In the scholarly literature on smart city, normative and prescriptive approaches dominate. Most publications with analytic goals focus on transnational corporations, the related global imaginary of a smart city, and on associated new technologies. In comparison, actually existing smart cities have seldom been investigated. This is even more the case for public governance arrangements of smart city policies. Our study compares three EU cities in this regard, which are attempting to take a lead in smart city development. In addition, urban agriculture and citizens' participation are specifically investigated in their relation to smart city policy-making. Based on policy document and media discourse analysis, interviews, and participant observation, three governance arrangements of smart city policies are identified: hierarchical governance by the government in Barcelona between 2011 and 2015, closed co-governance by the city executive and non-governmental actors in Vienna and since 2015 in Barcelona, and open co-governance in Berlin. Citizens' participation is in the center in Barcelona since 2015, and is potentially important in Berlin. The Viennese smart city governance arrangement is characterized by non-hierarchical bargaining within the administration and signals innovative meta-governance, without citizens' participation. In all three cities, international dynamics play a crucial role for engaging with smart city, but it is enacted in particular ways according to place-specific history, social forces, and economic and political conditions. The meaning of smart city varies thus considerably: a comprehensive urban sustainability strategy focused upon climate policy goals in Vienna; a comprehensive internationalization strategy in Barcelona between 2011 and 2015; a limited technology- and business-oriented approach in Berlin; and a limited digital city frame geared to participatory democracy and technological sovereignty in Barcelona since 2015. Contrary to the literature, we highlight the agency of city executives, and the place-specific enactments that global smart city imaginaries undergo. Current smart city policies express more continuity than rupture with regard to urban development policies in our case study cities. / Series: SRE - Discussion Papers

M.Com. / Please refer to full text to view abstract

This dissertation develops and assesses hypotheses regarding the design and adaptation of institutions for maintaining the quality of a shared natural resource at regional scales. The analysis is centered on arrangements created by governmental actors for deciding how to jointly govern a resource producing high-quality drinking water. The cases studied are Boston (Massachusetts), New York City (New York), Portland (Oregon), and San Francisco (California). Drinking water in each of these cities is provided unfiltered, and it is sourced from lands located in other jurisdictions. To maintain water quality, both providers and landowners in the watersheds have reached agreements defining how to jointly govern the resource. This dissertation studies the design of these arrangements. Studying these dynamics, particularly in a federal regime, highlights the limits that governmental actors face in making decisions with other governments at different levels. The dissertation contains three empirical papers addressing aspects of design in these arrangements. The empirical chapters are structured as separate papers that follow a common theme. Throughout the dissertation, insights from various research traditions are brought in to complement the analysis of institutional design. The studies in this dissertation combine arguments from the Institutional Analysis and Development Framework, Common-Pool Resource Theory, Transaction Cost Economics, social network analysis, Adaptive Governance, and theories of information processing stemming from the Punctuated Equilibrium literature in public policy.

This empirical qualitative study based on four inter-organizational collaborations in the Singapore Public Sector contributes to the network management and public sector leadership literatures by examining leadership of the coordinating bodies through the studying of structures and processes within the four cases. Particularly paying attention to how network managers build trust and relationships with network members, partners and external institutions through the balancing of tensions arising from control and autonomy. Emerged from the findings, the network managers had exhibited leadership activities from two opposing spectrums i.e. “from the spirit of collaboration” and “towards collaborative thuggery” (Vangen & Huxham, 2003) to maneuver the balancing act thereby catalyzing members and partners towards fulfilling the network agenda and subsequently achieving outcomes. Henceforth it furthers Vangen and Huxham’s (2003) action-research study towards building the understanding of network leadership in the public sector.

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Masters of Commerce / This study aims at determining the m-Readiness of a Province for m-Government from a context of its Provincial Government (PG), the underprivileged citizens of the region and the mobile fluency thereof. In answering the research question, i.e., “What is the extent of readiness of the government and that of the underprivileged citizens for introduction of m-Government within the region under study”, literature was reviewed and existing models synthesised, and from that, a conceptual model was presented which acted as a reference point. The research process used a quantitative method and utilised a stratified random sampling method in determining and adequately representing the populations under study, namely, underprivileged citizens and IT managers and specialists from the PG’s office. Descriptive statistics were adopted in analysing the collected data used in answering the research questions and findings presented. The findings show that the Province is m-Ready for m-Government services, from the studied contexts of the PG, underprivileged citizens and mobile fluency. The reference model, that is, the Provincial Mobile Readiness Measurement Model (PMRMM), was developed from a perspective of the Province under study, therefore, its theoretical generalizability to other Provinces has to be first studied before being implemented. Secondly, the study only looked at three segments of the government service delivery value chain, which are the Government-to-Citizen (G2C), Government-to-Employee (G2E) and Governmentto- Government (G2G). The contributions of the study are twofold, firstly as a practical decision-making guide regarding introduction of m-Government and secondly, it adds to the conceptual understanding of government readiness for introduction of government services via ICT mobile platforms.

The primary objective of this study is to test the theoretical framework relating to three major Corporate Governance (CG) hypotheses by means of reviewing cited literature and testing it in the corporate field. These are the Agency, stakeholder and shareholder theories. Many scholars have recognised the predominance of agency theory compared to the others. The literature demonstrates that the agency theory is substantially more established in practice with limited discussions and debate around other two theories. The research adopted a two-phase research approach, which employed qualitative and quantitative methods to collect empirical data. The findings from the field reveal that the Agency Theory indeed succeeds; however, the respondents’ opinions are that academic writers have unnecessarily overstated it. Concurring with claims by writers that the relationship between senior managers and shareholders does not exist, it is found in this research that there is no need for the relationship to exist. The study also found no evidence that senior managers are treated as agents, which is the basis of agency theory. Copyright / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) is the only legislated corporate governance structure, and is aimed at increasing investor confidence in public companies by forcing them to be transparent in their financial affairs. In order for companies to comply with the legislation, significant costs need to be incurred without any guarantee that the benefits will accrue to the investors or the company. The legislation will be regarded as being successful if a) the benefits and costs can be identified and b) the benefits exceed the costs. This study reviews the SOX legislation elements using documentary and secondary interview research, and reveals a convergence between the two. While the purpose of the regulation is to prevent fraud and restore investor confidence, there was no empirical evidence suggesting that investor confidence has increased after complying with the legislation. The benefits of complying with the legislation appear to be access to capital markets in the United States, and awareness of the controls environment by all employees. The costs incurred are listed as initial implementation costs and ongoing sustainable costs, and the overall costs are greater than benefits obtained. In the long term, benefits should exceed the costs, as the sustainable costs are low compared to implementation costs. / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted

This study explored the political-economic dimension of corporate governance reform in South Africa. Such reform in South Africa is especially significant in view of the history of South African society. This study investigated the relationship between corporate governance institutions and systems on the one hand and the political, economic and historical context of South African society that produced these corporate governance institutions and systems on the other. The purpose of the study was to establish the political, economic and historical determinants of corporate governance reform, as they evolved in the course of South African corporate history. A literature review was done in order to provide a backdrop for the study, after which a number of documents in the public domain were observed, in particular, a number of historical sources, newspaper reports, internet resources, and analyses of selected statutes and South African case law. The study concluded that South African corporate governance reform and such reform in the Commonwealth economic systems have a lot in common in terms of their historical evolution. The outcome of the political process in South Africa, for very specific reasons, was that a specific shareholder model of corporate governance became the corporate governance system in South Africa. Copyright / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted

Corporate scandals such as Enron, WorldCom and Parmalat, have focused recent governance efforts in the domain of financial reporting due to fraudulent and/or erroneous accounting practices. In addition, the ineffectiveness of the current system of controls has been highlighted, including that some directors have been weak and ineffective monitors of managers. This board of director ‘weakness’ has called for additional mechanisms for monitoring and controlling of management, focusing on financial reporting. This problem intensifies in that today companies function in real-time, and decisions are based on available realtime financial information. However, the assurances provided by traditional auditing take place months after the transactions have occurred and therefore, a trust problem arises because information is not verified in real-time. Consequently, the errors and fraud concealed within the financial information is not discovered until months later. To address this trust problem a conceptual causal model is proposed in this study based on the principles of systems theory. The emergent property of the causal model is increased trust and control. This study establishes that mutual assurances assist in building trust and that information security assists in safeguarding trust. Subsequently, in order to have a positive relationship between the company directors and various stakeholders, uncertainty needs to be contained, and the level of trust needs to surpass the perceived risks. The study concludes that assurances need to be provided in real-time to restore stakeholder confidence and trust in the domain of financial reporting. In order to provide assurances in real-time, continuous auditing is required to verify the integrity of financial information when it becomes available, and not months later. A continuous auditing process has its foundations grounded in information technology and attends to the challenges in real-time by addressing the standardisation of data to enable effective analysis, the validation of the accuracy of the data and the reliability of the system.