The Politics of Public Budgeting: Getting and Spending, Borrowing and Balancing

Book info: The Politics of Public Budgeting: Getting and Spending, Borrowing and Balancing (Paperback, 408 pages) – CQ Press, 2019. Language: English.

Using a "power struggles" theme to examine the dynamics of budgeting, The Politics of Public Budgeting shines a bright light on the political jockeying between interest groups, parties, officials, policymakers, and the public. Bestselling author Irene S. Rubin explains budgeting changes over time by setting issues like the federal deficit and health care expenditures in political and comparative context. The Ninth Edition offers students recent examples of public budgeting from all levels of government, emphasizing the relationship among them. Analyzing each strand of the decision-making process, Rubin shows the extraordinary coordination involved in passing a budget and achieving accountability. Editorial Reviews Review "The greatest strength [in the text] is the inclusion of politics in the budgeting process, which is a key element that is often overlooked or understated in other budgeting books." -- Joseph Martin, JD, MPA

"[The Politics of Public Budgeting] discusses the impact of separation of payer and deicer, multiple actors, and openness to the environment." -- Sharon K. Vaughn About the Author

Irene S. Rubin is Professor Emeritus of Public Administration at Northern Illinois University.  She is the author of Running in the Red: The Political Dynamics of Urban Fiscal Stress, Shrinking the Federal Government, Class Tax and Power: Municipal Budgeting in the United States, and Balancing the Federal Budget: Eating the Seed Corn or Trimming the Herds, all four of which rely extensively on qualitative interviews.  She has written journal articles about citizen participation in local level government in Thailand, how universities adapt when their budgets are cut, and fights between legislative staffers and elected and appointed officials about unworkable policy proposals, all based on qualitative interviews.  She is in the middle of an interviewing project about how local officials view and use contracts with the private sector and with other governmental units to provide public services.