Admission requirements
None.
Description
How do public managers in the Netherland, Spain, and Japan behave differently? Why do public managers in some countries tend to be engaged in corrupt behavior while those in other countries do not. Why are some public managers more innovative than others? More broadly, what explains variations in public managers’ attitudes and behaviors across countries? The main purpose of this course is to understand how characteristics of public administration differ across countries (or across municipalities or ministries) and how they influence public managers’ attitudes and behavior, management practices, organizational performance, and broader outcomes. Rather than internal management of public organizations, this course focuses on the impacts of environmental and institutional factors on public managers’ attitudes, behavior, and policy and socioeconomic outcomes.
In recent years, scholars in the fields of public administration and political science have “rediscovered” the importance of public bureaucracies for understanding different levels of government performance (Olsen 2006). Recent studies show that meritocratically recruited, autonomous, and impartial public administration—so called “Weberian bureaucracy”—is associated with long-term economic development, improved health outcomes, reduced corruption, greater innovation, and higher government effectiveness. Furthermore, recent studies also show that demographic representation in public organizations affects organizational performance and policy preferences. However, the field of public management has been accused of neglecting the big questions (Roberts 2017, 9) and assumed that “all states are alike—that Mexico is just like the United States, for example” (Milward 2016, 312). This course aims to bridge this gap.
In this course, students are expected to not only study the related academic works, but also critically and constructively evaluate the previous studies. Students can use this opportunity to begin or to further develop their master’s thesis or independent research. This course does not focus on a specific geographic area. Instead, we will examine various countries in the world from a comparative perspective.
The class will address, for example, questions such as:
What explains cross-national and sub-national governments’ variations in levels of corruption, government effectiveness, and innovativeness?
Why are public managers in some countries more likely to engage in corruption than those in other countries?
Why are public managers in some national governments (or local governments) more innovative than others?
How does gender representation in the public sector affect organizational performance and policy preferences?
How do capacities and the experience of public sector leaders affect performance?
Course objectives
Upon completion of the course, students should be able to:
Explain varieties in administrative characteristics and management practices around the world;
Understand to what extent different institutional features and management practices influence governance outcomes and public manager’s attitudes and practices;
Critically and constructively assess the existing studies;
Practice research design skills and use the insights from the course to start or advance his or her own independent research or master's thesis.
Timetable
On the right side of programme front page of the E-guide you will find links to the website and timetables, uSis, and Brightspace.
Mode of instruction
This course takes participatory approaches of teaching rather than the classic lecture style approaches. Students are expected to actively engage in individual and group activity as well as class discussion. This course will be taught through a mix of lectures by the instructor, student presentations, group discussion, class activity, and class discussion facilitated by students.
Course Load
The total course load for this course is 140 hours (5 EC x 28 hours). These hours are (approximately) spent on:
Attending lectures (a total of 21 hours)
Self-study (e.g., studying readings and cases, completing assignments) (119 hours)
Assessment method
Active class participation and in-class activities: 20%
Presentation and discussion leader: 15%
Short assignment: 20%
Final assignment: 45%
All components need to be passed with a grade of 5.5 or higher in order to successfully complete this course. Redoing an assignment in case of a grade lower than 5.5 must be done before the course end and final paper deadline. Redoing the final paper is only possible if the paper had a score lower than 5.5.
From 2020-2021 onwards, partial grades will not remain valid after the exam and the resit of the course.
Reading list
The course does not follow a single text across all sessions. Instead, each class session will consist of 2-5 mandatory readings, which should be available via Leiden University Library.
Registration
Register for every course and workgroup via uSis. Some courses and workgroups have a limited number of participants, so register on time (before the course starts). In uSis you can access your personal schedule and view your results. Registration in uSis is possible from four weeks before the start of the course.
From the academic year 2020-2021 Leiden University uses Brightspace as its online learning management system. After enrollment for the course in uSis you will be automatically enrolled in the Brightspace environment of this course.
Contact
Dr. Kohei Suzuki k.suzuki@fgga.leidenuniv.nl