State energy plans are created at the request of a sitting governor or State Legislature in order to provide guidance set goals for the state’s energy sector. These plans will be critical indicators of energy trends such as the future market share of coal, natural gas, and renewables. If the future of energy in the United States is to be remotely sustainable, low-carbon policies must headline state plans. The strength of a state’s energy plan in terms of sustainability is directly related to that state’s willingness to prioritize and commit to incorporating energy sources that produce negligible carbon emissions. Questions about the role of efficiency can be answered by the political need for short-run payoffs that do not necessarily align with the long-term goals of sustainability (Kern & Smith, 2008). The nature of the American political system is that representatives want to be able to bring immediate results to their constituents, results that are usually shown in the short-run by efficiency programs. While the state energy plans in question (California, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Iowa, South Carolina, and Virginia) engage with sustainability at varying levels of strength, they deal mostly in weak sustainability by failing to commit to renewables. Historical reliance on energy efficiency and its accompanying theories of growth has created a climate in which state energy plans do not generally realize their enormous potential to lead the national transition away from fossil fuels.

abstract: ABSTRACT This research reveals how governments cut budgets during fiscal crises and what pattern may emerge based on the cuts. It addresses a significant gap in literature by looking into the details of an agency for a full recession period to explain how cutback requirements were met. Through investigating a large Arizona state agency during the 2008 recession in the United States, the research reveals that cutback management is a stage-by-stage process lagging the immediate deterioration of the state’s economy and that patterns found among cuts are more often rational than not. Cutbacks in this agency proceeded through three stages: the beginning, middle and the end period of cuts. In each stage, the author used descriptive analysis, process map analysis and cause and effect analysis to explore the features of cuts made. These methods of analysis were used to break down an annual budget reduction into original appropriation budget cuts, mid year reductions and the final budget cuts required to end the fiscal year in balance. In addition, the analytical methods permitted more detailed analysis of specific appropriation line items. The information used was secondary data collected from seven fiscal years around the recession and from various sources, including budgetary materials, legislation, accounting materials and many program reports related to budget cuts. The findings suggested that across-the-board cuts are implemented at the beginning of cutback stage mainly to non-mandatory programs without jeopardizing the core functions of the agency. Later, in the middle period of the recession, selective cuts are made on large programs. Fund transfers and excess balance transfers are also preferred to reduce the budgets of other restricted funds. At the end stage of budget cuts, new revenue sources are established to support programs which had relied on general fund revenues in the past. Overall, the cutback process observed in this research reflects decremental and rational patterns of decision making, contrasting with the randomness observed in previous research on cutback management. Across the board cuts are decremental; the remainders are rational, even strategic decisions. This investigation reminds researchers to be aware of the context and the level of observation when analyzing cutbacks. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Public Administration and Policy 2018

Orientador: Francisco Luiz Cazeiro Lopreato / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Economia / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-20T05:53:06Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Carmo_ManuelaSantosNunesdo_M.pdf: 1980853 bytes, checksum: d189a1eb096634c095526980a148be80 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012 / Resumo: O estudo analisou a institucionalidade, o financiamento e o gasto executados pelo governo estadual em São Paulo, no período de 1997 a 2009, a partir de uma tipologia que dispõe as políticas sociais em (i) ensino básico, (ii) saúde e (iii) habitação e transporte público urbano. Considerando que a capacidade estadual de se financiar e realizar gastos é um indicativo de sua capacidade de implementar políticas, a avaliação mostrou que os aspectos relacionados à nova fiscalidade, introduzidos na década de 1990, restringiram o poder e o espaço de atuação da esfera estadual de desenvolver e ampliar programas em seu território. Nas áreas de saúde e educação básica, esta situação de fragilidade intensificou-se com o modelo de descentralização adotado a partir da Constituição de 1988, devido ao crescente peso da relação administrativa e financeira direta entre a esfera federal e os municípios que marginalizou o governo estadual. Este processo, contudo, não envolveu os setores de habitação e transporte público urbano, nos quais estados e municípios já vinham atuando desde antes da promulgação da Constituição de 1988 e das estratégias federais descentralizadoras da década de 1990, dando espaço à maior presença estadual na gestão destas políticas / Abstract: The study analyses institutional aspects, financing and spending carried by the state of Sao Paulo government during the period 1997 to 2009. The analisis is based on a typology that divides social policies in (i) education, (ii) health and (iii) housing and public transportation. Since state's ability to fund and undertake spending is indicative of state's ability to implement policies the aspects related to the new fical policy rules, introduced in the 1990s, restricted state's power to develop and expand public programs in its territory. In the areas of health and basic education policies, the decentralization model adopted by 1988's Constitution intensifies this situation, due to the financial and administrative relationship between the federal and municipal governments which marginalizes the state's sphere. However, this process did not involve housing and public transport, in which state governement and municipalities had already been acting before the 1988's Constitution and the federal decentralization strategies of the 1990s enabiling state government to manege these policies / Mestrado / Economia Social e do Trabalho / Mestre em Desenvolvimento Econômico

This thesis deals with the development and structure of Czech Government Debt in comparison with other countries of Visegrad group. In the first part, there is a description of debt management, the institutional arrangement and financial instruments. In the second part, there is a comparison with Government Debts of Slovakia, Poland and Hungary.

This research provides initial empirical evidence on the association between municipal audit committees and internal control problems. Prior research has reported on the use and benefits of municipal audit committees and the quality of governmental accounting and reporting. This study extends prior literature by investigating an area of governmental accounting not heavily researched. This study also investigates the association between the presence of a municipal audit committee and the form of municipal governance, an area of governmental accounting not yet explored in the literature. Prior research on forms of governance indicates that the professional goals of the city manager, or the political goals of the mayor, may influence his or her decisions concerning municipal operations. Examining the association of the presence of an audit committee and form of governance allows for insight into a new area of municipal research. This research finds that the presence of an audit committee is not associated with reported internal control deficiencies, but is positively associated with reported internal control weaknesses. This suggests that municipalities with audit committees have higher incidences of reported internal control weaknesses. There is also partial support for an association between the presence of an audit committee and the form of governance. However, the results are not conclusive and suggest that the political climate beyond form of governance influences decisions with regard to having audit committees.

This is a state-level analysis of the impact of state building on woman suffrage legislation in the United States. This study examines all states in which state legislatures were conferred the power to submit a constitutional amendment to the electorate for approval. I use a sequential random-effects logistic regression model to estimate the effects of state building on legislative outcome. Legislative outcome is measured in three stages: whether or not a bill is introduced in either the House or the Senate during a legislative session, whether or not a bill is voted on in either the House or the Senate during a legislative session, and whether or not a bill is passed in either the House or the Senate during a legislative session. The data used in this study were collected from legislative journals and other sources which represent the most comprehensive and accurate data that have been used to study woman suffrage legislation. Most studies of woman suffrage explain success by concentrating on changing gender norms. While this may have explained eventual success, it overlooks barriers that existed within state governments. Only 15 states granted full woman suffrage prior to the Nineteenth Amendment, the majority of which were in the West. I argue that understanding the structure of state governments provides insight into the success of western states and also provides insight into the timing of success. I do this by moving beyond contemporary social movement theory and by adapting aspects of institutional politics theory and organizational theory. Specifically, I examine the dynamics of partisan politics, organizational characteristics of state government, and the legislative process. I find that partisan politics and organizational dynamics impact legislative success. Specifically, legislatures are more likely to pass suffrage bills in states that are more democratized, that are characterized by reform-oriented regimes, where woman suffrage advocates have a greater political presence, where there is less structural inertia, and where a smaller constitutional majority is required.

In order to provide enough economic growth so that the majority of individuals within the jurisdiction are satisfied with government services, state governments typically pursue two budgetary choices for economic growth: overall increased production and stabilization (Bivens, 2014). According to two budgetary choices as a path to economic growth, this research investigates the relationship between capital expenditure or savings and economic growth. It covers the years 1990 through 2013 and uses a paneled data set at the state level in the United States. The first model for this study is the structural equation model (SEM), which examines the direct and indirect effects of capital expenditure and state government savings on economic growth by including the volatility of the total expenditure as a mediating factor. Then, this dissertation investigates the relationships among capital expenditures, the total expenditure volatility and savings by using the endogenous growth or the OLS regression model. This dissertation can conclude that both of the two budgetary choices for state governments are effective for economic growth. Under controlling state characteristics, they are positively related to economic growth, which supports the allocation role of government for economic growth. However, this study finds that state governments do not find any supportive evidence on the fact that they can attain the stabilization role of government for economic growth. Even though they spend money on savings or capital expenditure from Keynesian macroeconomic theory, it does not lead to budgetary stabilization of the total expenditure. Thus, this dissertation leaves the missing links of the relationship between both fiscal policies and volatility inconclusive while it supports that volatility can negatively affect economic growth.

No description available.

The subject of studying the institutional powers of state governors has largely been expressed on a macro level. Scholars have focused on obtaining a measurement of overall gubernatorial powers, often overlooking the quality of the individual measurements that make up their cumulative index. The most recognized method for measuring the formal and informal powers of state governors was created by Joseph A. Schlesinger in 1960, with Thad Beyle carrying on the work and providing periodical updates to the index. The scales used in these studies fall somewhat short of measuring the reality of gubernatorial powers in individual states, as existing scales of individual powers in appointment, tenure, veto, budget, branch official selection and party control fail to recognize important differences among the states. Measuring gubernatorial powers can be important for scholars and citizens alike. Further knowledge of the governor's role and powers in the political process can give voters and researchers a better sense of what a governor may be able to accomplish, and serve as a possible predictor of policy success. This study reviews and reworks the Beyle scales in an effort to identify power differences between states in terms of their individual powers. A closer look at the categories used in cumulative indices reveals that many states are scored identically despite awarding significantly different powers to their state executives. By identifying constitutional and statutory differences among states, revised scales and scores are suggested to improve the validity of measuring the individual powers. A time period comparison for the years 1980-2005 shows that the revised scales find less change in certain powers than the Beyle scales. Finally, the results of the project are used to partially fulfill an existing framework for predicting and evaluating gubernatorial policy success in the states, allowing researchers a better relative context from which to predict and assess gubernatorial actions. / Master of Arts

This study examined changes in funding and expenditures for the forty-seven public community college districts in Texas from 1974 through 1983. Expenditures data were subdivided into three parts: state reimbursable operating costs, nonreimbursable operating costs, and the cost of bonded indebtedness. Data on income for operations were aggregated in four parts: state appropriations, tuition and fees, local property taxes, and miscellaneous funds. For the purpose of determining differences in expenditure and income trends by institutional size, each of the forty-seven public community college districts was categorized as small, medium, or large in size. The findings indicate that for the period of the study some changes occurred in both expenditures and funding. In the area of expenditures, nonreimbursable operating costs increased as a proportion of total expenditures while the proportionate cost of bonded indebtedness declined. Small colleges experienced the largest increase in nonreimbursable costs, diminishing the dollars available for instructional costs.