Shrinking the state: reforming arm's length bodies in an age of austerity

呼吁“半官方机构篝火”经常出现在英国的政治议程上，但往往无法实现重大改革。然而，现在，联合政府正在持续努力改革这些独立于部长做出决策和提供公共服务的“一臂之遥的机构”，这一问题以前由苏格兰行政院和威尔士议会政府解决。在激烈的辩论背后，是英国国家民主问责制、效率和组织的重要问题。在当前的经济、金融和政策挑战、削减赤字以及将公共供应的更大责任转移给公民和志愿组织的雄心的背景下，这些尤为重要。目前关于英国正常机构的争论为政策制定者和学术研究人员提出了一些重要问题：1。为什么在政治和公众的敌意面前，一臂之遥的机构如此持久？2.为什么改革现在是可能的，这是一个独特的英国现象吗？3.紧缩的气氛如何影响正常机构的持久性和改革？4.改革与部长、议会、公务员和使用其服务的组织和个人保持一定距离的机构会产生什么后果？5.是否有其他方法可以设计将行政或咨询权力授予独立机构，以及国际和地方一级的事态发展可以教我们什么？我们的研究将跟踪联合政府的手臂的长度机构的改革的发展和实施，并比较这与在英国，地方一级和国际上的权力下放管理的发展。它将考虑所涉及的法律的、宪法和行政问题，也将考虑重塑和缩小国家所涉及的更广泛的政治问题。它将汇集领先的学者谁采用了不同的，但互补的方法在以前的ALB研究，发展新的理论来解释代理设计在威斯敏斯特系统的比较视角。它是与政策界的伙伴，特别是下议院公共行政特别委员会、公共主席论坛、地方政府新闻股和行政首长协会一起制定的，并将与它们密切合作。它将采用先进的定量和定性技术，在一个独特的和强大的混合方法设计，以前没有在这个领域使用。4.它将通过整合跨国和多水平数据来克服ALB研究中单一国家、国家层面的偏见。这将促进与政策界的知识交流，并增加研究的影响。5.它将促进学者之间的国际对话，这些学者关心的是实现政策的体制设计的民主挑战。

Calls for a 'bonfire of the quangos' regularly appear on the political agenda in the UK, but often fail to deliver significant reforms. Now, however, the Coalition Government is making a sustained attempt to reform these 'arm's length bodies' that make decisions and deliver public services independently of ministers, an issue tackled previously by the Scottish Executive and Welsh Assembly Government.Behind the heat of the debate lie important issues for democratic accountability, efficiency and organisation in the British state. These are especially important in the context of current economic, financial and policy challenges, deficit reduction and the ambition to shift greater responsibility for public provision to citizens and voluntary organisations. The current debate about arm's length bodies in the UK raises a number of important questions for policy makers and academic researchers:1. Why have arm's length bodies been so durable in the face of political and public hostility? 2. Why is reform now possible, and is this a distinctly UK phenomenon? 3. How is the durability and reform of arm's length bodies affected by a climate of austerity? 4. What are the consequences of reforming arm's length bodies for ministers, Parliament, civil servants and those organisations and individuals who use their services? 5. Are there other ways in which delegation of executive or advisory authority to independent bodies might be designed, and what can developments internationally and at local level teach us? Our research will track the development and implementation of the Coalition Government's reform of arm's length bodies and compare this with developments within the devolved administration in the UK, at local level, and internationally. It will consider the legal, constitutional and administrative issues involved, but also the broader politics involved in reshaping and shrinking the state.The research has five distinctive features: 1. It will bring together leading scholars who have employed different but complementary approaches in prior ALB research to develop new theory to explain agency design in the Westminster system in comparative perspective.2. It has been developed, and will work closely, with partners in the policy community, especially the House of Commons Public Administration Select Committee, Public Chairs' Forum, Local Government Information Unit, and Association of Chief Executives.3. It will employ advanced quantitative and qualitative techniques in a unique and powerful mixed methods design, not previously employed in this field. 4. It will overcome the single-nation, national level bias in studies of ALBs through the integration of cross-national and multi-level data. This will promote knowledge exchange with policy communities and add to the impact of the research. 5. It will stimulate an international dialogue among scholars concerned with the democratic challenges of institutional design for policy achievement.