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| Coproduction and Perceived Public Service Performance: A Multi-level Analysis on Chinese Environmental Governance |
| Wu Jiebing1, Qian Qianyanhui1,2, Cheng Yuan3 |
1.School of Public Affair, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
2.School of Humanities and Management, Yunnan University of Chinese Medicine, Kunming 650500, China
3.Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455, U.S.A. |
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Abstract Coproduction is considered to be a critical solution to the current challenges facing the public sector. However, as to the correlation between coproduction and public service, there are mixed findings in empirical research about the relationship between coproduction and perceived public service performance. Some studies emphasize that coproduction can not only reduce administrative costs but also improve service quality, and active coproducers are more likely to be satisfied with the performance of public agencies. Some scholars point out the potential costs and negative effects of coproduction, such as the conflict between public governance principles and efficiency, and the possible tension between coproduction mechanisms and public management values, making coproduction run the risks of public discontent. Other studies show no significant correlation between coproduction and public service satisfaction. Hence, further empirical research is needed to reconcile existing theoretical differences with new data and a more dynamic and holistic analytical framework.It should be noted that coproduction emphasizes the joint participation of state actors and lay actors in the delivery of public services. It implies the fact that outcomes and processes in coproduction may be the result of individual, organizational, and contextual characteristics operating at different levels. Surprisingly, little research takes these multilevel factors into consideration when assessing the impact of coproduction, mostly treating coproduction as an individual level phenomenon. To fill in this gap, we construct a multilevel analytical framework to take account of both individual-level and local government-level factors in assessing the relationship between coproduction and perceived public service performance in the environmental governance in China.Based on the CGSS 2010 data, we apply the hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) to examine the relationship between government input and citizen coproductive behaviors on the perceived performance of the environmental governance in China. The results show that individual coproductive behaviors have no significant influence on the perceived performance of public services, and local government input significantly moderates the relationship between individual coproductive behaviors and the perceived performance of public services. That is, in the case of high/low local government input, individual coproductive behaviors are positively/negatively related to the perceived performance of the central government environmental protection.These findings therefore represent potential contributions as follows: (1) This research corroborates the uncertain correlation between coproduction and public service performance evaluation, but it can be identified as a definitive effect by introducing local government inputs as an organizational-level factor, which contributes to bridging the coproduction theory debate about efficacy. (2) Positive interaction between government inputs and individual coproductive behaviors implies that government input is a necessary condition for enhancing the perceived performance of environmental governance, meanwhile revealing the reciprocal relationship between government and citizens. (3) Public evaluation of government environmental governance is mainly focused on the central government level. It echoes past researches on trust at different levels of the government and reflects the specificity of the central-territorial relationship of environmental governance in China. This finding also provides theoretical support for the central government to strengthen its supervision and control of environmental governance.
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Received: 19 June 2021
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2022, Vol. 52 
