Issue 2011 no4 contents:

The idea of performance assessment and pay-for-performance of civil servants originated over ten years ago, but experts still are searching for the proper implementation of this idea. This article analyses the results gained by some of the federal agencies that implemented the pay-for-performance system for civil servants in some regional offices. Their experience, described in this article, should be used to form a normative and methodological foundation to be further applied in other ministries and agencies.

The article makes an attempt to identify link between the models of public service and some effective methods of stimulating civil servants’ performance. Making use of the basic elements of the institutional theory helps draw a conclusion that development of the public civil service in accordance with the NPM models does not only take into account any positive externals for modeling informal relations, but ignores their historical, social and cultural role in the country. Key words: civil service, gifts exchange theory, institutional economy, stimulation of civil servants, models of bureaucracy.

The article tries to assess the role of health statistics of the people in the state-run Health Service in modern Russia. The article analyses the problems connected with collecting statistics and concludes that medical statistics does not reflect the real situation in the Health Service and the health state of the nation. Taking this into account, the author suggests considering statistics as a means in the struggle for the distribution of resources and as a form to prove that the decisions taken on resources distribution are correct.

The paper shows the necessity of a differentiated approach to the planning of the rural territories development. The article focuses on the criteria of grouping rural territories. The affinity to city (center) is a key criterion that determines rural social and economic development in many respects. The author offers his approach to the methods of differentiation of intra-regional rural periphery. The main feature of the approach is that all the cities of the regional system are used as centers of regional development.

The paper reviews the problem of Russian regions’ inequality and the current system of intergovernmental fiscal relations, which is used as the main smoothing mechanism of the regional disparities. To use only the minimum level of fiscal capacity as the main calculated indicator of the intergovernmental transfers is not effective, because the real differences between the regions should be considered by taking into account socioeconomic variables (income levels, standard of living). Moreover the problem of a large grant amount to the sub-national government must be solved not only at the federal level. The detection of the reasons revealed that an active regional policy is required. There are also suggestions and recommendations to the federal and regional authorities how to improve the system of intergovernmental fiscal relations in the Russian Federation in the article.

The article analyses the goals and problems of making revenues for the local budgets at the present stage of local public management development. The author shows some faults of the legislative base in forming revenues, no match of some laws passed for the real requirements of the self-government development and proposes that budget legislation should be amended.

The public sector in North America as well as in parts of Europe is increasingly adopting a performance management system that includes goal setting, coaching, and the evaluation of an employee on goal attainment. The purpose of this article is three-fold. First, the extant literature on goal setting for individual employees is summarized in terms of its applicability to the public sector. Second, the importance of a context to goal setting and performance management in the United States and Italy is discussed. Third, coaching techniques, based on theory and empirical evidence, for increasing the probability of goal attainment by public sector employees are examined.

The article is devoted to stimulating activity of human resources in the legal field. The author defines the nature of human behaviour and types of behavioral responses; shows the influence that law consciousness and legal norms make on the variety of social roles; substantiates the suggestions on using some behavioral patterns while legislating and executing the laws.

The article deals with the legislative possibilities of perfection of the existing forms of direct democracy and participation of the population in local government to increase their demands on the municipal practice and to create the most convenient mechanism for the municipal union, giving them rights to maintain transition on qualitatively another step to the organization of municipal management and the construction of a new administrative IT-culture at the municipal level.

Public health is mainly dependent on the lifestyle and habits adopted by the population. However, Russians traditionally don’t pay enough attention to the healthy lifestyle, as compared with other nations. Last two decades in Russia were marked by an increasing number of young smokers, alcohol abusers as well as the obese. This paper examines the youth’s attitudes towards smoking, alcohol abuse, nutrition and physical activity as the main elements of an individual lifestyle. We show how different factors impact young people’s choice of a lifestyle. The policy measures to stimulate a responsible behavior among young Russians are discussed.

The article covers the feedback role in monitoring state bodies’ websites; analyses the data collected during the annual monitoring of the websites of federal executive government bodies, regional executive government bodies and federal courts; cites the data reflecting degrees of activity and effectiveness of interaction between the state bodies and the experts who carried out the monitoring (non-profit partnership The Institute for Information Freedom Development, St.-Petersburg). The authors consider such indicators as the number of the comments left by state bodies during the interaction, the level of informational openness before and after the interaction, and offer some ways of increasing interaction intensity with state bodies.

This article is based on the study of strategic documents of small towns in the Far North of Russia. It carries out a basic and qualitative analysis of the strategies of three northern cities. It is concluded that the critical elements of effective development strategies of municipalities are activity of local authorities, relevance of resources and tasks, and the sequence of implementation of the strategic directions.

The article discusses the applicability of the cluster approach to the modeling of the municipal district level, isolated clusters and indicators of clusters of the municipality, as well as the main directions for analysis of the functioning of clusters.

The basis of the legal status and powers of the organization of a commercial infrastructure of the wholesale electricity market and power are determined in accordance with the Federal Law of 26.03.2003 № 35-FZ «On Electricity».

The key role in the functioning of the commercial infrastructure of the wholesale electricity market is assigned by the Law on Electricity to the Market Council.

The Market Council is a special kind of self-regulatory organization which has not only private but also public powers in the electricity sector. This is confirmed by the presence of public competence in the sphere of implementation of quasi licensing procedures and control powers, designed form of the agreement on accession of the wholesale market to the trading system, legal regulation and organization of pre-trial settlement of disputes and corporate approval.

Analysis of the federal target program "Dwelling" for 2002-2010 on the basis of the end results put in the program is carried out in the article. The factor of availability of habitation and the annual volume of input of new habitation has been given a special attention to. Calculations proving inefficiency of the program are made in the article. It offers an alternative approach to the solution of the housing problem, the main idea of which is shaping a new Russia through the scale development of low housing construction lines.

The article looks upon the carrier consulting as an urgent resource to form competence and improve professional skills of workers in the field of public and municipal management. It shows that this kind of consultations is one of a very effective means to improve performance of the whole organization. The results of the analysis of carrier orientation and the kinds of carrier the office workers have, can well be used for consulting and as contents for effective training and developing specialists in public and municipal administration.