Volume 4 Issue 3

This article aims to approach highly important and current aspects regarding the public debt crisis in the European Union's economies. The current economic situation determined by the effects of the crisis is causing the governments of the countries worldwide to streamline their processes in terms of collecting revenue from the state budget and then redistributing them on the principle of performance and economic efficiency. Under these conditions, this article is based on a set of previous research and studies conducted at the EU level. In these analyses and studies, the following aspects were examined: (1) European Union's competitiveness in terms of country risk and fiscal discipline, and (2) Fiscal policy under current challenges and constrains at EU level. Based on these empirical analyses, a series of complex relationships are highlighted within the European community, more precisely in the context of markets with turbulences and search frictions that currently exist in the European Union.

After focusing on the Euro crisis, European leaders are now struggling with the biggest migrant crisis since Second World War. Up to now, over 1.1 million migrants have requested protection in Europe, and their number is growing every day. The functioning of the Schengen area is in danger due to control deficiencies at external borders. As it's facing this challenge, the EU is constantly seeking solutions designed to restore the proper functioning of the system and prevent its collapse.

Building a sustainable performance system at the level of the local public administrations must have as starting point the local public administration's (LPA) mission and must go down to the level of the individual. This system must follow the external performance that it delivers to the citizens, the outcomes generated, but also the internal performance which suggests how to achieve the external performance. We propose in this regard the simultaneous use of the Balanced Scorecard tool for managing the internal performance and the Public Service Value Model for measuring the external performance measurement which derives from the organization’s mission. In the second part of the work we analyzed comparatively the external performance created by the county capitals of Romania in the year 2013 using the Public Service Value Model (PSVM). Based on this analysis, the county capitals of Romania can be divided in the following categories: high performance organizations (value driven), budget conscious organizations, low performance organizations (sleeping giants) and quality conscious organizations. This classification is useful both for the external and internal stakeholders because it shows the efficiency of public money spending and the areas in which the LPA is performing well, and also the ones that need to be improved.