Abstract
In this chapter, the authors investigate the extent to which social capital and the structure and culture of public administration correlate with perceptions of the effectiveness of civil protection at both national and EU levels. They address this issue with the aid of survey data to shed light on how practitioners and officials working with civil protection think about the performance and effectiveness of agencies in this area. The main finding is that both trust-related and organizational factors matter for perceived effectiveness. The results show that, if civil protection is to work well and to be perceived as effective by those working in the area, then social capital in the form of trust is vital: trust levels must be high, loyalty prized, and professionalism valued. Organizational factors are clearly crucial too: in particular, the importance of hierarchy and rule-governance stands out.
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Notes
- 1.
See the online appendix http://persona.statsvet.uu.se/sv-se/Appendices, Tables A4.1 and A4.2.
- 2.
The Indices on Effectiveness in Crisis Management—National (EFFNA) and EU-level (EFFEU)—are the main dependent variables. The indices are additive, where each performative dimension has equal weight and is measured on a scale from 0 (low) to 6 (high). The reliability coefficient (Cronbach’s alpha) is 0.810 (EFFNA) and 0.850 (EFFEU), showing that the aggregation is appropriate.
- 3.
The correlation coefficient (Pearson’s r) between our compiled effectiveness index for the national level and the equivalent simple measure of national goal attainment is r = 0.58. The corresponding figure for the EU-level effectiveness index and the simple measure of EU-level goal attainment is r = 0.68.
- 4.
See the online appendix http://persona.statsvet.uu.se/sv-se/Appendices, Table A4.3.
- 5.
See the online appendix http://persona.statsvet.uu.se/sv-se/Appendices, Table A4.4.
- 6.
Index on Public Administration Structure (PAS): Our first independent variable is based on an index created from two questions in the survey regarding organizational structure. The PAS index is additive, where each component has equal weight and is measured on a scale from 0 (disagree strongly) to 6 (agree strongly). The reliability coefficient (Cronbach’s alpha) is 0.657. Index on Public Administration Culture (PAC): Our second independent variable is based on an index created from six questions in the survey regarding organizational culture. The PAC index is additive, where each component has equal weight and is measured on a scale from 0 (disagree strongly) to 6 (agree strongly). The reliability coefficient (Cronbach’s alpha) is 0.825.
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Widmalm, S., Parker, C.F., Persson, T. (2019). Assessing the Effectiveness of Civil Protection at National and EU Levels. In: Civil Protection Cooperation in the European Union. European Administrative Governance. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02858-9_4
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