Does Outsourcing Reduce Public Scrutiny Toward Elected Officials
Insights From US Municipal Water Management
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 6446530 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Jesse L Barnes (0000-0002-1490-732X, Department of Political Science University of Nevada, Reno Reno Nevada USA), Elizabeth A Koebele (0000-0001-9133-2710, Department of Political Science University of Nevada, Reno Reno Nevada USA), Aaron Deslatte (0000-0001-5518-3949, Paul H. O'Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs Indiana University Bloomington Bloomington Indiana USA) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 103 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 707-725 |
| Publication date | 2025-03-21 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Public Administration (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0033-3298 • E-ISSN: 1467-9299 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1111/padm.13058 |
| OpenAlex | W4408763512 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
| References cited | 150 |
Amidst 21st‐century climate‐related threats, municipal elected officials (EOs) may outsource public services to third parties to avoid the political costs of adopting “unpopular” sustainability policies—a strategy known as political decoupling. However, decoupling raises accountability concerns and may not improve sustainability, leading some municipalities to “recouple” services. To help understand the political impacts of these decisions, we assess how public scrutiny toward EOs in US municipalities changes after varying degrees of coupling in the water provision sector (i.e., how much service delivery shifts away from or toward municipal oversight). Analysis of local media coverage shows public attention toward EOs decreases after higher degrees of decoupling and recoupling, public opinion becomes polarized toward EOs after decouplings, and the public links sustainability‐related issues to EOs after high degrees of decoupling. The results highlight how reforming public services relates to political accountability‐related factors and raise critical questions about the political decoupling strategy
Business · Outsourcing · Political science · Scrutiny · Corruption and Economic Development · Law · Legal and Constitutional Studies · Marketing · Public Administration · Regulation and Compliance Studies
Governing the Tap
Contracting out by the public sector
Re-municipalization of public services
Contracting for Government Services
Crafting analytical tools to study institutional change
Ownership and Performance in Competitive Environments
Re-municipalisation in the early twenty-first century
‘Public service motivation’ as an argument for government provision
Beyond Markets and States
The electoral consequences of austerity
Sentiments and emotions evoked by news headlines of coronavirus disease (Covid-19) outbreak
An exploratory study of social media's role in facilitating public participation in e‐rulemaking using computational text analysis tools
Privatization and intermunicipal cooperation in US local government services
A comparison of news databases’ coverage of digital-native news
How Do Local Officials Conceptualize Sustainability as Practiced in Their Communities
Citizen perceptions of general-purpose and special district governments
Meanings of Public and the Future of Public Services
Collaboration Risk and the Choice to Consolidate Local Government Services
A Network Autonomy Framework
Avoiding the spotlight
Citizens, consumers, workers, and activists
Decoupling
Has the Bubble Finally Burst? A Comparative Examination of the Failure of Privatization of Water Services Delivery in Atlanta (USA) and Hamilton (Canada)
Public opinion on climate change
Landscapes of Remunicipalization
Reporting on climate change
Towards urban water sustainability
Climate change in news media across the globe
Institutional diversity and safe drinking water provision in the United States
The theory and practice of decoupling utility revenues from sales
Key issues in water privatization and remunicipalization
From pragmatic to politicized? The future of water remunicipalization in the United States
Does public ownership of utilities matter for local government water policies
How Public Opinion Constrains the Use of Force
Agency Design, the Mass Media, and the Blame for Agency Scandals
Government Accountability For Outsourced Services
The Strange Case of the Disappearing Special Districts
Accountability in Government Contracting Arrangements
The Public Accountability of Privatized Activation – The Case of I srael
Remunicipalisation, Mutating Neoliberalism, and the Conjuncture
(De)Financing remunicipalisation
Public–Private Partnerships and the Public Accountability Question
Interpreting performance information
Why Do Local Governments Privatize the Provision of Water Services? Empirical Evidence From Spain
Inter‐municipal Cooperation and Costs
Buying green in U.S. local government
Does political ideology still matter? A meta‐analysis of government contracting decisions
Outsourcing, bureaucratic personnel quality and citizen satisfaction with public services
Involuntary backsourcing in the public sector
The effects of contractual and relational governance on public‐private partnership sustainability
A replication of “Contracting out
Revenue Scarcity and Government Outsourcing
Bureaucratic accountability in third‐party governance
Disentangling the separate and combined effects of privatization and cooperation on local government service delivery
Political opportunism and transaction costs in contractual choice of public–private partnerships
Responsive, responsible and respected government
Country, sector and method effects in studying remunicipalization
Institutions, information asymmetry and democratic responsiveness
Remunicipalization
Government Responsiveness in the European Union
Best Practices for Journalistic Balance
Outsourcing Public Service Delivery
Pragmatic Municipalism
Embracing the ambiguity
What lies beneath these creatures of the state
Structural Topic Models for Open‐Ended Survey Responses
Who is responsible? The effect of clarity of responsibility on voter turnout
Avoiding Punishment? Electoral Accountability for Local Fee Increases
Specialized Local Government and Water Conservation Policy in the United States
Local Government's Resource Commitment to Environmental Sustainability
Does Inter-Municipal Cooperation Really Reduce Delivery Costs? An Empirical Evaluation of the Role of Scale Economies, Transaction Costs, and Governance Arrangements
What Does Sustainability Mean to City Officials
Motivated Localism
The Politics of Potholes
Accountability and Local Elections
Managing Markets for Public Service
Public values and sector service delivery preferences
Citizen Attributions of Blame in Third‐Party Governance
Retrospective Voting in Big-City US Mayoral Elections
The Politics of Scrutiny in Human Rights Monitoring
Assessing sustainability through the Institutional Grammar of urban water systems
Voluntary Environmental Programs in the Public Sector
Political Decoupling
Extent and dynamics of the remunicipalisation of public services
What have we learned from the last three decades of empirical studies on factors driving local privatisation
Pragmatic Municipalism
The contested politics of de-privatisation and the shifting terrain of the local state
The Politics of Blame Avoidance
Organizational Dissolutions in the Public Sector
Contracting or Public Delivery? The Importance of Service, Market, and Management Characteristics
Agents or Stewards
Transaction Costs and Institutional Explanations for Government Service Production Decisions
The Political Psychology of Citizen Satisfaction
Mayoral Decision-Making
Citizen satisfaction under changing political leadership
Clarity of responsibility
Climate Change
Representation and Accountability in Cities
The Conditional Effect of Specialized Governance on Public Policy
Fault Lines
| Unique citing works | 4 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 4 |
| Citation span | 2025 - 2026 (2) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 4 |