Our argument connects the management of relational contracts with the management of policy networks. Thinking about bilateral, horizontal extensions of governmental authority in a state of agents can be enhanced, we claim, because of the rich offerings of relational contracting theory. We review...

We rely on transaction cost economics and the contingency stream of organization theory to answer two related questions. First, when contracting for complex services, do governments design contracts for flexibility? Second, is the contingency perspective relevant to understanding contract...

Employing a resource-dependence theoretical framework, we analyze a set of recently awarded contracts between the Environmental Protection Agency and various suppliers to determine how joint dependence, supplier dependence, and government dependence affect contract design, and specifically the...

The U.S. Congress created the small disadvantaged business (SDB) and women-owned small business (WOSB) programs to promote fairness in government contracting. In this study, we examine whether increases in racial and gender representation in federal agencies correlates with the proportion of...

Relying on transaction cost logic we consider the likelihood that contract duration and monitoring are jointly determined in 241 cable franchise renewal agreements. Results indicate that municipalities award longer contracts to larger cable companies with more asset specific investments, but...

There is widespread agreement on the value of competition in the delivery of public goods and services. In some markets competition is naturally limited and thus various mechanisms have been utilized to bolster competition, including franchise bidding and auctions. In this article, we examine...

Collaboration is an increasingly important topic in the public administration and management literatures. A preponderance of studies focuses on how managers can build trust between the government and collaborative partners by means of behavioral attributes and managerial skill. In this article,...

We examine the effects of governments' use of alternative service provision on public employment using panel data from a nationally representative sample of local governments. We model the effects of alternative service provision on the size of the public workforce and hypothesize that...