Players in the Public Policy Process: Nonprofits as Social Capital and Agents

297 Pages·2012·2.25 MB·English

by  Herrington J. Bryce (auth.)

Players in the Public Policy Process
This book systematically develops the perspective of nonprofits or nongovernmental
organizations (NGOs) as social capital assets and agents of public policy within
the principal-agent paradigm and across public purposes—foreign or domestic,
religious or sectarian, in developed or developing countries. The perspective has
universal applicability and allows us to go beyond assumptions of market or govern-
ment failure. Moreover, the perspective reflects the competitive situation in which
nonprofits frequently find themselves when bidding against firms for government
contracts. The analysis identifies five factors that could offer nonprofits a clear,
competitive advantage over firms and governments in certain contract bidding. The
perspective yields a set of implications for the strategic positioning of nonprofits in
the public policy arena, and yields a new functional classification that includes non-
profits not merely as service providers but as managers of significant social risks, as
market and transaction regulators, and as centers of collective action along the full
spectrum of public policy issues.
Nonprofits influence our electoral choices of politicians (policymakers) and
through the latter, nonprofits influence the appointments of those who design, plan,
and administer policy within the public bureaucracy. Inside and outside the bureau-
cracy nonprofits influence policy choices, the protocols, the practices, and the suc-
cess or failure of policy implementation. The central contribution of this book is the
articulation of a perspective of how nonprofits play these varied roles as social capital
assets and agents for the public’s purposes and the subsequent theoretical, practical,
and managerial implications of this functional view.
A principal advantage of the theory developed in this book is that it may be
adopted as an umbrella theory of world realities and under which other theories and
dynamic changes in functions may be incorporated. Th e central contribution of this
second edition is that it extends the argument to developing countries and those
under stress for more civic involvement in the public policy process.
Players in the Public Policy Process
Nonprofits as Social Capital
and Agents
Second Edition
HERRINGTON J. BRYCE
PLAYERS IN THE PUBLIC POLICY PROCESS
Copyright © Herrington J. Bryce, 2012.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2012 978-1-4039-6829-6
All rights reserved.
First published in 2012 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN®
in the United States— a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC,
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world,
this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited,
registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills,
Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS.
Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
and has companies and representatives throughout the world.
Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States,
the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries.
ISBN 978-0-230-34028-2 ISBN 978-1-137-27392-5 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9781137273925
The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows:
Bryce, Herrington J.
Players in the public policy process : nonprofi ts as social capital and agents /
Herrington J. Bryce.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Nonprofi t organizations. 2. Non-governmental organizations. 3. Political
planning. I. Title.
HD2769.15.B79 2005
320.6—dc22 2004048838
A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd., Chennai, India.
Second edition fi rst published in paperback by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN in April 2012
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To Beverly, Marisa, Herrington Simon, and Shauna
a precious foursome and as always to
Simon J. and Myra Bryce, and Mabel
an awesome three.

Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction and Overview xiii
Part I The Need for Perspective: Nonprofit Regulatory
Power and Policy Purpose 1
1 The Significance of the Principal-Agent Paradigm 3
2 The Policy Significance of Nonprofit Organizations:
Beyond the Limits of Failure 11
Part II Nonprofits as Social Capital Assets and
Agents of the Public 31
3 The Nonprofits as Social Assets and Agents of Public Policy 33
4 Nonprofits as Agents of Public Policy: A Paradigm of
Principals and Agents 57
5 The Choice of Nonprofits as Agents of Public Policy 77
Part III Agency Powers, Performance, and Problems
through the Prism of the Principal-Agent Paradigm 113
6 Housing and Community Development: A Case Study of an
Agency Function 115
7 The Performance of Agents: Acute Care Hospitals and
Community Benefits 133
8 Policy Formulation, Nonprofit Advocacy, and the
Principal-Agent Framework 153
Part IV Problems of Regulating the Nonprofit Agent and
the Foreseeable Challenges of Management 169
9 Regulating the Finances of the Agent 171
10 The Nonprofit as a Self-Regulator 189
viii Contents
11 The Implications for Strategic Organizational Planning,
Management, and Positioning 205
Part V Additional Applications 225
12 NGOs as Alternatives to Nationalization, Leasing, and
Other Forms of Utilization of Public Assets 227
13 T rust in Government: A Rationale for NGO Intervention in the
Public Policy Process 2 33
Notes 249
Author Index 273
Subject Index 279
Acknowledgments
I am grateful that the first edition of this book was the recipient of The Charles H.
Levine, Jr. Memorial Book Award (2006) for its contribution to the fields of public
policy and public administration. For that award, I am grateful to the International
Political Science Research Committee on the Structure of Government and particu-
larly to its Award Committee members Professors, Frank Baumgartner, Jon Pierre,
and Mark Thatcher.
I am also grateful to those scholars who reviewed the first edition for various
academic journals. They will notice that their comments have expanded the cov-
erage of this second edition These reviewers as I am aware of are alphabetically,
Efraim Ben-Zakok, Patrick Bishop, John Bryson, Naim Kapucu , Nancy Kinney,
Max Stephenson, Mark Tranel, Mary Tschirhart, Robert Tucker, H. Turner, and
Eva Witesman, LEX. Professor William Ryan reviewed an essay drawn from the
book and made helpful suggestions. The book review editors also receive my thanks.
They are Susan Ainsworth (Organization Studies), Misra Amalendu (P olitics &
Policy ) , Naomi Caiden ( Public Administration Review ), Louise Comfort (J ournal
of Comparative Policy Analysis ), Robert Cox (G overnance ), Obadare Ebenezer
( Voluntas ) , Fran Graf ( Choice ), Ali Farazmand ( Public Organization Review ), Eugene
McGregor (J ournal of Policy Analysis and Management) , Donald Moynihan ( Public
Management ), Laura Reese (A merican Journal of Public Administration ).
I am thankful for back-cover endorsements of the first edition comments from
professors Theodore R. Marmor (Yale), Julian Wolpert (Princeton), Steven Kelman
(Harvard), and Clarence Stone (Maryland) on that first edition. This second edition
grows from the first, therefore, I add these additional acknowledgments particularly
as they relate to this edition. First, I thank Ms. Robyn Curtis of Palgrave Macmillan
for suggesting a second edition and for Kimberly Reeves help in making the editor’s
deadline.
Because of its added application specifically to developing countries and countries
under stress, I was able to use two of my previous publications thanks to Ms. Lee
Dion from Taylor and Frances for license 2706570922557, I nternational Journal
of Public Administration , Vol. 32, pp. 951–969, and 2705960964930 (new/cor-
rect) Politics & Policy , Vol. 37, No. 5, 2009 , pp. 1083–1091. The first of these two
builds on a manuscript on formalizing engagement prepared for and given by invi-
tation at the United Nation’s 7th Global Forum on Trust in Government and also
given at International Political Science Association (SOG) meetings, “Governance
Crisis in Comparative Perspective,” held at the Public Administration Department,