Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory Advance Access published online on December 17, 2007
Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, doi:10.1093/jopart/mum037
Institutional Determinants of Collaboration: An Empirical Study of County Open-Space Protection
University of Arizona
Address correspondence to the author at crsmith{at}email.arizona.edu
Collaboration is an increasingly important topic in the public administration and management literatures. A preponderance of studies focuses on how managers can build trust between the government and collaborative partners by means of behavioral attributes and managerial skill. In this article, the author suggests that stable institutions and local government structure facilitate collaboration by allowing public managers to more credibly commit in a policy arena. Using county data on open-space policy, the author finds empirical support for the proposition that county form of government, along with rules governing debt accumulation and administrative commitment, increases the breadth of county collaboration in open-space protection.
I would like to thank Deanna Malatesta and the anonymous Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions. I would also like to thank the leadership at the Carl Vinson Institute of Government for granting me access to the data used for this research.