Polihot

JOP — 2026-09-14 Original Anti-Environmental Signals and Deforestation: Evidence from Brazil Gustavo Magalhães de Oliveira, Elías Cisneros, Jorge Sellare, Jan Börner

PAR — 2026-09-11 Original The “Professional Mortality” Problem in Early City Management: A Study of Organized Denial

PA — 2026-09-11 Original Responsible Algorithmization in the Public Sector: A “Natural Perspective” Based on Ethnographic Research in Regulation, Policing, and Healthcare

PA — 2026-09-11 Original Inspired to Serve: Exposure to Moral Models to Enhance Public Service Motivation Xiaoyu (Christina) Wang, James L. Perry, Yuming Wang, Dingxiang Chen, Bangcheng Liu

PA — 2026-09-11 Original A Public Values Framework for AI Governance: Evidence From US Federal AI Policymaking Ogadinma Enwereazu, Kaylyn Jackson Schiff, Tyler Girard, Alexander Wilhelm, Daniel S. Schiff

PAR — 2026-09-10 Original Restoring the Deformed Administrative State? Bureaucratic Repair After Illiberal Rule Michael W. Bauer, Daniel Kovarek, Bárbara Motta, Andrzej Schultz

PAR — 2026-09-10 Original Investor Orientation and Commitment in Outcomes‐Based Public Service Contracts

PMR — pp. 1-25 2026-09-09 Original Unlocking the transformative potential of design: reflections from practice on navigating barriers to designing for societal transformation Geert Brinkman, Arwin van Buuren, Suzan Christiaanse, Irene Fierloos, Wiesje Korf

PNAS 123/37 pp. e2600126123-e2600126123 2026-09-09 Original Plausible nonsense and deliberative reasoning: Benchmarking LLMs against human judgment Francesco Veri, Gustavo Umbelino Abstract Large Language Models (LLMs) are entering democratic contexts as instruments of governance, where the challenges at hand are ill-structured, marked by ambiguity and contestation. Ill-structured democratic problems demand more than factual precision; they call for intersubjective reasoning: context-sensitive judgments that others can understand and publicly accept. Using the Deliberative Reason Index (DRI), this study evaluates 60 LLMs against human deliberation across nine policy scenarios. Only four models consistently exceed the permutation-based null benchmark for alignment with human patterns of reason-giving. Most models fall short: their reason-preference structures rarely clear this threshold, even though their outputs can still appear coherent and persuasive. Yet outputs can appear reasonable even when this alignment is absent. The observed gap between surface plausibility and deliberative coherence urges caution: deploying LLMs in governance contexts requires prior assessment of their deliberative reasoning capacity, not just their surface outputs.

JPART — 2026-09-09 Original Institutional Conversion and Digital Transformation in Local Governments: A Longitudinal Analysis of Trajectories Adalmir de Oliveira Gomes Abstract Abstract This article asks a central question in digital government research: why do local governments operating under similar institutional conditions follow sharply different digital transformation trajectories over time? Drawing on theories of gradual institutional change, the study conceptualizes digital transformation not as a discrete adoption outcome, but as a process of institutional conversion through which technological capacity is translated into sustained digital service provision. Information governance is theorized as the key conditioning mechanism linking technological resources to durable organizational outcomes. The analysis combines longitudinal panel models, fixed-effects estimators, and trajectory-based clustering using a panel of all Brazilian municipalities (MUNIC/IBGE; N = 5,569) across seven waves between 2004 and 2024. Results show that increases in technological capacity are associated with subsequent gains in digital services, but these effects are gradual and conditional. Information governance significantly shapes how municipalities mobilize and stabilize technological resources over time, while interaction models reveal non-linear and diminishing returns consistent with institutional coordination limits. Trajectory analyses identify four distinct patterns of digital transformation, ranging from ‘institutionalized pioneers’ to ‘persistent stagnation’, demonstrating that digital development unfolds through path-dependent and institutionally anchored trajectories rather than through simple convergence. The article contributes to public administration research in three ways: provides rare longitudinal evidence on local digital transformation over two decades; integrates institutional change theory into digital government research by conceptualizing governance as a mechanism of institutional conversion; and advances a trajectory-based explanation of digital transformation that shifts attention from episodic technological adoption to cumulative institutional processes shaping long-run administrative performance.