Images of Coordination: How Implementing Organizations Perceive Coordination Arrangements

A crucial challenge for the coordination of horizontal policy programs—those designed to tackle crosscutting issues—is how to motivate government organizations to contribute to such programs. Hence, it is crucial to study how practitioners in implementing organizations view and appreciate the coordination of such programs. Assisted by Q-methodology, this inductive study reveals three significantly different “images”: central frame setting, networking via boundary spanners, and coordination beyond window dressing. Most surprisingly, different images show up among respondents within the same organizations and horizontal programs. The authors find that the images reflect elements of the literature: the resistance to hierarchical central control, the need for local differentiation and increased incentives, and a collaboration-oriented culture. Most importantly, practitioners of implementing organizations perceive top-down mechanisms as ineffective to achieve coordination and ask for adaptive arrangements, involvement, and deliberative processes when designing coordination arrangements and during the collaboration.     

Postmortem redistribution of fentanyl in the rabbit blood

Postmortem redistribution of fentanyl in the rabbit was investigated after application of the 50-μg/h Durogesic pain patch. Patches were applied for 48 hours. Two cycles of patch administration were used before characterization of the postmortem redistribution. Fentanyl showed marked redistribution into the femoral and pulmonary veins of the rabbit through 48 hours after the animals were humanely killed and the pain patches removed. The plasma concentration of 2.34 ng/mL in the femoral blood before killing the animals increased 5.6-fold by 48 hours after patch removal to 13.2 ng/mL. This postmortem concentration is approximately 3-fold the C(max) determined during antemortem pharmacokinetic analysis, 4 ng/mL, which was achieved 24 hours after the application of the second 50-μg/h Durogesic pain patch. After blood sampling for 48 hours after animal termination with patch removal compared with sampling for 48 hours from animals not terminated and with patch removal, the exposure ratios in the terminated animals were approximately 30-fold, indicating that between the postmortem redistribution of fentanyl and the cessation of hepatic clearance of fentanyl in the rabbit, the postmortem redistribution of fentanyl leads to an elevated measures of postmortem blood concentrations relative to antemortem blood concentrations.     

A behavioral view on responsibility attribution in multi-level governance: Upward and downward responsibility attribution in response to performance below aspirations

Multi-level governance systems provide decision-makers with many avenues for external responsibility attribution in response to lacking performance. This study provides a behavioral perspective that examines responsibility attribution to the national government (upward) and policy implementers (downward) as a function of performance relative to decision-makers' aspiration levels. The study proposes that perceived accountability increases the propensity of external responsibility attribution, and that decision-makers' political alignment to actors on other governance levels explains when responsibility is deflected upwards or downwards. Using a survey experiment that presents factual information on youth care overspending to 1086 elected local government officials, the study finds consistent evidence that performance below aspirations increases upward responsibility attribution. Accountability strengthens responsibility attribution for negative performance downward to policy implementers. Finally, responsibility is attributed upward less frequently by decision-makers who are politically aligned with the national government, but information that signals performance below aspirations attenuates this tendency.     

The Associations between Substance Use,Sexual Behavior,Deviant Behaviors and Adolescents’ Engagement in Sexting: Does Relationship Context Matter?

While prior research has identified multiple associations between engagement in sexting and risky behaviors, most existing studies do not take into account the contexts in which sexting occurs. The present study extends prior research by examining whether the associations between adolescents’ sexting behavior and engagement in substance use, sexual behaviors, and deviant behaviors differ depending on the relational context (within or outside of a romantic relationship) in which young people engage in sexting. Results from a survey of 1187 secondary school students (61.3% girls, n?=?728) between 16 and 22 years old (M?=?17.82 years; SD?=?0.88) revealed that sexting with a romantic partner is not a significant marker of engagement in risk behaviors. However, single youth who engage in sexting outside of a romantic relationship are more likely to report substance use, relative to their non-sexting counterparts. These findings underscore the need to use more nuanced measures to investigate sexting and for sexual education initiatives to integrate messages about substance use.     

When do people report crime to the police? Results from a factorial survey design in the Netherlands, 2010

Objectives  

In this paper we assess to what extent factors of the reporting process affect the willingness to report crime to the police. The focus is on the following factors: (1) duration and flexibility (i.e. possibility to report outside office hours), (2) method of reporting (i.e. phone, Internet or police station), (3) anonymous reporting, and (4) encouragement by police officers.     

Understanding China's Court Mediation Surge: Insights from a Local Court

This article seeks to understand how reported mediation rates in Chinese courts are produced and what they actually signify. It analyzes data obtained through prolonged fieldwork at a court in central China. The article finds that the court has directly responded to central level mediation incentives by enhancing its overall mediation rate. It has done so strategically by seeking the highest increase using the fullest discretion in the mediation incentive structure and seeking to optimize the highest rate at the lowest cost and risk to the court. This has undermined the objectives of the central level incentives toward mediation, while also drawing the courts' scarce resources away toward unnecessary mediation practices, in part far removed from the courtroom. The article concludes by drawing out broader theoretical conclusions about how information asymmetries, discretion, and goal displacement play out in hierarchical control structures of authoritarian courts.     

Evaluation of postmortem biochemical markers: Completeness of data and assessment of implication in the field

Throughout the years an increase has been observed in research output on biochemical markers for determining the postmortem interval (PMI). However, to date, a complete overview is missing on the results of postmortem biochemical markers (PBM's) for PMI estimation. In this paper, literature was reviewed in order to identify the knowledge lacunae of PBM research from a practical point of view. A three-step approach was undertaken in order to achieve the set goal. Literature was collected, the PBM's were evaluated for completeness by means of a scorings index based on set criteria, and PBM's were subsequently evaluated in light of the Daubert & Frye criteria for scientific evidence in court. Seven PBM's were found to be well investigated, from which potassium had the highest completion score. However, none of these PBM's could be qualified as suitable for court evidence. Further, this study revealed that the majority of PBM's (94%) is not well investigated. Consequently, these PBM's did not meet Daubert & Frye criteria. In order to improve the assessment for use of PBM's as evidence in court regarding PMI estimation, PBM's should be investigated more thoroughly and data should be made readily available.     

The Impact of Public Branding: An Experimental Study on the Effects of Branding Policy on Citizen Trust

Branding has become common in the public sector as brands are increasingly used to influence citizens’ associations with public organizations and public services. Using experimental research replicated in three European countries, this article investigates the effect of using the European Union (EU) brand on trust in policies. Experiments were conducted among economics students in Belgium, Poland, and The Netherlands to test the hypothesis that adding EU brand elements to policies positively affects trust in those policies. The results show a consistent positive and significant effect of applying the EU brand to trust in the policies in all countries and for both policies included in the experiment—even in The Netherlands, a country characterized by a negative overall EU sentiment. These findings provide some of the first empirical evidence of the effectiveness of branding for public policy.     

The First Time is the Hardest? A Cross-National and Cross-Issue Comparison of First-Time Protest Participants

The study aims to extend the existing knowledge about the dynamics of first-time participation in protest events. To tackle that puzzle we rely on extensive and innovative protest survey evidence covering 18 separate demonstrations in eight countries across nine different issues. On the individual level, age, motivation, and non-organizational mobilization appear to be consistent and robust predictors of first-timership. On the aggregate level, demonstrations staged just after or during a protest wave, large demonstrations, and demonstrations of old or new emotional movements are attended by a relatively larger share of first-timers. We conclude that it is thus the interplay of individual- and aggregate-level determinants that produces first-time participation.