Meeyoung Lamothe

• University of Oklahoma

What is the nonprofit sector and why does it exist? Collecting the writing of some of the most creative minds in the field of nonprofit studies, this book challenges our traditional understanding of the role and purpose of the nonprofit sector. It reflects on the ways in which new cultural and economic shifts bring existing assumptions into questio...

We utilize the two latest ICMA Profile of Local Government Service Delivery Choices surveys to investigate first, whether the service provision and delivery arrangement information reported in the surveys accurately represents reality and second, if not, what potential factors contribute to generating incorrect or unreliable survey responses. We ut...

Researchers studying local governance, especially alternative service delivery arrangements, have long relied on the ICMA ASD survey to examine the scope and nature of service provision and production at the local level. Building upon Lamothe, Lamothe, and Bell's (2018) findings that raise questions concerning the accuracy of the ASD survey and res...

Researchers studying local governance, especially alternative service delivery arrangements, have long relied on the ICMA ASD survey to examine the scope and nature of service provision and production at the local level. Building upon Lamothe, Lamothe, and Bell's (2018) findings that raise questions concerning the accuracy of the ASD survey and res...

As the charitable sector continues to grow, so do concerns over its accountability. Calls for greater accountability for nonprofits have led to not only an increase in government oversight activities, but also the proliferation of accountability standards within nonprofit communities as the sector has been determined to address the issue through se...

The purpose of our study is to broaden the investigation of nonprofit misconduct beyond financial fraud perpetrated by individual actors and to identify structural features that are more or less likely to be associated with actual misconduct. We utilize the Charity Navigator Advisory System and related press releases to identify 215 nonprofit organ...

The election of Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential race was said to result in an unprecedented surge in public support for nonprofit advocacy organizations. Given the cyclical nature of public attention to hard-to-solve social problems and the challenges associated with free-riding in collective action, a question arises as to the extent to whic...

The authors utilize the two latest ICMA Profile of Local Government Service Delivery Choices surveys to investigate whether the service provision and delivery arrangement information reported in the surveys accurately represents reality and, if not, what factors contribute to generating incorrect or unreliable survey responses. Interviews with prac...

Objectives In the past, research focusing on local service decisions was dominated by the exploration of make‐or‐buy choices (i.e., how to produce services). In this article, we extend this venue of research to explore service termination (i.e., whether to provide). In doing so, we adopt four theoretical strands developed in the fields of public po...

Using four consecutive International City/County Management Association alternative service delivery arrangement surveys, this study explores the determinants of service shedding by local government in the United States. Our findings indicate that service shedding is fairly common, with almost 70% of jurisdictions experiencing at least one terminat...

It is commonly posited that for-profit, nonprofit, and other government vendors have fundamental differences, which make one or the other the superior choice depending on the circumstances of service delivery. Past research, focusing on service and market characteristics, finds support for this proposition. In this article, we investigate not only...

Relational contracting or collaborative governance has come to the forefront of scholarly studies of government privatization efforts. The concept of trust (between contracting governments and their vendors) is rising in importance as one of the central tenets of this type of governance. What is largely understudied in the midst of this increasing...

In this article, we examine the governance structures used to manage local service delivery contracts with an eye toward two specific concerns. First, we contend that public managers likely use dual regimes in which contract writing is more formal in nature than is the management style adopted during contract implementation. We also explore the det...

While principal-agency theory has greatly facilitated our understanding of governance and management in the hollow state, close examinations of how system designs affect agency problems has been rare. The purpose of this study is to explicitly investigate the effects of different contract configurations on agent shirking, which is a common problem...

This article explores the links between competition and contractor performance often assumed by market theory. Using data from Florida social service contracting, the authors test to see if competitively procured vendors outperform their noncompetitive peers regarding adherence to contract terms. It is found that, contrary to market theory, this is...

In this paper, we examine if local public managers adhere to the precepts of economic and contracting theory regarding how they perceive the nature of services (hard versus soft), the types of contracts they write (formal versus relational), and the contract management styles they adopt. We find support for theoretical expectations concerning the p...

While scholars of local service delivery arrangements are fully aware the process is dynamic, research has tended to take the form of cross-sectional studies that are inherently static in nature. In this article, the authors model the determinants of production mode accounting for past delivery decisions. They find, not surprisingly, that there are...

The authors argue it is time to move beyond thinking of competition in social service contracting simply in terms of whether competitive tendering procedures are used. Although the procurement process is important, other factors should be examined as well. In particular, they look at how market consolidation and accountability are related to compet...

This article examines the relationship between “contract failure” (the bringing “in-house” of previously contracted services) and service characteristics. The connection between contract failure and nonprofit and for-profit status is also explored. The analyses are performed using International City/County Management Association data and three serv...

As more governments adopt performance measurement and opt to deliver their services through the private sector, performance contracting has emerged as a popular form of privatization. This paper examines various issues public managers confront in their efforts to manage and monitor performance contracts. To do so, this paper studies the case of Flo...

In this paper, we examine the governance structures employed to manage local service delivery contracts with an eye towards two specific concerns. First, we contend that public managers likely employ dual regimes in which contract writing is more formal in nature than is the management style adopted during contract implementation. We also explore t...

In this paper, I examine the level of competition in social service contracting using data from Florida’s largest social service agency. I account not only for the number of bids received for competitive tendering efforts, but also the quality of the bids as defined by administrative indicators and formal bid scores. I then attempt to link these me...

Abstract will be provided by author.

Abstract will be provided by author.

In this paper, we use International City/County Managers Association data to identify instances in which local jurisdictions terminate provision of given services. We then model the determinants of these decisions. The findings indicate that, contrary to expectations, challenging financial times and ideology are not meaningfully related to service...