“行为人”视角下的避责逻辑与协同治理--一项情景实验

Blame Avoidance Motivation and Collaborative Governance from the Perspective of Behavioral Public Administration:A Vignette Experiment based on Hazardous Chemicals Management

在“理性人”视角下,协同治理是基层政府实现有效治理并降低问责风险的重要手段。然而,实践中有着较强避责逻辑的基层官员却并非总会选择协同治理以规避问责。对这一与理论相悖现象的解释有助于理解基层政府开展协同治理的决策过程。本研究从“行为人”视角构建分析框架,根据M湾区危化品监管实践设计情景实验以搜集决策过程数据。通过对589名口岸监管部门基层官员的实验数据进行分析发现:基层官员的避责逻辑与其协同治理行为负相关,并且心理压力在其中起到负向中介作用;问责风险与协同治理行为呈现倒U形关系。研究结论可以为完善行政问责制度、提升基层官员的协同治理行为提供政策启示。

Blame avoidance motivation describes a situation whereby government officials treat blame avoidance as a priority,rendering it the main motivation behind their behavior.Collaborative governance is an important approach for local government officials to promote governance performance and to reduce blame risks.From the perspective of a rational person,people with a high level of blame avoidance motivation should prefer to engage in collaborative behavior to reduce blame risk.However,in practice,grass-roots government officials in hazardous chemicals management departments with a high level of blame avoidance motivation prefer not to engage in collaborative behavior.An exploration into why such a phenomenon,which is contradictory to theory,exists will thus be helpful to understand the decision-making processes in collaborative governance by grass-roots government officials.Prior research offers a new perspective to understand this puzzle.With the development of cognitive science,researchers gradually realized that human cognition is biased,and individual decision-making is affected by irrational factors.This study constructs an analytical framework from the perspective of behavioral public management,in which both rational and irrational factors might impact the decision-making of government officials in collaborative governance.This framework emphasizes the importance of real blame risks,the officialsblame avoidance motivations,and the individualscognitive biases to determine the decision-making processes behind the collaborative governance behavior of local government officials.We designed a vignette experiment to collect data on the decision-making processes of local government officials according to regulatory practices in hazardous chemicals management.Through an analysis of experimental data from 589 local government officials in hazardous chemicals management departments in M Bay,the results reveal that blame avoidance motivation has a significant negative effect on their collaborative governance behavior,with psychological stress playing a negative mediating role.In addition,the results also indicate that blame risk and collaborative governance behavior have an inverted U-shaped relationship,implying that appropriate blame will encourage collaborative governance behavior among grass-roots officials.Introducing a theoretical lens to look at behavioral public administration,this study considers local government officials as both rational persons and behavioral persons to understand their collaborative governance behavior.In further research,the study reveals the influence of psychological stress,drawing attention to the irrational cognitive factors.According to the findings,this study suggests that government leaders should take proactive actions to reduce the psychological stress and the blame avoidance motivation of local government officials.Additionally,to prevent local government officials from undermining the public interest,government leaders should properly train local government officials with respect to crisis decision-making.