Public management reform and organizational performance: An empirical assessment of the U.K. Labour government's public service improvement strategy

We present the first empirical assessment of the U.K. Labour government's program of public management reform. This reform program is based on rational planning, devolution and delegation, flexibility and incentives, and enhanced choice. Measures of these variables are tested against external and internal indicators of organizational performance. The setting for the study is upper tier English local governments, and data are drawn from a multiple informant survey of 117 authorities. The statistical results indicate that planning, organizational flexibility, and user choice are associated with higher performance. Conclusions are drawn for the theory and practice of public management reform. © 2006 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management     

State‐level predictors of food insecurity among households with children

This article examines interstate variation in household food security. Using hierarchical modeling, we identify several kinds of state characteristics that appear linked to household food security: the availability and accessibility of federal nutrition assistance programs, policies affecting economic wellbeing of low income families, and states' economic and social characteristics. These dimensions comprise what we refer to as the state food security infrastructure. We find that a strong food security infrastructure is particularly beneficial to families who are economically vulnerable yet have incomes above the poverty line. Almost all of the observed interstate differences in food security can be explained by crossstate differences in demographic and contextual characteristics. © 2006 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management