We propose an interdisciplinary theoretical framework that integrates insights from political science, public administration, organizational theory, economics, psychology, sociology, and cognitive science to better understand the role of emotions in governance in the digital age. We argue that citizens' sentiments and emotional responses are central to their relationships with government institutions and bureaucracies. Building on bounded rationality and technology acceptance models, we develop a conceptual model that captures the bi‐directional relationship between emotions and digital governance interactions. This gap is increasingly important as traditional human‐to‐human interactions are progressively replaced by citizen engagement with digital platforms, where emotional responses are directed toward technological systems rather than human officials. We therefore introduce a theory of emotional digital governance and propose a set of propositions that incorporate cultural values as key moderating factors. Finally, we outline the theoretical, methodological, empirical, and practical contributions of this framework for advancing research on digital governance and data‐driven public administration.

When governments adopt private‐sector techniques to reform public services, a tension arises between efforts to improve administrative efficiency and to secure democratic values. While scholars acknowledge this tradeoff, the specific institutional processes through which managers resolve these competing values in practice remain a puzzle. To bridge this gap, this study presents a longitudinal case study of Lean Government initiatives, based on 2.5 years of ethnographic fieldwork in an Ohio municipality. Using Constructive Grounded Theory, the analysis reveals that public managers are not passive executors of efficiency mandates; rather, they actively reconstruct public values through sophisticated social and institutional interactions. This research introduces a conceptual framework for the dynamic construction of good governance, demonstrating how value conflicts are mitigated via meso‐level institutional processes. By illustrating how good government and equity are operationalized in managerial decision‐making, the research findings offer a practical roadmap for maintaining democratic legitimacy amid administrative reform.

Performance budgeting has been widely advocated as a tool to strengthen fiscal accountability and improve public spending efficiency. However, its role in deterring corruption remains underexplored. This study examines the impact of performance budgeting reforms on corruption in Chinese local governments. Using a difference‐in‐differences approach with the staggered implementation of performance budgeting reforms across Chinese provinces, we find significant reductions in actual corruption cases and perceived corruption levels. These effects are particularly pronounced in provinces with early pilot experience and incorporated external oversight during the implementation of the reform. Mechanism analyses indicate that the performance budgeting reforms curb corruption by improving fiscal transparency, reducing financial irregularities, enhancing expenditure efficiency, and increasing public scrutiny of government activities. This study contributes to the literature by providing robust empirical evidence and advancing theoretical understanding of how well‐designed budgeting systems can promote fiscal accountability and ethical governance.

Term limits for elected officials are often advocated to enhance responsiveness to constituents. We argue however, that they can weaken executive power by reducing bureaucratic deference. Using an experimental survey of state bureaucrats across nine U.S. states, we investigate the impact of gubernatorial term limits on bureaucratic effort and prioritization of executive preferences. Our findings reveal that bureaucrats exert less effort and place lower importance on the preferences of term‐limited governors compared to those at the beginning of their term or running for re‐election. However, these effects are modest in size, suggesting that while gubernatorial term limits create space for bureaucrats to afford executives less deference, the degree to which they ultimately shirk is limited. Our findings highlight the unique ways in which term limits affect elected executives and that term limits affect not only how the officials subject to them represent the public, but also how others in government interact with them.

Existing research on public network effectiveness has largely overlooked the issue of performance stratification in hierarchical systems, failing to adequately answer the critical question, “effective for whom?” Focusing on China's business environment governance (BEG) networks (2016–2022), this study employs panel fuzzy‐set qualitative comparative analysis (Panel fsQCA) to identify which governance configurations—composed of formalized management strategies, network structure, and resource carrying capacity—differentially drive client‐level and network‐level effectiveness. The findings reveal a stark divergence between two logics: client‐level effectiveness is highly dependent on a supportive network structure (especially a large‐scale network), whereas network‐level effectiveness relies more on active management strategies and resource support (especially performance‐based incentives and resource carrying capacity). This disparity provides clear configurational evidence for the performance tensions inherent in hybrid governance systems and demonstrates that the effect of formalization is highly contingent on the effectiveness goal being pursued. We therefore emphasize that understanding network effectiveness requires a multi‐level, dynamic analytical framework. It also calls for vigilance against the risk of goal displacement, whereby networks satisfy their superiors while failing to serve their external clients.

While the digital transformation (DT) literature has acknowledged the relevance of collaboration, recent contributions have highlighted how governments are increasingly relying on centralization to address digitally induced change in the public sector and the adverse effects brought about by an overemphasis on collaboration. This research aims to contribute to the debate by answering the following research question: To what extent does public digital transformation rely on collaborative dynamics? To answer this question, we conduct an embedded qualitative case study based on a theoretical framework identified through the literature review on collaboration and DT in the Italian public DT strategy network. Our analysis reveals that collaboration can be particularly relevant in the context of a hybrid inter‐institutional governance model, enabling a balance between centralization and decentralization tensions within a shared performance framework. Moreover, it highlights significant implications for scholars and practitioners, identifying which factors foster network effectiveness and positive DT outcomes.

Governance of sustainable development increasingly relies on voluntary standards and commitments, the credibility and effectiveness of which hinge on accountability—ensuring actors align with shared goals and follow through on them. However, voluntary initiatives operate outside traditional control structures and blend elements of state, market, and community governance. This study examines how accountability is constructed and practiced through the lens of accountability logics. Using Finland's Commitment 2050 platform as a case, it analyzes how bureau–legal, economic–managerialist, and community logics shape the motivations, standards, processes, and consequences of account‐giving. The findings indicate that commitment‐based accountability emerges from the shifting and often uneven balance between these logics. While Commitment 2050 fosters multiple motivations and relations, accountability remains largely unrewarded and unsanctioned. This flexibility can broaden participation but weaken effectiveness and legitimacy. Future studies should examine how logic configurations evolve and how voluntary initiatives can achieve credible flexibility.

International environmental agreements are key instruments for addressing transboundary environmental problems, but treaty ratification remains uneven and clustered across countries despite the proliferation of multilateral treaties. While existing research has concentrated largely on domestic political‐economic determinants, less is known about the role of cross‐national interdependence and strategic interactions in the ratification of treaties. To address this gap, we present a comprehensive analytical framework drawing on policy diffusion theory to assess whether and through which channels environmental treaty ratification diffuses internationally. Using static and dynamic spatial econometric models on a global panel of 140 countries over the period 1990–2018, we specifically examine learning, competition, and emulation through theoretically grounded interaction matrices that reflect one‐to‐one relationships between countries and clearly identify trade competitors, cultural peers, and learning channels. The results prove that spatial dependence and significant spatial spillover effects exist across countries. Learning and competition are dominant mechanisms, while the magnitude of the peer‐based emulation effect is weaker but statistically significant. Dynamic specifications indicate strong temporal persistence in treaty ratification, reflecting policy path dependence. Prior actions of neighbors play a significant role in shaping current decisions; early adopters act as policy laboratories. The study advances diffusion research by moving beyond distance‐only proxies and explicitly modeling cross‐national interdependence through mechanism‐specific interaction matrices, offering a stronger empirical basis for assessing how cross‐national spillover shapes IEA ratification.

This paper invites the readers to rethink regulatory governance by examining how trust‐based and rule‐based governance interact. To do this, it uses analytical narratives of three fictional polities: “Trustland”, “Regland”, and “Concordia”. Each polity represents a stylized model of governance: Trustland is anchored in trust‐based governance, Regland in rule‐based governance, and Concordia evolves as an attempt for a synergy of both. The analysis reveals the deep logics, political tensions, and institutional trade‐offs involved in governing through trust and through rules. It traces how different conceptions and priorities around trust and rules compete in each of the three fictional countries. Trustland is not Utopia, Regland is not Dystopia, and Concordia may be better understood as a “Protopia” – a space of gradual, contested improvement. Four modes of governance compete in each polity to capture alternative configurations of institutional alignment, interaction, and conflicts. Rather than advocating a normative ideal, the paper positions each polity as a field of ongoing political struggle over legitimacy claims, institutional boundary‐drawing, and authority. These imaginative narratives offer a framework for rethinking how governance legitimacy is articulated, organized, and contested in contemporary regulatory systems. In so doing, it provides an innovative way of thinking and rethinking the academic field and practice of regulatory governance.

This study investigates whether the consolidation of corporate compliance in Brazil after Law No. 12.846/2013 resulted in substantial gains in effectiveness or reinforced predominantly symbolic compliance patterns. The research uses administrative data from the National Registry of Substantiated Complaints between 2009 and 2024 and applies a quasi‐experimental strategy composed of interrupted time series, logistic regression with clustered errors, and fixed‐effects models. The results show no structural break following the law and a statistically significant decrease in the probability of conflict resolution in the post‐law period (OR = 0.941; 95% CI: 0.909–0.974). Additional robustness analyses with a balanced recurrent‐firm panel point in the same direction, but the event‐study specification does not fully satisfy the parallel‐trends diagnostic (Wald p = 0.010). The findings therefore provide convergent evidence consistent with means‐ends decoupling in the post‐law regulatory environment, while suggesting caution in stronger causal interpretations. These findings contribute to debates on legal endogeneity, the audit society, and society‐level compliance washing, showing that the expansion of formal integrity apparatuses has not been matched by verifiable gains in corporate responsiveness.