Blockchain Papers

Adriana Ioana Filip, Mihaela Gabriela Todrican Rosca, Romeo Aurelian Clinciu

This article aims at depicting practical hypotheses of the concept of decentralization in the Romanian pre-university education system, from both financial and administrative perspectives.It shall comprise aspects related to territorial decentralization and decentralization of services.It uses both quantitative and qualitative research methods and underlines the complex advantages which multi-level-governance -related principles can bring to the Romanian education and, within a wider framework, to the overall administration.Definitions and approaches to the decentralization process clearly show an evolution in both the concerns of practitioners and specialists.This evolution must be understood in the context in which even the process of decentralization is not a static reality, suffering transformations depending on the geographic, historical, socio-economic context etc.When talking about decentralization, we must consider both the basic and intermediate level of the local public administration.Therefore, an evolutionary presentation of decentralization also logically includes regional decentralization or regionalization.

Emilian Miricescu, Lucian Ţâţu

The paper focuses on Romanian experiences regarding the financial strategies used by managers from pre-university education. In Romania, local public authorities provide funds to pre-university institutions. Given the sharp economic recession and the austerity measures imposed by Romanian government, the public executives had to find solutions in collecting additional funds and in spending wisely the existing financial resources. Therefore, our paper aims at examining several practices regarding: (i) employees' wages, (ii) EU funds implementing, (iii) self-financing activities, (iv) public procurement and (v) balancing strategies for the budgets, which could improve the financial management of public institutions. This also can contribute to the increase in the efficiency of spending at micro-level within public administration.

Cristian Dogar, Codruța Mare

European Social Fund has to be accurately implemented by Members’ States authorities through projects developed by public and private national entities, according also to the principle of “sound financial management”, described as the expression of the appropriate mix of economy of assigned resources, efficient allocation of resources toward indicators and effectiveness of financed operations. As long as ESF funding is trusted for implementation through a decentralized management mechanism to the Members’ State Authorities, those have to comply with reporting objectives to the EC, as set into the European Regulations, including compliance to the “sound financial management” principle whose three components are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timely (SMART). Identifying the most appropriate quantitative methods that could be applied to the measurable elements may be seen as a first step in assisting both: management's decision towards implementation and reporting over the EC objectives. Our study tends to appropriate some quantitative models to the ESF implementation mechanisms, enhancing connections among ESF specific variables: project's budgets and number of individuals receiving labor market related services (also called project's indicators). Conclusions lead us to a series of quantitative models that may be practically used for assisting management's decision and reporting towards a sound ESF implementation in Romania.

Cătană Emilia Lucia, Cătană Marius Cristian

Improving quality and efficiency in providing public services by accelerating the decentralization process represents one of the fundamental premises of a democratic, rule of law state that is oriented towards achieving performance in public services for its citizens. Bringing public decision-making closer to the citizen, improving quality in providing public services to citizens, as well as reducing their costs, are but a small part of the advantages brought about by public services decentralization, with the major role in decentralization being played by both education institutions, and local public authorities. In this context, the study focuses firstly on approaching empirically and epistemologically the decentralization of Romanian public education system, which presupposes transfer of authority, responsibility and resources concerning decision-making, and of general and financial management towards education institutions and local community. What is also revealed in this study is the premises and stages of Romanian public education decentralization, the advantages but also disadvantages and limitations of decentralization, as well as the education public service prospects from the perspective of decentralization. Last, but not least the study approaches the subject from the viewpoint of related public policies and legislation; the research puts emphasis on the fact that in accordance with the present Romanian legislative framework, the entire patrimony of public schools- land and premises- is public property and belongs to communes, cities and municipalities, and it is managed by the respective local public authorities. Furthermore, it is local budges that finance schools, and school patrimony and funds are currently being handled by local councils. Insufficiency of financial resources on the part of local communities may represent a serious drawback in the way of achieving efficient and effective decentralization in Romania, thus indicating a need to identify feasible solutions for finding the resources necessary for the conclusion of this process.

Felicia Cornelia Macarie

The internal public audit procedures have been applied since recent time in our country and this strongly influences the managers’ and employees’ perception of the internal audit relevance. The internal audit is perceived as “another form or a new form of control” due to the fact that the audit departments were organized, especially in the local public administration and in the decentralized public institutions, with the support of the internal control structure and with the participation of the personnel who was in the past responsible for control activities. This error of perception impairs the internal auditors’ work and the organization management. The sources of the research are the annual reports of UCAAPI regarding the internal public audit activity between 2004-2007, available on the site of the Ministry of Economy and Finance. The obtained results partly confirm the hypotheses of the research.