Interorganizational Mobility within the U.S. Federal Government: Examining the Effect of Individual and Organizational Factors

Interorganizational mobility can make a positive contribution both organizationally and government‐wide. Using data from the U.S. Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey, this article seeks to provide a better empirical understanding of the determinants of interorganizational mobility within the U.S. federal government. A specific analytical framework is used, as the intention to take another job within the federal government is nested in the intention to leave the current organization. The results highlight that gender, minority status, length of service, and promotion are determinants of interorganizational mobility within the U.S. federal government.     

Schools with a Difference: Policy Discourses and Education Reform in Britain and Germany

Throughout the 1990s, corruption cases, policy failure and scandals tarnished Belgium's international reputation. In this article, we analyse the effect of federalism and political culture on corruption and policy failures and their impact on the likelihood of such occurrences becoming scandals. Survey material suggests that there are few differences between French- and Dutch-speakers in the perception and tolerance of corruption. We then list a number of variables that can explain corruption in Belgium and argue that the independent effect of federalism is very limited. Next we demonstrate that federalism has played a much more significant role in lowering the risk of policy failure, while at the same time creating a few new vulnerabilities. Finally, we argue that the regional political elites do not often engage in policy learning and frequently put forward federalism as the main solution to the avoidance of policy failure and scandal. In this sense, regional political elites do not seize the opportunity for policy experimentation and transfer that is generally seen as one of the main virtues of a federal system of government.     

The EU and the Mediterranean: Overhauling the status quo policy approach

Redefining sovereignty: The use of force after the end of the cold war / edited by Michael Bothe, Ellen O'Connell, Natalino Ronzitti. ‐ Ardsley : Transnational Publishers, c2005. ‐ xii, 496 p. ‐ ISBN 1–57105–324–7     

Win–Win? Early experience from local area agreements

Local Area Agreements (LAAs) are a mechanism for delivering improved outcomes for local people, through recasting governance relationships between central government and localities and between local agencies. This paper assesses the effectiveness of LAAs in reforming these critical relationships, drawing on research carried out in 2004–06 into the round one and two negotiations. These early negotiations highlighted the complexity of ‘central–local relations’; a coherent approach across Whitehall was hampered by differences in departmental culture and in the nature of relationships with local delivery agencies, while the new role for Government Offices was ambiguous. Nevertheless the early LAAs represented a major step forward in terms of local–central relations. Within localities, the process of developing LAAs proved challenging and highlighted governance weaknesses; however in the main participants report that partnerships have been greatly strengthened as a result. These early experiences provided rich learning, and policy has developed significantly since the pilots. At the time this research ended there was not yet any conclusive evidence on the balance of costs and benefits. However, over time LAAs have the potential to bring about a transformation in governance relationships and, in turn, the delivery of services to address cross-cutting outcomes.     

Covering HIV/AIDS: Towards a heuristic comparison between communitarian and utilitarian ethics

Abstract

This article considers two approaches to ethical decision-making on the issue of reporting on human immunodeficiency virus/Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS)-related deaths in the popular media. The conflict between cultural values and the public interest is explored via the ethical approaches of communitarianism and utilitarianism. The death of a former South African presidential spokesperson, is taken as an illustration of how these approaches might lead to different ethical decisions.     

Globalisation and making sense of the world

Abstract

This article grapples with the problem of understanding present human life and circumstances, and the challenges humans face in their effort to make sense of it. The importance of theory in this quest is emphasised. Two notions are considered in terms of their value towards this endeavour: globalisation and worlding. Globalisation is the current buzz word and some of the issues related to this term have been named. The term world is, however, preferred to globalisation, since world does not refer to the impersonal globe, cosmos or universe. The term world, or worlding, wants to emphasise humanisation and further signifies sense-making. Sense-making, however, is no easy matter. On the one hand, it involves the threatening reality of evil, not in the religious sense but in a profound ethical sense. On the other hand, it involves the process of the expansion of consciousness carried and supported by the ascent into the noosphere which offers an awareness of a kind of thinking other than and different from logical reasoning. While the one warns against the mechanisation of the mind, the other maintains that technique is a point of support for the spiritualisation of humanity. This world compels us to find or make sense of it; world is precisely where there is a place, a true place, for everybody. If this were not the case there would only be a globe: a place of exile where we would exist as strangers.     

F.H. (Terry) Terblanche (17 June 1939 – 30 April 2014)

ABSTRACT

Research shows that there is a perception that gender equity in the South African news media has reached maturation and that the power female journalists hold in the newsroom equals that of their male counterparts. these perceptions might be attributed to the fact that South african news media have reached near gender parity in terms of the workforce. However, the question is whether this translates into women having equal power to influence news agendas and to extend the broader public discourse.

Through interviews with journalists from a cross-section of the South african english- and afrikaans-language media, the study shows that despite improved gender equity in the workforce, female journalists do not think they have the same power to alter news agendas as their male counterparts. Furthermore, the study shows that despite women and men often covering similar beats and stories, they emphasise different story angles and also articulate their role in society differently.