Trust, Voice, and Incentives
Trust, Voice, and Incentives

Author: Hana Brixi

Publisher: World Bank Publications

Published: 2015-05-29

Total Pages: 342

ISBN-13: 1464804575

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This report examines the role of incentives, trust, and engagement as critical determinants of service delivery performance in MENA countries. Focusing on education and health, the report illustrates how the weak external and internal accountability undermines policy implementation and service delivery performance and how such a cycle of poor performance can be counteracted. Case studies of local success reveal the importance of both formal and informal accountability relationships and the role of local leadership in inspiring and institutionalizing incentives toward better service delivery performance. Enhancing services for MENA citizens requires forging a stronger social contract among public servants, citizens, and service providers while empowering communities and local leaders to find 'best fit' solutions. Learning from the variations within countries, especially the outstanding local successes, can serve as a solid basis for new ideas and inspiration for improving service delivery. Such learning may help the World Bank Group and other donors as well as national and local leaders and civil society, in developing ways to enhance the trust, voice, and incentives for service delivery to meet citizens’ needs and expectations.

Trust, Voice, and Incentives
Trust, Voice, and Incentives

Author: Hana Brixi

Publisher: World Bank Publications

Published: 2015-05-29

Total Pages: 343

ISBN-13: 1464804567

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This report examines the role of incentives, trust, and engagement as critical determinants of service delivery performance in MENA countries. Focusing on education and health, the report illustrates how the weak external and internal accountability undermines policy implementation and service delivery performance and how such a cycle of poor performance can be counteracted. Case studies of local success reveal the importance of both formal and informal accountability relationships and the role of local leadership in inspiring and institutionalizing incentives toward better service delivery performance. Enhancing services for MENA citizens requires forging a stronger social contract among public servants, citizens, and service providers while empowering communities and local leaders to find 'best fit' solutions. Learning from the variations within countries, especially the outstanding local successes, can serve as a solid basis for new ideas and inspiration for improving service delivery. Such learning may help the World Bank Group and other donors as well as national and local leaders and civil society, in developing ways to enhance the trust, voice, and incentives for service delivery to meet citizens' needs and expectations.

Sustainable States
Sustainable States

Author: Jon B. Alterman

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2021-10-13

Total Pages: 89

ISBN-13: 1538140381

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The importance of environmentally sustainable public utilities in the Middle East is an improbable topic for a Washington think tank study. Yet, many countries in the Middle East face serious challenges providing utilities in any manner to their populations, and the failure to do so is an increasing flashpoint for public dissatisfaction. This study finds that providing more environmentally sustainable services in the Middle East would be an effective way to address many citizens’ grievances which go beyond the reliability of those services. It would also help ameliorate deep dissatisfaction with the quality of governance and help build trust between citizens and their governments. This study examines three sectors—power, water and sanitation, and solid waste—in Jordan, Lebanon, and Tunisia. While the three countries are different in many ways, each faces increasing challenges providing services to their citizens. Providing these services in an environmentally sustainable way would also crucially increase each country’s resilience and diminish their vulnerability in a chronically unstable region.

Trust and Trustworthiness
Trust and Trustworthiness

Author: Russell Hardin

Publisher: Russell Sage Foundation

Published: 2002-03-21

Total Pages: 257

ISBN-13: 1610442717

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What does it mean to "trust?" What makes us feel secure enough to place our confidence—even at times our welfare—in the hands of other people? Is it possible to "trust" an institution? What exactly do people mean when they claim to "distrust" their governments? As difficult as it may be to define, trust is essential to the formation and maintenance of a civil society. In Trust and Trustworthiness political scientist Russell Hardin addresses the standard theories of trust and articulates his own new and compelling idea: that much of what we call trust can be best described as "encapsulated interest." Research into the roles of trust in our society has offered a broad range of often conflicting theories. Some theorists maintain that trust is a social virtue that cannot be reduced to strategic self-interest; others claim that trusting another person is ultimately a rational calculation based on information about that person and his or her incentives and motivations. Hardin argues that we place our trust in persons whom we believe to have strong reasons to act in our best interests. He claims that we are correct when we assume that the main incentive of those whom we trust is to maintain a relationship with us—whether it be for reasons of economic benefit or for love and friendship. Hardin articulates his theory using examples from a broad array of personal and social relationships, paying particular attention to explanations of the development of trusting relationships. He also examines trustworthiness and seeks to understand why people may behave in ways that violate their own self-interest in order to honor commitments they have made to others. The book also draws important distinctions between vernacular uses of "trust" and "trustworthiness," contrasting, for example, the type of trust (or distrust) we place in individuals with the trust we place in institutions Trust and Trustworthiness represents the culmination of important new research into the roles of trust in our society; it offers a challenging new voice in the current discourse about the origins of cooperative behavior and its consequences for social and civic life. A Volume in the Russell Sage Foundation Series on Trust

Trust in Divided Societies
Trust in Divided Societies

Author: Abdalhadi M. Alijla

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2020-11-26

Total Pages: 257

ISBN-13: 1838605339

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When countries try to navigate through the aftermath of conflict, trust is the main focus and the catalyst for rebuilding societies, nations, economies and democracies. Trust is vital, not only at an individual level, but also at a community level: trust is important to sustain peace and also works as a trigger to end conflicts. But why are some divided societies more prone to the collapse of social trust than others? This book uses empirical and case study research, including qualitative comparative analysis (QCA), statistical methods, observations and interviews, to compare which policies and institutions to build trust have a greater impact on divided societies in the Middle East. The book focuses on Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria, but analyses the results from these societies by also comparing other political and ethno-religiously divided societies beyond the MENA region. The book does not want to forward a universal 'theory' that gives us the origin of trust and how it is destroyed. Rather, it aims to provide a comprehensive explanation of generalised trust in divided societies and answer the question: under which institutions is generalised trust in a divided society maintained or destroyed, and how does this happen? Of key importance to Abdalhadi Alijla is to highlight the formal and informal institutions that inspire an elevated level of trust to help make societies less vulnerable to internal conflict, and also to give voice to the real people who live and experience divided societies.

Rich Minds, Rich Rewards
Rich Minds, Rich Rewards

Author: Valorie Burton

Publisher: Villard

Published: 2001-12-19

Total Pages: 120

ISBN-13: 1588360717

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A rich mind nourished with positive thoughts, learning, and encouragement can indeed reap rich rewards, writes dynamic author Valorie Burton as she offers 52 simple but powerful ways to enrich your everyday life and do those things that will bring you the rewards you so richly deserve, such as: • Count Your Blessings • Change Your Ways to Change Your Life • Create a Vision Statement • Mind Your Own Business • Create Your Own Opportunities • Listen to Your Inner Voice

Building State Capability
Building State Capability

Author: Matt Andrews

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2017

Total Pages: 276

ISBN-13: 0198747489

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Governments play a major role in the development process, and constantly introduce reforms and policies to achieve developmental objectives. Many of these interventions have limited impact, however; schools get built but children don't learn, IT systems are introduced but not used, plans are written but not implemented. These achievement deficiencies reveal gaps in capabilities, and weaknesses in the process of building state capability. This book addresses these weaknesses and gaps. It starts by providing evidence of the capability shortfalls that currently exist in many countries, showing that many governments lack basic capacities even after decades of reforms and capacity building efforts. The book then analyses this evidence, identifying capability traps that hold many governments back - particularly related to isomorphic mimicry (where governments copy best practice solutions from other countries that make them look more capable even if they are not more capable) and premature load bearing (where governments adopt new mechanisms that they cannot actually make work, given weak extant capacities). The book then describes a process that governments can use to escape these capability traps. Called PDIA (problem driven iterative adaptation), this process empowers people working in governments to find and fit solutions to the problems they face. The discussion about this process is structured in a practical manner so that readers can actually apply tools and ideas to the capability challenges they face in their own contexts. These applications will help readers devise policies and reforms that have more impact than those of the past.

Trust
Trust

Author: Ben Seyd

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2024-04-30

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 0198896506

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We seem to be living in an age of citizen distrust of social and political elites. Distrust is also seen to have numerous negative consequences for our civic and democratic life. Yet are western democracies really facing a crisis of trust? This book provides an extensive and up-to-date review of one of the most important topics in contemporary political life. It explores the nature and condition of trust today by exploring three key issues. What do we mean by trust? How far are levels of trust in decline? How damaging are the consequences of low trust for effective democratic governance? Seyd also considers how trust arises, and which factors might explain the declines in trust witnessed recently in many countries. Providing evidence from many countries, Trust: How Citizens View Political Institutions pays particular attention to Britain, which has seen a marked decline in public regard for political elites, making the country a vital case for identifying the causes and effects of low trust. Combining conceptual and empirical analysis, the book provides a timely analysis of a central issue in contemporary political debate.

The Case for Case Studies
The Case for Case Studies

Author: Jennifer Widner

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2022-05-26

Total Pages: 329

ISBN-13: 1108427278

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This volume demonstrates how to conduct case study research that is both methodologically rigorous and useful to development policy. It will interest scholars and students across the social sciences using case studies, and provide constructive guidance to practitioners in development and public administration.

Exit, Voice, and Loyalty
Exit, Voice, and Loyalty

Author: Albert O. Hirschman

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 1970

Total Pages: 180

ISBN-13: 9780674276604

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An innovator in contemporary thought on economic and political development looks here at decline rather than growth. Albert O. Hirschman makes a basic distinction between alternative ways of reacting to deterioration in business firms and, in general, to dissatisfaction with organizations: one, “exit,” is for the member to quit the organization or for the customer to switch to the competing product, and the other, “voice,” is for members or customers to agitate and exert influence for change “from within.” The efficiency of the competitive mechanism, with its total reliance on exit, is questioned for certain important situations. As exit often undercuts voice while being unable to counteract decline, loyalty is seen in the function of retarding exit and of permitting voice to play its proper role. The interplay of the three concepts turns out to illuminate a wide range of economic, social, and political phenomena. As the author states in the preface, “having found my own unifying way of looking at issues as diverse as competition and the two-party system, divorce and the American character, black power and the failure of ‘unhappy’ top officials to resign over Vietnam, I decided to let myself go a little.”