‘What Counts is What Works’? Constructing Evaluations Of Market Mechanisms

This paper draws on a study of the introduction of market testing in the UK civil service to explore ways in which managers involved in the implementation of the new policy constructed evaluations of its impact. It is structured around three arguments. The first concerns the problems of evaluating 'what works' in the multi-stakeholder, multi-goal context of public management. The research highlights a range of overlapping and sometimes conflicting evaluation criteria across different organizational and occupational groupings. The second argument explores the difficulties of evaluation in the context of shifting policy objectives and the dynamic nature of institutional change. The research shows how the practitioners involved shaped and reshaped their construction of events over time as unanticipated benefits and disbenefits became evident. It also suggests ways in which they responded to the changing policy context, constructing new rules and norms of action over time. The third argument concerns the different levels of analysis underpinning managers' constructions of 'efficiency' and 'effectiveness', and how these constructions were deployed as strategies of legitimation in shaping the process of institutional change.     

Cumulative experiences of violence among high-risk urban youth

This study examines type-specific and cumulative experiences of violence among a vulnerable population of youth. Sixty high-risk, shelter-dwelling, urban youth were interviewed regarding their history of childhood maltreatment, exposure to community violence (ECV), and experience with intimate partner violence (IPV). Results show a high prevalence and high degree of overlap among multiple types of violence exposure. Childhood physical, sexual (CSA), and emotional (CEA) abuse were interrelated and were associated with ECV. Cumulative experiences of childhood abuse (CCA) had a graded association with IPV victimization. In multivariate analyses, CCA and ECV were independently associated with IPV victimization. Gender moderated the effect of one association: CEA raised the risk of IPV victimization for girls but not for boys. Only CSA predicted IPV perpetration. Findings suggest that cumulative exposures to violence create cumulative risk for experiencing more violence. Shelter-dwelling, urban youth may be particularly vulnerable to this additive effect.     

I Get By with a Little Help from My Friends: Leveraging Campaign Resources to Maximize Congressional Power

Central to the study of Congress is the study of relationships among members. Electoral collaboration is a function of a member's position in the broader congressional power network. It allows members to leverage their campaign resources to achieve the four classic goals of members of Congress: reelection, making good public policy, obtaining power within the institution, and having one's party in the majority. Using nearly 3.2 million FEC records from 2010 to 2016, we explore the dynamics that influence electoral collaboration. We find members are most likely to collaborate electorally with other members from the same state, party, and committee, and the most electorally vulnerable. Further, party leaders share most frequently with the rank and file. These findings build upon our expanding understanding of congressional collaboration, the networks members of Congress form, and the congressional power structure members operate within.