This book is based on a unique data set and assesses in comparative terms the public management reforms in the five Nordic countries: Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. Based on the assessments of administrative executives, the book compares the Nordic countries with the Anglo-Saxon, the Germanic, the Napoleonic and the East European group of countries. The book addresses the following questions: What reform trends are relevant in the public administrations of the Nordic countries? What institutional features characterize the state authorities in these countries? What characterizes the role identity, self-understanding, dominant values, and motivation of administrative executive in the Nordic countries? What characterizes reform processes, trends and content, what is the relevance of different types of management instruments, and what are their perceived effects and the perceived performance of the public administration? The book also examines how the different Nordic countries dealt with the financial crisis of 2008, and how the differences and similarities in their approaches can be explained.

The result of an international comparative research project on informatization in European public administration, this work addresses information policies, large scale information systems, informational infrastructure and water policy, and informatization and administrative modernization.

This volume contains the edited proceedings of the Working Conference on the Transfer and Diffusion of IT for Organizational Resilience, sponsored by the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP) Working Group 8.6 (Transfer and Diffusion of Information Technology), and held in Galway, Ireland in June of 2006. The material contained in this book represents current thinking on the topic of resilience by academics and leading practitioners.

E-government and Public Sector Process Rebuilding: Dilettantes, Wheelbarrows, and Diamonds provides an input to rebuild and improve the processes in which the public sector perform activities and interact with the citizens, companies, and the formal elected decision-makers. Through eleven chapters, the book emphasizes information systems (IS) as the vehicle for redirecting the public sector towards its key customers. The book stresses serious capability challenges inhibiting the digital transformation using activity and customer centric applications. The dilettantes in the public sector are in need of upgrading, rethinking, and refocusing their use of IS. There is a need to revisit the extensive use of digital wheelbarrows to transmit data, and complement the transactional focus with IT-enabled analysis of the activities. There is also a need to recognize that IS are not just flashy and shining diamonds to be shown off on special occasions. IS are, as most diamonds, manufactured products, part of the activities and intended for replacement whenever the diamonds are no longer suitable for serving their purpose - diamonds do not last forever.

This OECD Review of Regulatory Reform of Norway presents an overall picture, set within a macro-economic context, of regulatory achievements and challenges including regulatory quality, competition policy, and market openness.