health Treatment Diversion Reduce Crime among Youth?" Journal of Policy Analysis and Management Vol. 25 No 1 (Winter 2006) 197-214.
• Comfort, Louise K. "Cities at Risk: Hurricane Katrina and the Drowning of New Orleans." Urban Affairs Review Vol. 41, No. 4 (March 2006) 501-516.
• Gallay, David R. "Public-Private Partnerships for Financing Federal Capital: Useful or Chimerical?" Public Works Management & Policy Vol.11, No.2 (October 2006) 139-151.
  This article by David Gallay will be of most interest to a manager at a federal agency exploring her funding options. It studies whether public-private partnerships (PPPs) bring anticipated benefits to federal agencies looking to implement capital—intensive projects such as a building renovation. Gallay conceives a model of a hypothetical renovation project—which is useful as there are too few examples to conduct any type of empirical study?and finds that pursuing a PPP approach will not necessarily save money, but it could save time, when compared to "the routine federal budgeting approach."
• Mutek, Michael. "Government Concerns over Contractor Team Formation: Is the Message Consistent?" The Procurement Lawyer (Winter 2005) 3-8.
• Bingham, Lisa Blomgren, Tina Nabatchi, and Rosemary O'Leary. "New Governance: Practices and Processes for Stakeholder and Citizen Participation in the Work of Government." Public Administration Review (September/October 2005) 547-558.
• Provan, Keith G., Mark A. Veazie, Lisa K. Staten, and Nicolette I. Teufel-Shone. "The Use of Network Analysis to Strengthen Community Partnerships." Public Administration Review (September/October 2005) 603-613.
• Schneider, Saundra K. "Administrative Breakdowns in the Governmental Response to Hurricane Katrina." Public Adminstration Review (September/October 2005) 515-516.
• McGarvey, Craig. "Networks in a New 'Gateway.'" National Civic Review (Spring 2005) 62-64.
• Whitaker, Gordon, Margaret Henderson, and Lydian Altman-Sauer. "Collaboration Calls for Mutual Accountability." Public Management (December 2004) 16-20.
• Brown, Trevor L., and Matthew Potoski. "Managing the Public Service Market." Public Administration Review (Nov/Dec 2004) 656-668.
• Hansen, Morten T., and Nitin Nohria. "How to Build Collaborative Advantage." MIT Sloan Management Review (Fall 2004) 22-30.
• Sampson, R.C. "R&D Alliances and Firm Performance: The Impact of Technological Diversity and Alliance Organization on Innovation." (working paper 2004) in MIT Sloan Management Review: Maximizing Innovation in Alliances (Fall 2004) 5-6.
• Grell, Jan M. and Gary Gappert. "The Future of Governance in the United States: 1992-2002." The Annals of the American Academy , Vol. 522 (July 1992) 67-78.

Urban America

• Comfort, Louise K. "Cities at Risk: Hurricane Katrina and the Drowning of New Orleans." Urban Affairs Review Vol. 41, No. 4 (March 2006) 501-516.
• Cuellar, Allison Evans, Larkin S. McReynolds and Gail A. Wasserman. "A Cure for Crime: Can Mental Health Treatment Diversion Reduce Crime among Youth?" Journal of Policy Analysis and Management Vol. 25, No 1 (Winter 2006) 197-214.
• Gassman-Pines, Anna and Hirokazu Yoshikawa. "Five-Year Effects of an Anti-Poverty Program on Marriage Among Never Married Mothers." Journal of Policy Analysis and Management No.1 (2006) 11-30.
• Lawther, Wendell C. "Public?Private Partnerships in Transportation Policy: The Case of Advanced Traveler Information Systems." International Journal of Public Administration Vol.28, No.13/14 (2005) 117-1134.
  Lawther's article is of interest to public officials at all three levels of government?local, state and federal?involved in issues of road transportation, from safety to traffic mitigation. The author studies several cities' experiences creating public-private partnerships (PPPs) to make real-time traffic and road condition information available to travelers. He categorizes the systems into five models, each "reflecting different roles and responsibilities of public and private partners" (from abstract). The three key issues regarding PPPs and Advanced Traveler Information Systems turn out to be: quality and effectiveness of ATIS technology; reliability and delivery of information to travelers; and the degree to which private partners pursue revenue.
• Lewin, Alisa C. and Eric Maurin. "The Effect of Family Size on Incentive Effects of Welfare Transfers in Two-Parent Families." Evaluation Review (December 2005) 507-529.
• Ferguson, Ronald. "Low Wage America: The working-poverty trap." Public Interest Vol.158 (Winter 2005) 71-82.
• Kosters, Marvin H. "Low Wage America: Up from the bottom ring." Public Interest Vol.158 (Winter 2005) 83-95.
• Page, Marianne E., Joanne Spetz, and Jane Millar. "Does the Minimum Wage Affect Welfare Caseloads?" Journal of Policy Analysis and Management No. 2 (2005) 273-295.
• Spencer, Margaret Beale, Elizabeth Noll, and Elaine Cassidy. "Monetary Incentives in Support of Academic Achievement: Results of a Randomized Field Trial Involving High-Achieving, Low-Resource, Ethnically Diverse Urban Adolescents." Evaluation Review (June 2005) 199-222.
• Becton, J. Bret, Leslie Meows, Rachel Tears, Michael Charles and Ralph Ioimo. "Can Citizen Police Academies Influence Citizens' Beliefs and Perceptions?" Public Management (May 2005) 20-23.
• McGarvey. Craig. "Networks in a New 'Gateway.'" National Civic Review (Spring 2005) 62-64.
• Hanushek, Erin A., and Margaret E. Raymond. "Does School Accountability Lead to Improved Student Performance?" Journal of Policy Analysis and Management No. 2 (2005) 297-327.
• Holzer, Harry J., Paul Offner, and Elaine Sorensen. "Declining Employment Among Young Black Less-Educated Men: The Role of Incarceration and Child Support." Journal of Policy Analysis and Management No. 2 (2005) 329-350.