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QUANGO REFORMS AND CHALLENGES IN SOUTH KOREA:
SOCIAL RELATIONS, INFORMAL NETWORKS, AND HIDDEN ACTIONS
by
Hyang Won Kwon
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(POLICY, PLANNING, AND DEVELOPMENT)
December 2012
Copyright 2012 Hyang Won Kwon
Object Description
| Title | Quango reforms and challenges in South Korea: social relations, informal networks, and hidden actions |
| Author | Kwon, Hyang Won |
| Author email | hyangwon.kwon@usc.edu;99blackmonday@hanmail.net |
| Degree | Doctor of Philosophy |
| Document type | Dissertation |
| Degree program | Policy, Planning and Development |
| School | School of Policy, Planning and Development |
| Date defended/completed | 2012-10-09 |
| Date submitted | 2012-11-27 |
| Date approved | 2012-11-28 |
| Restricted until | 2012-11-28 |
| Date published | 2012-11-28 |
| Advisor (committee chair) | Robertson, Peter J. |
| Advisor (committee member) |
Suarez, David Fiss, Peer C. |
| Abstract | ABSTRACTS OF CHAPTERS: Chapter 1: Setting the (1) Scenes, (2) Problems, and (3) Directions -- (1) Administrative reforms, since the 80s, toward the infusion of business logics and practices into public sector entail two elements: Quangocratization and Boardization. Quangocratization means a trend of transferring of certain governmental functions and authority into arm’s length semi-autonomous non-governmental organizations or quangos, while boardization prompts adopting corporate-style governing boards in those organizations. (2) Despite the popularity, the business-inspired reforms are subject to informal influences or ‘hidden actions’ from party politics, which will likely gravitate the management toward merely ‘defensive strategies’ to hedge political bias and concomitant costs from public eyes. (3) Drawing on network perspectives, this study views elite networks and inner politics as substantial source of political influences over quango management with particular regard to staffing and financing. South Korean case was considered as viable research subject in that its administrative culture and ethos are largely collectivist and relational, and also that its quango reforms have been thought to having incompatibility issue in terms of politicization. ❧ Chapter 2: (1) Concept of Quango and (2) Case Selection -- (1) Quango is a denominator term to tag a cluster of hybrid non-state or semi-state entities that fulfill a public function as policy instruments with a degree of independence and autonomy from governments by sitting at arm’s length distance. The central rationale of creating quangos involves the separation of administration from politics, and the implementation of business-style practices for the sake of continuity, specialty, and responsiveness. Nevertheless, a ‘rhetoric-reality gap’ commonly exists in relation to ‘the depoliticization design’ and needs to be appreciated critically because the theory of depoliticization and managerialism are often questionable. Arguably, quangos may not completely be immune from political influences. (2) This issue was dealt critically in the case of South Korean quangos. Two characteristics are salient. First, the reforms were externally forced, and second, they were government-centric and top-down. Given its administrative culture is relational and collectivist, incompatibility problems between implanted treatment and cultural contexts are anticipated, which makes the case interesting and worth looking into. ❧ Chapter 3: Theory - Informal Networks and Hidden Politics in Quangos -- Quango rationality states that the domain should be insulated from special interest of a partisan because party politics is oriented toward a motivation of vote maximization rather than of public welfare at large. In reality, the management is nevertheless intertwined with politics as bureaucratic decisions with regard to resource allocations of governmental grants and personnel appointments of senior executives are largely political. It makes ex ante design of quangos to be operationally closed mythical. Quango rationality may be impaired when the management is exploited to the interest of a limited segment of dominant and consolidated social members. When this happens, quango rationality will be translated into a disguised class-wide rationality. At negative tone, a verdict was typically made on informal networks and inner group politics which may lead to hidden action problems such as collusion. Three families of theoretical mechanisms are thought, in this study, to best explain the phenomenon, including homophily, proximity, and social support. Together with social network analysis techniques, the theories account for in-group bias of social influence effects. ❧ Chapter 4: Design and Method -- The overall research design takes a form of the sequential mixed methods design that consists of two sequential phases: (a) preceding qualitative inquiry, and (b) following quantitative inference. The first phase aims to explore less known issues of quango management with regard to (a) the causes and consequences of hidden action problems, and (b) the elements constituting informal networks, including key players and contents of ties. The results of interviews were thematically analyzed to develop a theoretical model as to the link between informal ties and outcomes. The initial findings suggested two primary outcomes, such as (a) impaired independence of boards, and (b) loose implementation of expenditure, as a function of inner group politics by (a) politicized CEOs, and (b) collusive boards in quangos. Based on the two outcomes, two subset models were established and then tested against a larger sample for generality and relevance. ❧ Chapter 5: Sub-model 1 – Board Structural Independence -- The installment and implementation of corporate-style boards in quangos are not necessarily linked to rigid board controls unless boards are materially independent from both external political influences and internal management. Given that quango CEOs are commonly appointed politically, the boards are a significant locus to maintain quango rationality. The archetype of board independence points to the role of non-executive outside directors who are more socially distanced from senior executives. As it has often been challenged by an iron triangle of president, minister, and quango CEOs, it was tested if social cohesion amid the agents leads to a more aspiration for inner group politics and therefore to reduce board structural independence of outsiders to neutralize internal pressure for controls. Defining board structural independence as an overall functional proximity between CEOs and outside directors, social proximity between the actors was regressed against the defendant variable. Overall, the results showed the hypothesized relations among the variables. ❧ Chapter 6: Sub-model 2 – Firm-level Expenditure -- Being a steward of public money, quangos have a degree of autonomy and independence in making fiscal decisions. When the decisions are not well linked to public interest at large, but to opportunism and agency costs, the rationale for the autonomy and independence will be compromised. Since quangos as arm’s length apparatus of governments are less visible or noticed from public eyes, it was reasoned that the propensity of being hidden costs or shadow domains to conceal costs of the governments from public scrutiny will likely be large. Albeit there are structural designs to thwart the propensity such as (a) regulatory review by parental ministries or cabinets, and (b) oversights by internal governing boards, inner group politics may bias the fiscal decisions toward self-serving purposes. Popular press has pointed out that the oligarchic triangle resulted in excessively benevolent monetary benefits, other than compensation, to quangos in a form of non-fixed discretionary expenditure. The expenditure was regressed against cohesiveness of the triangle and network centrality of CEOs to see if social cohesion and network-conferred power actually led to empathetic monitoring and increased agency costs. Overall, the results confirmed the hypothesized links between the variables. ❧ Chapter 7: Discussion and Conclusion -- Overall, the findings suggested that there is the rhetoric-reality gap in the apolitical mode of quangos in South Korea. This would make the reforms a part of defensive practice for the party governments either to hedge their costs or to expand political influence through staffing. It implies that the theory of public administration needs to extend toward the aspect of interpersonal informality and social relations as it tended to focus exclusively on macro level analysis of structural treatments or inter-organizational networks. Social aspects and their outcomes have been largely neglected. Some originalities and values are found. First, as a sort of crossover research, this dissertation brings in conventional subject (‘corporate governance’) of business research into public administration research. Second, it broadens network research in public administration into networks among the top to explain organizational outcomes. Third, the classic debate as to the dichotomy of administration-politics is touched on by raising a critical point that the orientation is guiding in macro-design (‘ex ante’) while it needs constant appreciation in operation (‘ex post’). Some limitations and future research agenda were offered. |
| Keyword | QUANGO; South Korea; social relations; informal networks; hidden actions |
| Language | English |
| Part of collection | University of Southern California dissertations and theses |
| Publisher (of the original version) | University of Southern California |
| Place of publication (of the original version) | Los Angeles, California |
| Publisher (of the digital version) | University of Southern California. Libraries |
| Provenance | Electronically uploaded by the author |
| Type | texts |
| Legacy record ID | usctheses-m |
| Rights | Kwon, Hyang Won |
| Access conditions | The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the author, as the original true and official version of the work, but does not grant the reader permission to use the work if the desired use is covered by copyright. It is the author, as rights holder, who must provide use permission if such use is covered by copyright. The original signature page accompanying the original submission of the work to the USC Libraries is retained by the USC Libraries and a copy of it may be obtained by authorized requesters contacting the repository e-mail address given. |
| Repository name | University of Southern California Digital Library |
| Repository address | USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 7002, 106 University Village, Los Angeles, California 90089-7002, USA |
| Repository email | cisadmin@usc.edu |
| Archival file | uscthesesreloadpub_Volume6/etd-KwonHyangW-1360.pdf |
Description
| Title | Page 1 |
| Full text | QUANGO REFORMS AND CHALLENGES IN SOUTH KOREA: SOCIAL RELATIONS, INFORMAL NETWORKS, AND HIDDEN ACTIONS by Hyang Won Kwon A Dissertation Presented to the FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (POLICY, PLANNING, AND DEVELOPMENT) December 2012 Copyright 2012 Hyang Won Kwon |
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