Governance in the UK Public Sector: the Involvement of the Governing Board

Governing boards are a prominent feature of many public sector organizations today. These boards have been modelled on the private sector board of directors. Like company boards, one of their main functions is to provide strategic leadership and policy direction for the organization. The role of managers and chief executives is to implement this. This paper examines the extent of involvement of one public sector board, the school governing body, in strategic activity. Using empirical evidence from a number of semi-structured interviews conducted in schools, its findings indicate that governing bodies are not involved at a high level in strategy within schools. Rather, headteachers are more likely to be undertaking this activity. Reflections are made about the relevance of the 'board of directors' model for both governing bodies and the public sector more generally.     

Service Personalization as a Response to Noncompliance with Routine Childhood Vaccination

Governmental reaction to citizens’ noncompliance with policy is often portrayed as a retrospective enforcement effort, in which incentives and information serve as the main mechanisms to change citizens’ noncompliant behavior. This study suggests that government may adapt existing policy arrangements to encourage compliance rather than enforce implementation. Such responses recognize that noncompliance is an ongoing decision‐making process rather than a single event, with scope for government intervention at different points. Drawing on toddlers’ nonvaccination in Israel as a test case, findings indicate that to minimize noncompliance and its public health implications, officials have responded by personalizing the standardized service. Personalization is a pragmatic response that recognizes that hesitant parents may be amenable to modified interventions as an alternative to complete exit. Nevertheless, personalization challenges the very notion of a public health intervention based on a standard protocol and raises new dilemmas around where private responsibilities end and public ones begin.     

Desire for Smart Growth: A Survey of Residential Preferences in the Salt Lake Region of Utah

As an alternative to sprawling development, smart growth combines proximity to work, proximity to shopping and other destinations, neighborhood housing mix, shared and paid parking, complete street designs, and proximity to public transit. This article uses a stated-choice experiment to determine residents' attitudes toward these various aspects of smart growth in the Salt Lake region of Utah. Utah is a conservative state, where attitudes toward auto-oriented suburbia may be more positive than in other parts of the United States. So, one might wonder whether changing national attitudes toward smart growth, documented in several surveys, apply to residents of the Salt Lake region. In this stated-choice experiment, respondents were asked to choose between pairs of housing scenarios with different attributes and different prices. Mixed logit (random parameters logit) was used to relate individuals' choices to attributes, prices, and sociodemographic characteristics of respondents. The results show that, generally, respondents have positive attitudes toward most aspects of smart growth but still express preferences for single-family neighborhoods with free parking in their own driveways or garages. Different life cycle cohorts have different preferences. Proximity to work is more important for childless young adults. Young families with children place higher value on living in a neighborhood with only single-family homes and transit access. Retired empty nesters favor a mix of housing types over single-family housing on one-acre-plus lots. The results suggest that while residents of the Salt Lake region like suburban neighborhoods with primarily single-family houses, they would also like to have improved accessibility to amenities in the suburbs.     

The faces of death: regional differentiation in cause-specific mortality in the past

In mortality research, much attention has been paid to the strong geographical differentials in mortality levels and in modern mortality decline, as the analysis of this geographical differentiation might hold the key to explaining the determinants of mortality change. The use of historical cause-specific mortality data has proved a challenging, although very insightful, means to this end. The four contributions to this special issue focus on cause-specific mortality in the past, both to reassess older data using new insights and to challenge existing insights by using new data and methods. These papers, of which earlier versions were presented during the thirty-eighth Social Science History Association (SSHA) Meeting in Chicago, 21–24 November 2013, explore mortality at different stages of the life course, ranging from early infancy to old age. Moreover, each paper revolves around a different group of causes of death. Although the papers are in many ways rather different, together they demonstrate how different data, theoretical frameworks and methodologies can push the boundaries of research into the trends and determinants of historical mortality patterns.     

Strategic planning through a participatory learning and action framework: a Kenyan study

This paper reflects on the use of a participatory learning and action (PLA) framework in a strategic planning process (SPP) at a primary school in rural Kenya. Successes and challenges are discussed, focusing on the barriers to fully implementing the PLA framework. Additionally, lessons learnt and ways forward for participatory SPPs are outlined. The PLA framework allowed the project stakeholders to engage in a planning process that gave participants a voice in the process. Although PLA methodology faces shortcomings, the application of this model is a step towards making community development more sustainable.