Immigration and the Remaking of New York

Abstract

The 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act abolished quotas that favored European immigrants, and for the first time placed all countries on an equal footing. The law resulted in increased overall immigration, and altered the sources of immigrants to the U.S. Since 1970, New York City has absorbed 2.6 million immigrants, primarily from non-European sources, who have dramatically altered the City's racial/Hispanic mix. Using immigration and birth records, as well as data from decennial censuses, this paper examines immigration to New York and assesses the demographic impact of these flows on the City's population.

Current immigrant flows have noticeably increased the ethnic diversity within the major race/Hispanic groups. This is largely due to increases in refugee flows, and to recent changes in immigration law that allow for “diversity” visas, which are aimed at countries that are under-represented in immigration flows to the U.S. Diversity immigration has provided New York with a continuing flow of new groups, most recently from Bangladesh, Mexico, Ghana, Nigeria, and Senegal, who have established enclaves in many of the City's neighborhoods. The increasing diversity poses serious challenges for social service and health care professionals, who need to devise new strategies to deal with the disparate socioeconomic backgrounds, cultures, and belief systems of new ethnic groups. This is especially important given that New York's ethnic mix will continue to be churned, especially by way of diversity immigration and refugee flows from all parts of the globe.     

Disparities in Infant Mortality Rates Among Immigrant Caribbean Groups in New York City

SUMMARY

This study examined infant mortality rates (IMR) in New York City (NYC) to identify those groups reporting higher IMR concentrations in recent years and to determine what factors and explanations are associated with this new trend.

Analysis of data from NYC Department of Health (DOH) identified infant mortality patterns throughout the City by both maternal birthplace and NYC Health Districts. In addition, infant mortality rates for those NYC populations with the highest concentrations were compared to the most recently available IMR data from their countries of origin. Focus group sessions were conducted with women in the identified groups in New York City in an effort to obtain their perspectives on causality and other factors associated with the new trend.

Strong patterns emerged from this study pointing to a concentration of the City's highest IMR among groups from the circum-Caribbean region. Results of focus group sessions with women in the identified population groups yielded a list of specific barriers faced by this population in the utilization of perinatal care services. In addition, the study resulted in some clearly delineated program and policy approaches that can help to address the disparities in IMR.

Myriad causative factors contribute to the high rates of IMR among Caribbean immigrant groups. Expanding the availability of both successful program models and promising practices is critical to decreasing infant mortality in immigrant communities. Specific recommendations are for the development of a strategic set of interventions designed to eliminate this most serious challenge to the health of new immigrant groups in NYC.

Any references to comparisons between data from NYC and data from the countries of origin were merely to serve as a reference point as it is not often possible to determine the level of scientific rigor applied to the collection and analysis of data external to the United States (U.S.).

Implications for social work practice with immigrant populations include the need for delivery of culturally competent services in general and for cultural sensitivity to health beliefs surrounding maternal child health issues in particular.     

In search of budgetary excellence: the government finance officers association award for distinguished budget presentation

During the twentieth century, American governments progressed from essentially no use of government budgeting to experimentation with a host of budgeting strategies designed to improve the control, efficiency, and decision making capacity of governing agencies. In 1984, the Government Finance Officers Association of the United States and Canada sought to synthesize many of these approaches into a broad definition of budgetary excellence by the establishment of an Award for Distinguished Budget Presentation. This article reviews the effort to define budgetary excellence, then offers a discussion of the lessons learned during the first years of the program's operation. he of the products of the program's operation.     

Governing the Water Use in the Greater Richmond Area: Dispute and Resolution

This study probes into the governing issues centering around the water use dispute and resolution between Richmond City and Henrico County in the Greater Richmond area, Virginia. For a variety of reasons, Richmond City strongly opposed the initiative by Henrico County to construct and operate its own water treatment plant in 1987. As a result of rigorous multi-party planning, mediation, and negotiation processes, Richmond City and Henrico County finally reached a compromise settlement in 1994. This study concludes that mediating and resolving public policy disputes between localities within the metropolitan area is a highly complicated and politically charged process, which can involve different levels of government, business community elites, and other stakeholders; driven by their common interests, the public-private intersectoral boundaries are increasingly blurred; and a planning process blends both political and technical factors together. In this case, the Henrico County's newly proposed water treatment plant project was environmentally cleared by the Water Review Panel's technical report.     

Russia,Chechnya and Strasbourg: Russian Official and Press Discourse on the ‘Chechen Cases’ at the European Court of Human Rights

This article explores contemporary Russian official and media discourse on cases concerning human rights violations in Chechnya which have been heard at the European Court of Human Rights. By comparing and contrasting the discourses on the Court's rulings which have been reproduced by various government representatives and various Russian newspapers, the article aims to demonstrate that, while official discourse remains critical of the Court's work with regard to Chechnya, reporting of such cases provides certain media outlets with the opportunity to criticise the government for its perceived failings in relation to safeguarding Chechnya's civilian population from human rights abuses.     

Strategic planning and budgeting in the “new texas”: putting service efforts and accomplishments to work

Texas implemented a new “strategic budgeting” system to craft the state's 1994-95 biennial budget. This performance-based budgeting system combines strategic planning, service efforts and accomplishments (SEA) indicators and reporting, and line-item appropriations. This article reviews the ideas and process behind linking strategic planning and line-item budgeting and describes the key role of SEA indicators. Interviews with agency practitioners and the experiences of the Governor's Office of Budget and Planning are used to evaluate the system.     

Post-National Voices

Why did The Statanic Verses, Salman Rushdie's novel about self‐doubting Muslims in London and Bombay written almost two decades ago, so resonate continents away in the corner minimalls and polylingual schools of the City of Angels ?     

Risk pooling in new york city: the anatomy of an award-winning innovation

This article discusses the Citywide Central Insurance Program of New York City. This award-winning innovation ensures insurance for many of the city's nonprofit social service providers. Using a partnership approach, CCIP increases the availability of insurance, reduces insurance costs, and improves the risk management.     

After the fall of the soviet union: the changing status of local governments in the republic of latvia

When the Republic of Latvia gained its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, one of Latvia's first priorities was to rebuild its system of local government. This article describes many of the problems local governments in Latvia faced after 50 years of communist rule. The article also discusses the new Latvian laws which changed the structure of local government in that country. Also discussed are Latvian central government institutions which impacted on local governments in general and local government finances in particular. The unique status of the Capitol City of Riga, Latvia's largest municipality is also reviewed in detail.     

Forming community councils East Kilbride

The principle of directly elected mayors forms a key part of the Labour government's strategy to modernise local democracy and strengthen accountability. First applied to London, the government has sought to extend the institution, allowing local referendums to determine whether the public favours the principle or not. This article examines the state of public opinion regarding elected mayors before reporting on the outcome of referendums held since the 2001 general election. We then consider the results of mayoral elections, specifically addressing issues of electoral participation, legitimation and partisan support. In conclusion, we consider whether its experience with both referendums and mayoral elections may have affected the government's enthusiasm for further expansion of this institution across the local government system.     

Experiences of a learning organization in the public sector

This article explores the experience of a municipal government agency as it confronts the challenges and opportunities of meeting seemingly unlimited demands with limited resources. The City of Scottsdale, Arizona, enjoys a national reputation for innovative approaches to public policy issues. This article examines Scottsdale's efforts to create a learning organization, through a Venture Team which represents a core strategy for continuous improvement and lifelong learning.     

Health care technology assessment: A policy planning tool

Health care technology has developed more rapidly than have the tools to aid decisions regarding that technology's assessment, acquisition and allocation. This article proposes theoretical and technological bases for formulating and analyzing policies for technology assessment. A computerized procedure for measurement and reporting of judgmental sources of technology assessment is presented, accompanied by a pilot study illustrating how the procedure can be used for both research and practical applications.     

Implementing IFRS in Local Government: Institutional Isomorphism as NPM Goes Mad?

Abstract

The impact the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) has on business has been considered by various authors, such as Jones and Higgins (2006 Jones, S. H. and Higgins, A. D. 2006. Australia's switch to international financial reporting standards: a perspective from account preparers'. Accounting and Finance, 46: 629–652. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). However, there has not been the same research conducted with respect to local government. As Australia and New Zealand are leading the world by being the first to introduce IFRS into local government financial reporting, this study is timely in order todetermine the impact of compliance on local government. With the New Public Management (NPM) introduced in the late 1970s, accrual accounting and the desire to enhance transparency became embedded in financial reporting across the world. The paper adds to the growing literature on institutional theory with results of the study suggesting that a form of coercive isomorphism is present in regards to local government compliance with IFRS. It also suggests that the philosophy behind NPM – especially that espousing the benefits of public sector reporting in a private sector vein–may not be as relevant to Australian local government as the policy makers would have us believe. The thrust to implement IFRS may have finally pushed local government into a world they struggle to cope with. For example, findings indicate that there is now, more than ever, a perception in the community that the bottom line is an important indicator of a council's performance. Results reported here determined that the implementation process was time-consuming and costly with, in general, very little perceived benefit. Councils are conforming to the coercive pressure from legislative bodies, but they are not converging as part of the ‘transaction-neutral’ reporting regime.     

Policy Experimentation in China’s Economic Rise

Policy experimentation is frequently highlighted as a potent means to facilitate institutional innovation, and avoid reformist leaps in the dark by injecting bottom-up initiative and local knowledge into the national policy process. Yet experimentation remains a surprisingly vague concept in the debate over variants of economic governance. This article contributes to the study of experiment-based policymaking by examining the distinctive tools, processes, and effects of experimental programs in major domains of China’s economic reform. China’s experience attests to the potency of experimentation in bringing about transformative change, even in a rigid authoritarian, bureaucratic environment, and regardless of strong political opposition. Large-scale experimentation stimulated policy learning and economic expansion effectively in those sectors in which political elites could benefit from supporting new types of private and transnational entrepreneurial activity. Conversely, experimental programs largely failed in generating an effective provision of social goods which would require a combination of active societal supervision and strict central government enforcement to make it work. Though the impact of reform experiments varies between policy domains, China’s experimentation-based policy process has been essential to redefining basic policy parameters. At the heart of this process, we find a pattern of central–local interaction in generating policy—“experimentation under hierarchy”—which constitutes a notable addition to the repertoires of governance that have been tried for achieving economic transformation. The research for this article was supported by the German National Research Foundation and the Fairbank Center for East Asian Research at Harvard University. The author is especially indebted to Elizabeth Perry, Steven Goldstein, Rolf Langhammer, Dani Rodrik, Victor Shih, Ezra Vogel, and Rudolf Wagner for their encouragement and comments. Nancy Hearst made a crucial contribution by bringing precious sources from the Fairbank Center’s library to my attention that I otherwise would have overlooked.

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From Brain Drain to Brain Circulation: Transnational Communities and Regional Upgrading in India and China

By 2000, over one-third of Silicon Valley’s high-skilled workers were foreign-born, and overwhelmingly from Asia. These U.S.-educated engineers are transforming developmental opportunities for formerly peripheral regions as they build professional and business connections to their home countries. In a process more akin to “brain circulation” than “brain drain,” these engineers and entrepreneurs, aided by the lowered transaction costs associated with digitization, are transferring technical and institutional know-how between distant regional economies faster and more flexibly than most large corporations. This article examines how Chinese- and Indian-born engineers are accelerating the development of the information technology industries in their home countries—initially by tapping the low-cost skill in their home countries, and over time by contributing to highly localized processes of entrepreneurial experimentation and upgrading, while maintain close ties to the technology and markets in Silicon Valley. However, these successful models also raise several questions about the broader relevance of brain circulation outside of several key countries, and regions of those countries, within the global South. AnnaLee Saxenian is dean and professor at the School of Information Management and Systems and professor in the Department of City and Regional Planning at the University of California, Berkeley. She is currently exploring how immigrant engineers and scientists are transferring technology entrepreneurship to regions in Asia.     

“Crossing the River by Feeling the Stones”: Vietnam's Experiment with Block Grant Budgeting

“We are crossing the river by feeling the stones.”

— attributed to Deng Xiaoping on economic reforms in China

Abstract

In December 1999, Vietnam's leaders granted Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) powers to pilot a remarkable budget management reform. This small-scale but radical experiment, launched in January 2000, has involved allowing the provincial finance department to approve and control budgets for 10 pilot spending units as “block grants” or “lump sums.” This review of the first two years of the HCMC block grants experiment suggests that such mechanisms may be useful in the developing country context. It also explores why Vietnam's decision to continue with pilots on a larger scale, rather than move immediately to full-scale rollout, may be an optimal reform implementation approach.     

The Difficulties and Dilemmas of International Intelligence Cooperation

Stéphane Lefebvre is a former Strategic Analyst at the Canadian Department of National Defence and a former Marcel Cadieux Policy Planning Fellow at the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade. The views expressed here are the author's and do not necessarily reflect the views of any governmental or nongovernmental organizations with which he is or has been affiliated. An earlier version of this article was presented at the Colloque Renseignement et Sécurité internationale, Laval University, Quebec City, Canada, on 20 March 2003.     

The changing dynamics of policy experiment in Singapore: does the 2011 general election make a difference?

The city-state of Singapore is proactive in harnessing policy experimentation to incubate innovations, transfer knowledge and facilitate collaborations across different public sectors. Given the country’s strong knack for pragmatism, international practices and lessons are usually first tested and adapted in policy experiments before scaling up to nationwide policies. Singapore’s practice of policy experimentation, however, has also demonstrated evolution over time. This article reviews the evolving role of experimentation in Singapore’s policy decision-making and implementation, and analyses pilot programmes in public housing to elicit the key attributes and commonalities of its policy experiments. It finds that policy experiments have been increasingly used after the 2011 general election, which witnessed a radical political rebalancing in Singapore’s governance history. Pilot projects have thus transformed from a utilitarian to citizen-centric, design-thinking approach after 2011. Pilot programmes are used for multiple purposes in policy innovations, among which civil service mentoring, knowledge transfer and cross-boundary collaboration are the values primarily pursued. The article discusses the contributions of the findings to the literature and policy implications for practitioners.     

The impact of finance regulations on political parties: The case of Bulgaria

This article suggests that a successful explanation of the development of Bulgaria's post-1989 party system must include the rules governing funding of political organisations. By examining the composition of party incomes and spending practices, I evaluate patterns and trends in fund raising using official party self-reported accounts and other data for 2001 – 05. I conclude that the specific public funding regime led to the emergence of three tiers of parties. The case of Bulgaria suggests that in the absence of strict regulations for reporting and enforcement mechanisms, the image of parties as representatives of the public interest was seriously damaged.     

Financial reporting transparency,citizens' understanding,and public participation: A survey experiment study

This study investigates the conditions under which transparency contributes to citizens' understanding of financial reporting and examines how this enhanced understanding is associated with public participation. To this end, a survey experiment was conducted in which two attributes of financial reporting transparency (i.e., content clarification and presentation format) were the manipulated variables, whereas citizens' understanding and public participation were the outcome variables. Results demonstrate that the provision of explanations to clarify obscure technical jargon does have a positive effect on citizens' understanding. A similar effect was found for the provision of graphical and visual representations. However, the study reveals that there is no additional benefit in simultaneously providing both explanations of technical jargon and visual aids. Furthermore, findings show that the levels of public participation are highest among the individuals who felt they understood the financial information the best, but yet possessed the lowest level of actual understanding.