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Title: Attitudes toward gun control laws: exploring relationships in recent gathered data.
Creator: Borkowski, Elizabeth., College for Design and Social Inquiry, School of Criminology and Criminal Justice
Abstract/Description: Recently, empirical attention has been directed toward understanding public opinion about gun control laws. Despite this focus, three gaps are evident in extant scholarship. First, few current examinations have relied on recently collected, national data to explore predictors of public attitudes. Second, relatively little work systematically investigates whether type of weapon bans (e.g. handgun versus semi-automatic weapon) affects public support for a given gun control initiative. Third,...
Show moreRecently, empirical attention has been directed toward understanding public opinion about gun control laws. Despite this focus, three gaps are evident in extant scholarship. First, few current examinations have relied on recently collected, national data to explore predictors of public attitudes. Second, relatively little work systematically investigates whether type of weapon bans (e.g. handgun versus semi-automatic weapon) affects public support for a given gun control initiative. Third, and importantly, the general focus in prediction support for gun control measures has been on social and demographic factors. Little is known from a theoretical perspective about how other variables - such as knowledge of Constitutinal issues or perceptions of the U.S. Supreme Court - affect public attitudes toward gun control. Using national poll data collected in 2011 by Time magazine, this study addresses these research gaps by estimating several logistic regression analyses. Research and policy implications are discussed.
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Date Issued: 2012
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3358285
Subject Headings: Gun control, Political aspects, Gun control, Social aspects, Gun control, Statistics, Firearms, Law and legislation, FIrearms ownership, Social aspects, Firearms and crime, Public opinion
Format: Document (PDF)

Title: Collaborative governance and the implementation of the Ryan White CARE Act: a case study of HIV health services planning councils in two South Florida counties.
Creator: Agbodzakey, James K., College for Design and Social Inquiry, School of Public Administration
Abstract/Description: The complex problems of the twenty-first century cannot be effectively addressed with twentieth century top-down bureaucratic governance alone because of limited stakeholder participation in collective decision making and/or implementation. The somewhat limited stakeholder participation in the policy process, especially, that of target populations, can impact generating viable solutions to complex problems. Collaborative governance has emerged as a promising alternative to traditional...
Show moreThe complex problems of the twenty-first century cannot be effectively addressed with twentieth century top-down bureaucratic governance alone because of limited stakeholder participation in collective decision making and/or implementation. The somewhat limited stakeholder participation in the policy process, especially, that of target populations, can impact generating viable solutions to complex problems. Collaborative governance has emerged as a promising alternative to traditional management in addressing contemporary complex problems. Collaborative governance is thus a type of governance that promotes joint participation of state and non-state stakeholders in decision making and/or implementation by using agreed upon processes of engagement to collectively address problems. Such governance is especially beneficial for addressing the challenges posed by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). This dissertation uses the collaborative governance concept to explicate the efforts of HIV Health Services Planning Councils in Broward County and Palm Beach County of South Florida with the purpose of accentuating how collaborative governance works in providing various categories of services to meet the needs of people with AIDS (PWAs), as part of the implementation of the Ryan White CARE Act. The study focuses on critical variables of collaborative governance such as facilitative leadership and institutional design, the collaborative process variables such as trust building, commitment to the process and shared understanding, and outputs such as allocation priorities of the Councils. This study employed mixed methods in collecting data from various relevant sources., The combined findings from surveys, interviews, observations and document reviews were essential to knowledge and understanding of collaborative governance of the respective Councils. The results revealed more similarities than differences between the Councils in their efforts towards addressing the HIV/AIDS problem. The Councils are similar in all variables of collaborative governance with few exceptions relative to facilitative leadership and institutional design. The differences were relative to membership, number of committees, amount allocated for various service categories and number of clients served. Furthermore, the Councils were slightly different in reaching consensus on subjects of deliberation. On the average, Palm Beach County's Council make decisions by consensus relatively easily when compared with the Broward County's Council. Nonetheless, both Councils are consensus-oriented and strive to make decision by consensus as evidenced by unanimous votes or simple majority votes on various subjects of deliberation. In addition, representation and participation of target populations in collaborative governance have contributed to the empowerment of those target populations. The study contributes to the literature by developing a conceptual model for HIV/AIDS collaborative governance for producing outputs to help meet needs of target populations. Also, the study contributes to collaborative governance theorizing by drawing a nexus between variables of collaborative governance and by complementing the existing non-linear perspective of collaborative process for collective problem solving. Collaborative governance involving state and non-state stakeholders thereby enhances efforts of public managers by harnessing resources to effectively manage and/or address complex problems for the benefit of society.
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Date Issued: 2009
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/368614
Subject Headings: HIV infections, Government policy, AIDS (Disease), Patients, Services for, Public-private sector cooperation, Public administration, Decision making
Format: Document (PDF)

Title: Democratic accountability for outsourced government services.
Creator: Keeler, Rebecca L., College for Design and Social Inquiry, School of Public Administration
Abstract/Description: Public administration scholars have raised serious concerns about loss of democratic accountability when government services are outsourced to private forprofit businesses because of the very different values and missions of the two sectors. Particular concern for democratic accountability arises when administrative discretion is delegated to governments' private sector agents. Furthermore, if contractors may adversely impact individual rights or interests, or may adversely impact vulnerable...
Show morePublic administration scholars have raised serious concerns about loss of democratic accountability when government services are outsourced to private forprofit businesses because of the very different values and missions of the two sectors. Particular concern for democratic accountability arises when administrative discretion is delegated to governments' private sector agents. Furthermore, if contractors may adversely impact individual rights or interests, or may adversely impact vulnerable populations, special democratic responsibilities arise. It is these three features of outsourcing transactions that constitute the elements of the proposed framework used in this research in order to assess need for heightened attention to democratic accountability. Some scholars argue for application of constitutional and administrative law norms to some government contractors., Public service ethics and transparency requirements found in administrative law are heavily value-laden and mission-driven. If applied to certain government contractors, they can help to bridge the sectors' mission and value differences, thus enhancing democratic accountability for the services performed by governments' private sector agents. This research offers an analytical framework for identifying features of outsourcing transactions that call for enhanced democratic accountability measures such as ethics and transparency requirements, and explores the application of ethics and transparency requirements to governments' contractors. Contracts and laws governing three Florida local government service categories were subjected to close systematic textual and legal analysis: residential trash collection, building code inspection, and inmate health care., The analysis revealed circumstances calling for greater attention to democratic accountability in that the selected outsourcing transactions delegated to contractors the authority to exercise police power, make public policy, and commit expenditures of public funds. Contracts and laws haphazardly required contractors to abide by public service ethics and transparency requirements, thus beginning to adapt the mission and value system of their private sector agents to those of government.
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Date Issued: 2010
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/1927311
Subject Headings: Contracting out, Privatization, Public administration, Decision making, Public contracts, Management
Format: Document (PDF)

Title: An analysis of accountability in public-private health care programs serving vulnerable populations.
Creator: Cleare, Thomas W., School of Public Administration, College for Design and Social Inquiry
Abstract/Description: References to accountability are common throughout public administration literature. However, a clear model to assess accountability in government programs is not fully developed. This research fills this gap and provides policymakers with a tool they can use to assess accountability in both public and contracted programs and enables them to make more informed contracting-out decisions. In addition, the Integrated Accountability Framework introduced in this research will serve as a guideline...
Show moreReferences to accountability are common throughout public administration literature. However, a clear model to assess accountability in government programs is not fully developed. This research fills this gap and provides policymakers with a tool they can use to assess accountability in both public and contracted programs and enables them to make more informed contracting-out decisions. In addition, the Integrated Accountability Framework introduced in this research will serve as a guideline for how public administrators can improve accountability in the programs they administer and oversee. For the public and private health care programs analyzed in this study, the findings indicate that the publicly delivered programs provided more accountability to the vulnerable populations served than the contracted-out health care programs.
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Date Issued: 2011
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3169917
Subject Headings: Health services administration, Public administration, Moral and ethical aspects, Municiipal services, Contracting out, Administrative responsibility
Format: Document (PDF)

Title: The social construction of breast and prostate cancer policy.
Creator: Martinez, Jocilyn., College for Design and Social Inquiry, School of Public Administration
Abstract/Description: Breast and prostate cancers are the most commonly diagnosed forms of cancer in women and men in the United States. The federal government has played an active role in dedicating resources toward breast and prostate cancers since the early 1990s, when policy actors successfully lobbied Congress to adopt policies that increased awareness and spending. Using theories of social construction, I argue that the key to their success was the ability of these policy actors to socially construct the...
Show moreBreast and prostate cancers are the most commonly diagnosed forms of cancer in women and men in the United States. The federal government has played an active role in dedicating resources toward breast and prostate cancers since the early 1990s, when policy actors successfully lobbied Congress to adopt policies that increased awareness and spending. Using theories of social construction, I argue that the key to their success was the ability of these policy actors to socially construct the illnesses of breast and prostate cancers into politically attractive public issues that appealed to federal policymakers. Through the use of embedded collective case study and content analysis of newspaper coverage and congressional data, this dissertation demonstrates how the social constructions of these illnesses impacted the way that breast and prostate cancers were treated as they moved through the policy process. The way in which social construction influenced the types of policies that were adopted to deal with these illnesses is also examined. Because social construction is a multidimensional and dynamic process, several different elements of this process were examined in this dissertation: the ways that policy actors attracted attention to these illnesses, how gender influenced advocacy efforts, the symbolic aspects of these illnesses, and the way the illnesses were defined on systemic and institutional agendas. Since this dissertation examines two different policy issues, the similarities and differences in breast and prostate cancer policymaking were analyzed. I found that discussing breast and prostate cancers in relation to their social constructions provides support for the importance of symbolism and non-rational policy-making processes.
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Date Issued: 2010
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/1927310
Subject Headings: Breast, Cancer, Patients, Services for, Prostate, Cancer, Patients, Services for, Health services accessibility, Government policy, Medical policy
Format: Document (PDF)

Title: An exploration of religious terrorism over time: a content analysis of The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.
Creator: Zurburg, Heather., College for Design and Social Inquiry, School of Criminology and Criminal Justice
Abstract/Description: The current study is a content analysis and comparison of news articles from the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. The objective of this study is to explore media coverage of terrorism over the last five decades to determine the impact of religion and to compare coverage between two respected news sources that are known for their liberal (New York Times) and conservative (Wall Street Journal) view points. Using a stratified random sample, 1,832 news articles were selected between...
Show moreThe current study is a content analysis and comparison of news articles from the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. The objective of this study is to explore media coverage of terrorism over the last five decades to determine the impact of religion and to compare coverage between two respected news sources that are known for their liberal (New York Times) and conservative (Wall Street Journal) view points. Using a stratified random sample, 1,832 news articles were selected between 1960 and 2006 from the two news sources of interest. The articles were read, analyzed, and categorized. Then, a qualitative analysis examined a random selection of articles pertaining to religious terrorist events. Results suggest an increase in coverage of religiously perpetrated terrorism in recent decades. Interestingly, coverage from the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal showed similar patterns despite being representative of opposite ideologies. Implications are discussed.
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Date Issued: 2011
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3174311
Subject Headings: Mass media and public opinion, Terrorism and mass media, Mass media policy, Newspapers, Objectivity, War on Terrorism, 2001-, Press coverage
Format: Document (PDF)

Title: Public asset management: empirical evidence from the state governments in the United States.
Creator: Lu, Yaotai, College for Design and Social Inquiry, School of Public Administration
Abstract/Description: Public asset management is a critical component of the financial integrity of government. However, in practice, problems exist in the field of public asset management at different levels of government in the United States. This research explores the management of public fixed assets owned, controlled and used by state governments in America. It attempts to answer two major questions: (1) What are the characteristics of a modern public asset management system based on the available literature?...
Show morePublic asset management is a critical component of the financial integrity of government. However, in practice, problems exist in the field of public asset management at different levels of government in the United States. This research explores the management of public fixed assets owned, controlled and used by state governments in America. It attempts to answer two major questions: (1) What are the characteristics of a modern public asset management system based on the available literature? and (2) How do public asset management practices at the U.S. state government compare to the system standard described in the first question? Based on systems theory and current research on public asset management and public procurement systems, this research develops an intellectual framework of a public fixed asset management system. This system is composed of six interdependent cornerstones, including legal and regulatory requirements, organization structure, management process throughout th e life cycle of assets, human capital strategies, information and technology resources, and monitoring, integrity, and transparency. Each cornerstone consists of a number of components that reveal the underlying working principles of the relevant cornerstone and together determine the standards of fixed asset management in the relevant area. Survey results demonstrate that state governments fundamentally satisfy the standards identified in the fixed asset management system. However, certain problems obviously exist in the area of each cornerstone. In addition, survey results reveal that the six cornerstones of fixed asset management system are interrelated with one another. In most states, when a management element in the area of one cornerstone is widely implemented, the relevant management elements in areas of other cornerstones are employed and vice versa., A major contribution of this research is the development of a fixed asset management system. State and federal governments may compare their fixed asset management to the standards identified in this system. Local governments may find appropriate management components to adapt to their characteristics from this system.
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Date Issued: 2011
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3171677
Subject Headings: Finance, Public, Infrastructure (Economics), Finance, Organizational behavior, Government policy
Format: Document (PDF)

Title: Mimetic, coercive, and normative influences in institutionalization of organizational practices: the case of distance learning in higher education.
Creator: Caravella, Kristi D., College for Design and Social Inquiry, School of Public Administration
Abstract/Description: In this study, DiMaggio and Powell's (1983) institutional model of isomorphic change is hypothesized to explain the changes witnessed in educational organizations with regard to the acceptance, implementation and institutionalization of distance learning. In order to show the power of institutional theory in explaining organizational change over time, a comparative qualitative case study methodology is utilized. Document analysis and interviews are used to explore the utility of this...
Show moreIn this study, DiMaggio and Powell's (1983) institutional model of isomorphic change is hypothesized to explain the changes witnessed in educational organizations with regard to the acceptance, implementation and institutionalization of distance learning. In order to show the power of institutional theory in explaining organizational change over time, a comparative qualitative case study methodology is utilized. Document analysis and interviews are used to explore the utility of this isomorphic change model. Each research question seeks to explore different influences of institutional isomorphism, coercive, normative, and mimetic. DiMaggio and Powell (1983) suggest organizations converge on similar practices and behaviors and appear similar to like organizations over time. The appearance of change toward homogeneity is explored through the isomorphic change theory which indentifies three forces, coercive, normative and mimetic, influential in determining how adopted behaviors and pr actices become isomorphically accepted by the organizational field. Coercive isomorphism stems from political influence and organizational legitimacy, often conveyed through laws, regulations, and accreditation processes (or outside agency requirements); normative isomorphism is associated with professional values; and mimetic isomorphism is copying or mimicking behaviors that is a result of organizational response to uncertainty. By examining the organizational field for the presence of these forces and measuring the extent of these forces at various points in time one is able to explain convergence on regularized practices and institutionalized behaviors, or how an organizational field becomes institutionalized, around a particular idea or practice., The coercive, mimetic, and normative forces present in the field dictate institutionalization and theoretically produce an environment that induces organizational conformity, or homogeneity, through pressure to appear legitimate, competition, mandates associated with funding, and influential professional group and network values.
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Date Issued: 2011
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3169915
Subject Headings: Distance education, Influence of technological innovations on, Education, Political aspects, Organizational behavior, Diffusion of innovations
Format: Document (PDF)

Title: The Sisyphusian predicament: existentialism and a grounded theory analysis of the experience and practice of public administration.
Creator: Hollar, T. Lucas., College for Design and Social Inquiry, School of Public Administration
Abstract/Description: Public administration addresses issues that competing and aligning groups determine to be meaningful enough to address. However, there seems to be no shared universally objective ways of remedying anything. Everything is up for argument. Additionally, attempting to solve one set of problems often creates other connected problems and/or unintended consequences. So, public work ever [sic] never ends. This dissertation's purpose was to contribute a new theoretical understanding of the experience...
Show morePublic administration addresses issues that competing and aligning groups determine to be meaningful enough to address. However, there seems to be no shared universally objective ways of remedying anything. Everything is up for argument. Additionally, attempting to solve one set of problems often creates other connected problems and/or unintended consequences. So, public work ever [sic] never ends. This dissertation's purpose was to contribute a new theoretical understanding of the experience and practice of public administration. Its research addressed if and how a grounded existential theoretical framework could emerge that would help practitioners and scholars understand and describe public administrative efforts and experiences. Currently, there is no existential theory of public administration. This dissertation sought to initiate work in that direction. This dissertation employed a grounded theory methodology to collect information from Senior Executive Service (SES) members, to analyze the information for emerging concepts and theoretical relevance through constant comparison, and to discover/construct a theoretical framework for understanding public administrative efforts and experiences. "The grounded theory approach is a general methodology of analysis linked with data collection that uses a systematically applied set of methods to generate an inductive theory about a substantive area" (Glaser, 1992, p. 16)., This dissertation identified the emergence of three categories/themes that organized what the SES members were saying, doing, and perceiving. These categories include "the environment," "the work," and "the individual." The core category/theme, "the Sisyphusian predicament," theoretically unifies these categories/themes through a metaphorical application of existential concepts. It describes the issues administrators experience (never-endingness, boundedness, and finitude in the face of infinitude (managing the scope and scale of one's intentions; generating and authoring relevance, significance, and meaning; and the choice for metaphysical revolt/ microemancipation). There are scholarly and practicable applications of this framework. This dissertation contributes exploratory work towards developing a new theoretical alternative within public administration. It provides an alternative approach for viewing and understanding organizational processes within public organizations. Additionally, an existential approach facilitates a plurality of competing schools of thought wherein administrators can select approaches to decision making and acting on the basis of context and utility.
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Date Issued: 2008
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/165673
Subject Headings: Public administration, Philosophy, Public administration, Moral and ethical aspects, Administrative agencies, Management, Policy sciences, Public administration, Research, Methodology
Format: Document (PDF)

Public administration (4)	+ -
Government policy (3)	+ -
Contracting out (2)	+ -
Decision making (2)	+ -
Management (2)	+ -

Moral and ethical aspects (2)	+ -
Organizational behavior (2)	+ -
Patients (2)	+ -
Political aspects (2)	+ -
Services for (2)	+ -
AIDS (Disease) (1)	+ -
Administrative agencies (1)	+ -
Administrative responsibility (1)	+ -
Breast (1)	+ -
Cancer (1)	+ -
Diffusion of innovations (1)	+ -
Distance education (1)	+ -
Education (1)	+ -
FIrearms ownership (1)	+ -
Finance (1)	+ -
Finance, Public (1)	+ -
Firearms (1)	+ -
Firearms and crime (1)	+ -
Gun control (1)	+ -
HIV infections (1)	+ -
Health services accessibility (1)	+ -
Health services administration (1)	+ -
Influence of technological innovations on (1)	+ -
Infrastructure (Economics) (1)	+ -
Law and legislation (1)	+ -

Florida (1)	+ -
States (1)	+ -

New York Times. (1)	+ -
Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency Act of 1990. (1)	+ -
Wall Street Journal. (1)	+ -

School of Public Administration (7)	+ -
School of Criminology and Criminal Justice (2)	+ -
Agbodzakey, James K. (1)	+ -
Borkowski, Elizabeth. (1)	+ -
Caravella, Kristi D. (1)	+ -

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