This thesis investigates the trade and revenue impact of trade liberalization. The purpose is to address the following issues: to examine the effect of trade liberalization on the volume of imports and exports, taxation, and its association with the enhancement of the performance of overall tax system. An empirical analysis is conducted by, first, adding liberalization factors to the import and export demand functions to assess their impact on imports and exports. The results indicate that, for Thailand, trade liberalization does not lead to the deterioration in the trade balance. Instead, it helps improve export performance. However, trade deficit may still occur due to a high income elasticity of demand for imports, rooted from its import structure. Although trade liberalization is not found to be associated with the problem of trade imbalance, the fiscal imbalance may still persist due to the mechanism of tariff reduction. In order to deal with the fiscal problem, the government needs to implement domestic tax reform. The consequence of reform may vary since liberalization impacts on taxation differ greatly depending on various factors. The study examines its effect on taxation, by applying a tax effort model and employing a two-way fixed effect approach. The results suggest that tax reform in less developed and developing countries, by moving away from trade tax to domestic taxes, may be inapplicable since domestic taxes may also severely suffer from liberalization. However, tax reform is still necessary and thus the study applies the concept of tax buoyancy and elasticity to evaluate the ability of Thailand’s tax system to mobilize its revenue after the reform. The results reveal that the tax system as a whole is buoyant and elastic due to the high tax-to-base buoyancy of corporate income tax, especially in the post-AFTA period. The main findings from empirical studies have important policy implications for tax strategies of Thailand and other developing countries.

This thesis draws on the analysis of data from interviews, observations, documents and archival records to examine the conditions of possibility for PFI procurements by three English National Health Service (NHS) Trusts and the extent to which these projects are affordable and delivering Value for Money (VfM). Drawing from Bourdieu’s Theory of Practice and his social praxeology, the thesis problematizes the critical explanations for the adoption of PFI by NHS Trusts and the VfM evaluations in operational projects. It contributes to the literature by theorising and empirically examining the operational conditions that have made NHS PFI a viable possibility, and the affordability and VfM issues arising from choosing and implementing PFI. On the conditions of possibility, the thesis finds that the state, through a statecraft of modernisation, structured local dispositions for PFI programmes using multi-layered and multi-directed reforms. Reforms restructuring the bureaucracy and financing of healthcare delivery, together with state-wide neoliberal practices, made Trusts more receptive to the use of the PFI. In addition, the increasingly evolving demands from national healthcare delivery frameworks in their applications to insufficiently resourced Trusts, defined the spatio-temporal adoption of the PFI. The thesis also finds that the projects are relatively unaffordable, but the reasons for their unaffordability are complex and multi-layered. In addition, VfM in operational projects is polysemous; has largely become symbolic and inconsequential, with its pursuit and constitution taken for granted. Ex-post evaluation programmes are not executed as procurers hold the costs of such exercises to outweigh the benefits. Furthermore, HM Treasury’s regime for VfM determination, in application, constructs a VfM reality removed from the ‘lived’ experiences of the procurers; and accounts for the apathetic inertia in PFI procurements. However, this same regime works to the benefit of stakeholders vested with financial and ideological interests in the functioning of the PFI.

Improving public sector managers' accountability with performance measurement is one of the dominant themes of the New Public Management (NPM) literature. With a case study of HM Customs & Excise (HMCE), this PhD research analyses NPM-inspired accounting changes using evidence from interviews with HMCE personnel, official publications and parliamentary reports. There are four important research findings. First, unlike other service delivery organisations, two sets of competing accountability relationships exist in a tax administration, which are operationalised by two performance measurement regimes. This necessitates adaptation of leading private sector performance measurement models to accommodate the duality. Second, HMCE used accounting as a change vehicle in an attempt to shift emphasis from a traditional, compliance-driven accountability relationship to a customer-focus driven one. Third, the compliance-driven relationship remained the dominant relationship in practice despite implementation of the first round of customer-focused accounting changes. Fourth, a second round of accounting changes, i.e. a tax gap reduction approach, attempts to harmonise the two competing performance measurements. This arguably represents a notion of shared accountability of taxpayers and tax administration for 'tax gap' reduction. From an institutional theory perspective, however, adoption of the tax gap approach represents an exercise to (re)gain legitimacy in the eyes of Government. The PhD evidence, therefore, suggests that success of accounting changes is context specific. Moreover, based on a notion of reciprocity of accountabilities in the public sector, the PhD research also develops a theoretical framework. This is a significant contribution as existence of multiple accountabilities is recognised in the literature but using accounting changes to shift emphasis from one accountability form to another is not well addressed. In addition to these theoretical contributions, this PhD research is a first field study of PMS of a tax administration, and therefore, also improves our understanding of managerial issues of a neglected, but important, research site.

This thesis consists of three essays related to balance of payment or the external sector issues. These three essays include an analysis of a country’s current account and fiscal sustainability position, the role of external debt in economic growth, and the reserves and debt management. The main intention of the first essay (comprising Chapter 2) is to analyze the sustainability of the current account and fiscal position for high, middle and low income countries. This empirical analysis makes use of various panel unit root and cointegration tests, as well as fixed and random effects estimators. The results indicate that there is evidence of current account sustainability only for high-income countries indicating that the intertemporal budget constraints are being maintained. In contrast, the middle-income and low-income countries are found to be in an unsustainable current account position. In addition, this paper also finds that all groups of countries have a slow phase of convergence towards equilibrium which suggests that all countries are vulnerable to any sudden shock or stop. Besides that, there is evidence of sustainability on fiscal policy for the high and middle groups of countries. Chapter 3 investigates the issue of whether external debt contributes to expansion in economic growth. This chapter attempts to answer this question by analyzing 31 developing countries over a period of 36 years (1970-2005). The results reveal that the accumulation of external debt is associated with a slowdown in the economies of the developing countries. Besides this, we find evidence that debt service ratio does not crowd out the investment rate in developing countries. In other words, even though the external debt is negatively associated with economic growth, countries are found to be safe from being in the debt overhang hypothesis. However, the negative effect could be interpreted as the main symptom of a country before it becomes involved in the debt overhang problem. In addition, fiscal balance, iii government revenue, openness, and domestic credits are found to have a positive effect on investment and, to a lesser extent, economic growth. Furthermore, there is evidence to support the existence of spatial dependence in the growth model, suggesting the existence of positive spillover effect of growth among the neighbouring countries. This suggests that countries are found to have positive correlation with their neighbours’ economic growth. The main analytical contribution of the final chapter, which is chapter 4, is to analyze the cost of jointly holding reserves and sovereign debt decision. By analyzing the impact of holding reserves and sovereign debt on sovereign credit ratings, this provides the evidence of the costs of holding reserves and debt with respect to credit risk. As predicted by theory, the international reserves-holding is associated with good sovereign credit ratings as well as lower credit risk while the sovereign debtholding leads to a lower sovereign credit rating and high credit risk. This implies that reducing (repaying) their sovereign debts is the best decision for countries to keep and maintain a good credit risk reputation. Meanwhile, the benefit of holding reserves has crowded out the cost of holding short-term debt, resulting in a net positive effect on sovereign ratings. This could imply that a country should hold more reserves with regard to the level of short-term debt which is a highly vulnerable liability for a country. The results reveal that the adequate level of international reserves in month of imports is slightly higher than with the conventional rule which at 3 month of imports.

By making use of various social science research methods, in particular semi-structured interviews, this thesis reveals the main features of the Serbia’s 15-year long transition experience, which took place against a background of frequent constitutional changes over the period 1989 to 2004. Serbia’s transition began in December 1989 with the Markovic programme, while the Republic was a constitutive part of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY). The study confirms that the SRFY was the first country to start transition from a socialist to a market economy, but that this advanced position was lost due to a lack of political consensus, and the dissolution of the country in 1991. As part of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) which was formed in 1992, Serbia during the 1990s went through the most devastating period in its modern (economic) history, experiencing the second highest and the second longest hyperinflation ever registered (1992-94). The battle against (hyper) inflation and economic recovery took the form of the Avramovic programme of January 1994, but failed to delivery any prolonged stabilisation and growth. Additionally, during the period of FRY, when Slobodan Miloševic was in power, an extensive regime of economic and non-economic sanctions were imposed on Serbia by the international community (1991-2000). Moreover, in 1999, the country was faced with the seriousness of the Kosovo conflict and NATO bombing, and the concomitant impact of these events on economic life. As a result of all this, Serbia’s transition process was stillborn throughout much of the 1990s and public confidence in the state institutions, including the National Bank of Serbia (NBS), was entirely lost. Transition resumed in 2001, following the ‘bulldozer revolution’ of 5 October 200, and has since followed the main postulates of the transition blueprint which was based on the so-called “Washington Consensus”. The exchange-rate based stabilisation programme brought positive results as early as 2002 and 2003, notably in bringing down inflation. The combination of a de facto fixed exchange rate regime (formally announced as a managed float) and gloomy prospects of an ever-raising current account deficit and public debt, however, gave rise to a wide-ranging debate on the role of exchange rate and monetary policy in the overall profess of economic recovery. Our analysis reveals that there is a space, although limited due to the high “euroisation” of the Serbian economy, for a more active monetary policy. This would allow a substantial depreciation of the real dinar exchange rate, of importance given the demands of WTO and EU membership, namely full capital account liberalisation. Since February 2003, Serbia again changed its constitutional robe by becoming a member state of the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro. Following this constitutional change in June 2003, after a decade-long delay, Serbia's central bank reform was eventually initiated and the new NBS Law was enacted. The evidence contained in this work suggests that the NBS's legal independence perfectly matches the transitional average, but that the actual NBS's independence is a cause for concern. So as to prevent the inclusion of the 'systemic error' into the new Serbian constitution - by which a single person (i.e. the governor) is the sole source of monetary policymaking - the study proposes several principles which may guide the drafting process. Additionally, the thesis points to provisions of the current NBS Law which need to be adapted in line with the EMU acquis. The study concludes by rising the question of how the NBS's credibility can be restored, proposing a new NBS's approach to transparency as a possible solution.

The study was carried out against a background of a general perception that participatory budgeting (PB) in developing countries is an annual ritual exercise to comply with pressure from supranational agencies to adopt New Public Management (NPM) reforms, rather than a practical process that involves citizens in formulating and developing local government plans and budgets that incorporate their needs and priorities. The study adopts a qualitative interpretive approach and a case study design, using Uganda and Wamala District Local Government as country and study sites respectively, to explore how PB is implemented in practice and whether the desired outcomes are achieved. It further explores the underlying factors that restrict or enhance PB in a decentralised LG framework. The study argues that adapting NPM reforms to the local environment, and citizens exercising their rights and responsibilities, are critical to the achievement of desires, goals and outcomes. The findings of the study demonstrate that owing to power relations, inadequate locally raised revenues, citizens’ lack of knowledge, skills and competencies in public sector financial management, and inherent cultural norms and values, PB may not achieve the desired goals and outcomes in developing countries under a decentralized local governance system. The contribution to accounting theory from this study is that institutional pressures (coercive, mimetic and normative) can be mitigated by empowering citizens to exercise their civil, social, political and economic/financial citizenship rights and responsibilities effectively. This could lead to strengthening management accounting systems, and result in policy reforms (that are donor driven) achieving desired outcomes.

The basis of this study is to attempt to throw light on some of the problems arising from the public ownership of industrial enterprise through making a comparative examination of the records of public and private ownership in the gas and electricity industries before nationalisation. The plan of the study is to examine first of all the phenomenon of municipal 'trading' enterprise, studying its development, and considering it In relation to other municipal services. Then the genera’ structure of the gas and electricity industries is described. After this the main comparisons are attempted, under the headings of efficiency; financial policy; location policy; and administration. (In studying the difficult problem of the relative levels of efficiency achieved under public and private ownership in these two industries some attention is given to the meaning of the word efficiency itself and to evaluating the significance of the different methods of making efficiency measurements).