Minimizing costs is often cited as essential for optimizing service delivery. Roads are the oldest, most important infrastructure services provided by governments. They require construction, rehabilitation, maintenance, and administration. Various institutional arrangements affect the degree to...

Next to the decollectivization of agriculture, the most striking economic transformation in China since 1978 has been the rapid growth of rural nonstate industry. Firms in this sector (referred to as TVPs) are owned by a hierarchy of local government units below the county level: towns,...

The authors try to replace myths about government pay and employment with reliable facts from a survey for about 100 countries in the early 1900s. The study also outlines the general nature of civil service problems in the different regions. Nevertheless, while the facts are useful...

This paper explores the determinants of government environmental performance at the local level. Chinese township governments, the lowest level in the hierarchical government structure, were selected for this exercise. The performance indicators used in the analyses include the efforts of...

While decentralization holds out the promise of increased flexibility and efficiency, the preconditions for realizing it are daunting. To draw lessons for productive decentralization in integrated river basin management, this paper surveys the decentralization experience in education, health...

The author highlights some of the dangers of decentralizations. The benefits of decentralization in allocative efficiency are not as obvious as suggested by the standard theory of fiscal federalism. The assumptions of this theory are fragile. These doubtful benefits might carry a cost in...

The authors empirically investigate how decentralization affects the efficiency of road provision from the viewpoint of the local goods provider and the road user. The theoretical model: a double cost hidden level effort. They include both user and provider concerns in determining the optimal...

This paper complements a separate study in this Series ("Government Employment and Pay: A Global and Regional Perspective,"Policy Research Working Paper 1771, May, 1997) by providing the detailed statistical and econometric evidence on which that separate study is based. The authors briefly...

The author examines the corporate governance of banks. When banks efficiently mobilize and allocate funds, this lowers the cost of capital to firms, boosts capital formation, and stimulates productivity growth. So, weak governance of banks reverberates throughout the economy with negative...

The author estimate the costs and benefits of labor retrenchment in state-owned industrial enterprises in China. Their results indicate the prevalence of low and stagnant labor productivity, low capital productivity, and excessively high wages in the state sector for the period reviewed...