- Hvilket forskningsprosjekt jobber du mest med n??
At the moment, I am still occupied with the ERC project " Unlimited Growth? A Comparative Analysis of Causes and Consequences of Policy Accumulation " (ACCUPOL) that I worked on during my post-doctoral years with a team at LMU Munich. But as the project ends, we are now about to set off for “new shores”.
The key findings from this project indicate that governments produce substantially more policies than they can effectively implement. This occurs for various reasons, but primarily because policymakers tend to prioritize the creation of public policies over the provision of administrative resources. While the production of policies signals responsiveness to citizens' demands, the provision of administrative resources is less visible (or “attractive”) and therefore often neglected.
However, we have not yet explored how to address this issue. Specifically, how can we stop the excessive growth of policies and make the administration more resilient in dealing with these challenges? This is the focus we aim to address in our new "Sustaining Public Administration in Modern Democracies" Horizon Europe Consortium, which we call the SuPA Consortium. Let’s hope we can live up to the acronym!
- Hva ?nsker du ? finne ut?
The SUPA project is divided into two parts. The first part examines how to sustain policy growth. In particular, we focus on two aspects.
The first aspect are so-called “one-in-one-out” schemes, where governments are required to abolish an existing policy or rule when establishing a new one. I think it is quite impressive that already 18 developed democracies, including e.g. Denmark, France, and Germany experiment or have experimented with these offsetting schemes. We aim to investigate the effectiveness of these schemes and analyze the political motivations behind them. We suspect that these schemes may be less about achieving sustainable policy growth and more about providing a rationale for abolishing policies that the government does not favor. The second aspect of the first part of the project examines rule cascades. We often observe that a relatively simple policy made at the EU or central level becomes increasingly complex as it is implemented at lower government levels. This happens because lower levels of government tend to “add” to the policies. We aim to explore ways in which central policymakers can write laws to avoid these cascading rule effects.
In the second part of the project, we focus on designing strategies to enhance the resilience of public administration against the challenges of excessive policy production. In theory, we can expect three patterns of how governments deal with ever-increasing implementation duties: they can centralize them within one or a few agencies, distribute them across multiple agencies, or outsource them to the private sector. Depending on which strategy a government chooses, we anticipate facing different challenges, such as coordination problems in the case of burden sharing or oversight issues when involving private actors.
- Hvorfor er dette viktig?
The trend of administrative overburdening (more policies than capacities to implement them) comes with severe consequences for both public employees and citizens. First, it places immediate strain on individuals working within the administration. They are often forced to work extra hours or reduce the level of service provided to citizens, both of which can negatively impact their motivation and, over time, their health.
Moreover, administrative overburdening poses significant challenges for citizens. When administrative systems are overwhelmed, service quality declines, leading to prolonged processing times for requests, permits, and various government services. This often results in widespread frustration and diminished public trust in governmental institutions. Our Consortium partner “The European Citizen Action Service” (ECAS), which provides legal support to over 20,000 EU citizens each year regarding their EU rights, has highlighted a recurrent issue: access to public administration. For the first time in 15 years, ECAS observed that administrations across Europe had reduced operating hours and faced exceedingly long waiting lists.
Additionally, overburdened administrations do not only reduce service levels; they also cut back on monitoring and enforcement activities. This diminished oversight can have extensive consequences, potentially resulting in compromised rule compliance, less effective policy implementation, and an overall erosion of institutional governance. This undermines public safety, health, and welfare. In a recent survey involving German environmental administrators specializing in air quality, water protection, and waste disposal, findings revealed that approximately 60 percent of inspectors could no longer adequately control and enforce rules as mandated by law.
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The Consortium includes a range of great scholars that are experts in their research areas. For instance, Brigitte Pircher from S?dert?rn University Stockholm has studied regulatory offsetting in the EU and now aims to apply her knowledge at the national level. Similarly, Xavier Fernández-i-Marín developed several analytical tools, including an R package for analyzing regulatory activities. He will collaborate with individuals who have stronger computational backgrounds to develop a tool that predicts rule growth patterns based on the initial formulation of a law. We aim to call this tool LegGPT, the Legislative Growth Predictor Tool. Again, a tool that I hope will be as “promising” as its name.
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I believe there are two primary aspects to consider. First, the fit with the project. Science is about excellence and bringing the people with the right skill sets on board. The second aspect is the overall group dynamic or fit. From my experience, meetings and decisions on concepts, scope of analysis, and division of labor can often become quite heated. Therefore, it's crucial that people share mutual respect and can connect with each other, perhaps even beyond work-related interactions. This fosters a more productive and positive working environment.
- Hvilke andre forskningsprosjekter er du involvert i?
I am also co-heading an ERC project called the “Systemic Effects of Crises on Policy-Making in Modern Democracies”. In essence, we are interested in the multitasking capability of the state. This involves exploring how decision-making processes must be designed so that governments can address new and upcoming issues, such as the climate crisis or COVID-19, without neglecting other issue areas.
Additionally, I am part of the Accelerating Climate Action and the State: Getting to Net Zero (ACCELZ)
project led by Elin Boasson here at the University of Oslo. This project examines how climate policy becomes “institutionalized” in the structure of the state and what the implications of this entrenchment are. Recently, for instance, we published a paper demonstrating that the creation of designated climate ministries has a clear effect on reducing CO2 emission reductions.
- Hva synes du er det mest interessante med ? v?re forsker?
I think it is the freedom that appeals to me the most. As long as you can convince others about the significance of a problem, you have the liberty to pursue it as you see fit. Additionally, it is a great privilege to be surrounded by clever and often young people, which creates an inspiring and dynamic working environment.
Hva er det vanligste sp?rsm?let du f?r om jobben n?r du er sammen med andre?
They often ask for my opinion about a specific political party or event, which is quite concrete stuff that I am not necessarily better equipped to explain than they are. To disappoint these expectations can be a bit frustrating at times. However, the question has changed somewhat since I started working on policy growth and administrative overburdening. People can easily relate to the experience of facing super complex rules or struggling with some aspects of administration, making the discussions more engaging and relevant.