Local Government Volunteer Use: A Resource Dependence and Transaction Costs Explanation

• Published date: 01 September 2022
• Author: Seong C. Kang,Rebecca Nesbit,Jeffrey L. Brudney
• Date: 01 September 2022
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13320

806Public Administration Review • September | Oct ober 20 22

Research Article

Abstract: Volunteer use in the United States constitutes a service delivery alternative in which public agencies

involve citizens to assist in delivering public services. This article provides a resource dependence and transaction

costs explanation for why local governments in the United States may involve volunteers in service delivery. Using a

survey of local government service delivery arrangements, we analyze a repeated cross-sectional dataset derived from

four separate years to examine the factors associated with volunteer use. Key findings suggest that fiscal constraints are

associated with volunteer use in more municipal government services, while county governments with more resources

use volunteers in more services. Contracting out to private organizations is associated with more volunteer use in both

municipalities and counties. The findings provide evidence that volunteer use constitutes an effort by local governments

in the United States to leverage resources from the environment and to reduce the transaction costs of depending on

other organizations.

Evidence for Practice

• To capitalize on resources available in the environment, local governments may use volunteers in service

delivery.

• Local governments confronting fiscal constraints may use volunteers to deliver more services.

• Local governments that contract out more services to private organizations may use volunteers in more

services to lower administrative costs.

• Volunteer use may serve as a strategy for local governments to leverage resources from the environment and

to reduce the transaction costs of depending on other organizations.

Local governments in the United States resort

to a variety of service delivery arrangements

such as contracting out or intergovernmental

service agreements to deliver public services (Brown

and Potoski2006). Deemed “government by

proxy,” the involvement of third parties represents

a departure from the conventional mode of direct

service provision by government (Milward and

Provan2000). One service alternative that has not

received widespread attention is the use of volunteers.

Although volunteers are generally associated with the

nonprofit and voluntary sectors, local governments

have a long history of using voluntary arrangements

to deliver services (Brudney1990). Drawing on

the 1988 International City/County Management

Association (ICMA) alternative service delivery

(ASD) survey, Brudney(1990, 11) notes that, at the

time, volunteer use “ranked second only to the use

of contracting with respect to the number of services

where the method is applied and the percentage of

local governments that have adopted it.” According

to an analysis some 20 years later of the 2007 ICMA

ASD survey, more than a quarter of U.S. cities and

counties used volunteers to deliver some type of

service (Nesbit and Brudney2013). In a study of

local governments in the State of Georgia, Gazley and

Brudney(2005) found that 74 percent of cities and

97 percent of counties had some form of volunteer

program in 2003. Indicative of the importance of

volunteer involvement, professional associations such

as the National Association of Volunteer Programs in

Local Government (NAVPLG) have been established

to provide local governments with resources in

promoting volunteerism in the public sector

(Connors2011).

Such interest in volunteer use attests to its significance

as a mechanism for delivering public services.

However, scholars have devoted limited attention

to the question of why some local governments

in the United States use volunteers to deliver

services, and if so, why some involve volunteers in

a greater number of services than others. Among

a variety of theoretical approaches to explaining

why organizations collaborate with others in the

environment (Malatesta and Smith2014), this

Local Government Volunteer Use: A Resource Dependence

and Transaction Costs Explanation

Seong C. KangRebecca Nesbit

Jeffrey L. Brudney

New Mexico State UniversityUniversity of Georgia

University of North Carolina Wilmington

Jeffrey L. Brudney is the Betty and Dan

Cameron Family Distinguished Professor of

Innovation in the Nonprofit Sector in the

Department of Public and International

Affairs at the University of North Carolina,

Wilmington. Dr. Brudney’s research focuses

on volunteerism and citizen participation,

volunteer program development and

management, and coproduction and

alternative approaches to service delivery.

Email: brudneyj@uncw.edu

Rebecca Nesbit is an associate

professor of nonprofit management in

the Department of Public Administration

and Policy at the University of Georgia.

Dr. Nesbit’s research explores issues of

philanthropy and volunteerism, public

policy, and management in the nonprofit

and public sectors. In particular, Dr. Nesbit

conducts research on volunteer programs,

volunteers’ characteristics and motivations,

and volunteer management in public and

nonprofit organizations.

Email: nesbit7@uga.edu

Seong C. Kang is an assistant professor

in the Department of Government at New

Mexico State University, USA. His research

interests include public and nonprofit

management, public sector volunteering,

coproduction of public services, and

government accountability. He received

his Ph.D. from the Department of Public

Administration and Policy at the University

of Georgia.

Email: sckang@nmsu.edu

Public Administration Review,

Vol. 82, Iss. 5, pp. 806–817. © 2020 by

The American Society for Public Administration.

DOI:10.1111/puar.13320.