000 02280nam a22001577a 4500
999 _c519428
_d519428
008 220315b ||||| |||| 00| 0 eng d
100 _aSchoute, M., Graus, R. and Budding, T.
_932476
245 _aDrivers of service delivery modes in Dutch local government: An analysis over time and across domains
260 _aInternational Review of Administrative Sciences
300 _a87(3), Sep, 2021: p.425-439
520 _aThis study investigates the influence of service, financial and political characteristics on municipalities’ choices of four service delivery modes in the Dutch local government setting, thereby making a distinction between services in the physical and in the operational domain. It shows that, overall, use of inter-municipal cooperation and, to a lesser extent, municipality-owned firms increased substantially from 2010 to 2018. For use of private firms, we find remarkable differences. Whereas this use increased for the physical domain, it decreased for the operational domain. For both domains, we find that in-house production decreased substantially. We also find that the influence of especially transaction cost characteristics on the likelihood that municipalities choose a certain institutional form differs between 2010 and 2018, as well as between the physical and the operational domain. Points for practitioners Our finding that the use of in-house production decreased substantially from 2010 to 2018 suggests that municipalities are looking for mixed institutional forms, such as inter-municipal cooperation, to realize economies of scale. We observe that service delivery modes are especially driven by service characteristics, thereby stressing the importance of transaction cost motives in decisions about service delivery modes. However, our study also shows that financial and political characteristics have some influence. As the effects of the latter are not stable, we show that the way to implement reforms may vary over time and across domains. – Reproduced
650 _aInter-municipal cooperation, Local government, Municipality-owned firms, Re-municipalization, Service delivery modes JEL codes
_930445
773 _aInternational Review of Administrative Sciences
906 _aLOCAL GOVERNMENT
942 _cAR