What would a "smart government" look like? Political philosophers have spent entire careers trying to answer that question, which obviously implicates wide-ranging cultural and political values far beyond the purview of this paper. For purposes of the following discussion, however, the term...

What would a - smart government‖ look like? Political philosophers have spent entire careers trying to answer that question, which obviously implicates wide-ranging cultural and political values far beyond the purview of this paper. For purposes of the following discussion, however, the term -...

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...

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...

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...

This study compares the effectiveness of two different approaches to the delivery of human services-direct government and a collaboration between government and a nonprofit provider using a point of service contract. A work release program in Illinois provides the study context. We apply...

This article reports on a recent Indiana Court of Appeals ruling involving the elected mayor's ineligibility for office because of his previous employment with a local nonprofit. The case raises significant issues of federalism and provides evidence that the line separating public, private, and...