<p>The Incident Command System (ICS) exists as the nationwide standard for on-site incident management, as called for under the National Incident Management System (NIMS). However, the effectiveness of ICS is debated, both for its systemic efficacy as a response model and for its inconsistent application. Since the development of ICS, individual responders have trained to work together as Incident Management Teams (IMTs). Even though little research exists on IMTs, their use has increased widely since the release of the NIMS. The alternative to IMTs is implementing ICS through a collection of individuals in an ad hoc manner, often referred to as an Emergent Multi-Organizational Network (EMON). This study strives to determine the impact of IMTs versus EMONs on the effectiveness of emergency and disaster response. It is hypothesized that the use of IMTs will increase the perceived effectiveness of a response, specifically in the application of the Incident Command System. The population for this study is emergency and disaster responders at large, regardless of disciplinary or jurisdictional demographics. The sample population is individual responders comprising both members and non-members of Incident Management Teams. The responders were from across the four state area of FEMA Region VII (Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska). Non-IMT responders serve as a control group of EMONs to determine whether IMT membership has any effect on response. This study is limited in that it is not based on specific responses. Instead, respondents provide feedback to a survey based on what their normal actions were for their last biggest response.

A variety of archaeological Field Evaluation techniques are used by Curatorial Archaeologists in England to assess archaeological remains prior to implementing strategies for their protection through Town and Country Planning or Scheduled Monument Consent procedures. Yet the effectiveness of these techniques and methodologies applied have not previously been quantitatively tested. This innovative research uses Process Modelling to recognise the Decision-making processes within current archaeological Field Evaluation practice. This allows an application of Decision Analysis, a formal theoretical approach to Decision-making, to be used to identify thirteen Decision-making Points (DMPs) and DMP 12b is selected from these as the key point at which the success of Field Evaluation techniques can be tested. Data from a statistically sound Case Study sample of 100 development-led archaeological interventions is recorded using new characterisation and quantitative measurement methodologies. This information is fed into the Process Model of Decision-making Point 12b to provide a measured degree of confidence in the effectiveness of a range of techniques and methodologies. Decision Matrices are produced which show that it is Logically Unsound to rely on Field-walking or Geophysical Survey to identify the type and date of archaeological features. Even Trial Trenching, the most effective technique, can only produce good Performance Scores for the i, dentification of feature types on less than 32% of the Case Study sites. Statistical Analysis of Trenching methodologies shows that an increase to at least a 10% sample size is required for acceptable performance improvements. This research changes the way we look at archaeological Decision-making with the identification of previously unrecognised Conditions of Incomplete Knowledge at DMP 12b. Two original new concepts (Local Locational Factors and Past Landscape Use Patterns) are introduced as tools to assist with these, and their utility for improvements in performance using Predictive Modelling is also explored to provide a body of archaeological research to stimulate the profession and its operators to advance our knowledge of Decision-making into the 2lst Century.

<p> In her maiden speech in the House of Commons in February 1960, Mrs. Margaret Thatcher introduced a Public Bodies (Admission to Meetings) Bill whose purpose, she asserted, was 'that of guarding the rights of members of the public by enabling the fullest information to be obtained for them in regard to the actions of their representatives upon local authorities'. This private member's Bill was amended, then passed by Parliament and came into force in June 1961. Open government as envisaged by the 1960 Thatcher Act is the subject of this thesis. Its practice is studied in the early 1970s in four English boroughs - Ipswich, West Bromwich, Bolton and Preston. Each council had a different variant of holding council and/or committee meetings open to the public and/or press, and of appointing dedicated press relations officers to spotlight openness. The impact of Labour or Conservative Party control of the borough councils on open government is assessed. A total of 55 councilors, town clerks and other officers in the four boroughs were interviewed and 181 respondents serving as elected councilors returned mail questionnaires which explored the relationship between local authorities, the public and the press. Contrasting perceptions of participatory democracy and openness at the local level emerge, this study finds, consistent with the opaque character of Thatcher's 1960 Bill.</p>

Lobbyists for hire - commercial lobbyists - are a small, distinct,, accepted but minor addition to the dramatis personae of UK public policy-making. Their differentiating feature,, marking them off from other types of lobbyist., is that they are for hire and it is the feature which is the least previously researched. There is little explicit theory of commercial lobbying: it is best accounted for as an implication of neo-pluralism. Through primary fieldwork amongst them and the two groups with whom they interact - clients and decisionmakers - the nature of their hiring is analysed. They are mostly hired by large businesses and less so by public sector interests facing change. Clients show varying propensities to hire and services hired in by clients can be grouped under four headings. Commercial lobbyists are client-led and have no independent political influence. They are businesses seeking market share,, offering only what hirers want. Their work can be viewed through the prism of two ideal types: backgrounder and foregrounder. On balance, they work on the processes of policy-making rather than its contents; are less rather than more visible in the policy process; more reactive than proactive in their client relationships. They have a range of negative and positive relationships with decision-makers, who accept them in terms of supplying information otherwise difficult to access. There is no demonstrated methodology for evaluating their contribution to policy outcomes. The data suggests that this contribution is minor. But this 'minor' conclusion has to be qualified when looked at from the hirers' viewpoint: for them the hiring may help yield competitive advantage. Commercial lobbyists are corporate accessories and the source of any concern about their practices and about asymmetrical access to decision-makers lies in the nature of their relationships with other more substantial players in the UK policy process. Their role will be better understood if this process is more transparent and open.

Within a Gramscian analysis, concepts of hegemony, passive revolution and organic intellectuals are employed to investigate and theorise the New Right think tanks' critique of English local government. Unlike other accounts, it is argued that the New Right think tanks successfully modernised traditional Conservative party concerns that elected local government was susceptible to demands for social welfare and of bureaucrats and politicians self-seeking efforts. The Gramscian analysis further suggests that in a highly centralised state elected local government was never only concerned with locality but was often embroiled in the statecraft strategy if the dominant bloc. Previously when the dominant hegemony had been endangered, elected local government has been usefully deployed to resolve social tensions. This strategy however, has been problematic and has been destructive of the relative independence of elected local government. More generally, elected local government's decisive role in civil society means that it too has become a site where counter hegemonic projects have clustered. During the 1980s, such tensions become critical. The organic intellectuals associated with Thatcherism, the New Right think tanks, acted as a clarion for demands to end elected local government's role in providing social welfare that effectively questioned its existence. Elswhere in a parallel development increased regulation of elected local government by the centre restricted the activities of local authorities, a strategy that also adversly affected those who supported the dominant bloc's hegemony.

The thesis focuses on Local Government duties and powers for enabling energy and sustainability projects in England and Wales. It establishes a theoretical understanding for well-being in international law, European law and a pragmatic approach on how legal and policy instruments should be interpreted when assessing obligations for energy and sustainability. It then illustrates how various objectives are currently delivered across Europe. This leads to a theoretical and legal context for council members and officers working in local government with both mandatory duties and permitted powers available to advance the carbon emissions and fuel poverty agenda in their communities. The thesis evaluates the implications of ultra vires and judicial review on local authority behaviour in hand with the Local Government Act 1999 (Best Value) and suggests the combination has restricted positive action by the majority of local authorities in areas crucial to the well-being of many vulnerable residents. Compounding this, the subsequent Local Government Act 2000 (Powers of Well-Being) is currently underused due to a lack of legal certainty about their interpretation or realisation of their potential to address substantive community issues. To help counter the issue the thesis provides a theoretical context and working definition for energy and sustainability in local government which aligns Aristotelian thought and the principles of sustainable development. Then a practical example illustrates how energy and sustainability projects could be used to achieve wider community well-being. The thesis concludes by offering local government is under an implied duty to promote well-being and it should not defer actions on the grounds of the absence of a mandatory duty in the area. It must look to its history in public health reform in order to recognise the substantive issues of the day involving energy and poverty. It must become more outward looking, exploratory and adventurous in scope and find the political will to address the issues and the moral courage to direct resources to long term solutions.

This study examines the impact of environmental variables and organizational characteristics on minority bureaucratic representation in American municipalities. / A random sample of 111 American municipalities with populations of over 25,000 was chosen from U.S. census data. The base year for the analysis is l977. / After a comprehensive background, definitions of representation bureaucracy and affirmative action are drawn from the literature to provide rather explicit parameters for the analysis. Affirmative action, as a public personnel policy, is viewed as a contemporary means for achieving a representative bureaucracy. / There is first a concern for describing the municipal occupational representation of minorities. This descriptive section of the research addresses such questions as: (1) What is the occupational distribution of minorities? (2) In what occupations are minorities most represented? and (3) How do blacks and white females compare with regards to occupational representation? Second, there is a concern for generalizing these findings to U. S. municipalities. / The study tests hypotheses relating to organizational and environmental variables with the assumption that they would have a significant impact on minority bureaucratic representation in American cities. The relationship between these variables and their respective impact on municipal minority representation constitutes an ecological orientation. / This study shows that minorities tend to be located in lower status jobs. The most significant ecological factor that explains black bureaucratic representation is the percentage of blacks in the municipal population. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 41-02, Section: A, page: 0801. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1980.

This study was undertaken to examine the extent to which web-based transaction technology has diffused in small North Florida nonprofit organizations and to study what, if any, relationship exists between the adoption of web-based transaction technology and the adoption of other technologies in these organizations. The study also examined the nature and frequency of strategic technology planning in these organizations, and their relationship to the adoption of web-based transaction technology. This work is important and necessary as a means of understanding how popular, useful, and potentially powerful technologies are introduced and used in small organizations, to understand what, if any, technological complexities may be associated with the adoption of this potentially powerful technology. We also seek to understand the different formal and informal means by which these nonprofit organizations consider, then move to introduce and set permanently into organizational habit patterns, new technologies. / A Dissertation submitted to the Askew School of Public Administration and Policyin partial fulfillment of therequirements for the degree ofDoctor of Philosophy. / Degree Awarded: Summer Semester, 2008. / Date of Defense: April 21, 2008. / Information Technology, Technology, Strategy, Strategic Planning / Includes bibliographical references. / Frances Stokes Berry, Professor Directing Dissertation; Charles Barrilleaux, Outside Committee Member; Ralph Brower, Committee Member; William Earle Klay, Committee Member.

One of today's more highly sensitive and controversial areas of human relations in the workplace is sexual harassment. The news media turn charges of sexual harassment into front page sex scandals, which create problems for employers as well as the individuals involved. / The numbers of women in the workforce have been increasing rapidly, and they are entering occupations previously closed to them, providing more opportunities for sexual harassment to occur. Changing attitudes toward sex by both women and men are impacting their relations in the workplace; and the women's movement seeks to sensitize women to problems of unwanted sexual attention at work, establish that it is illegal, and change men's behavior. / This study reviews national information on sexual harassment and analyzes data from a random sample of female employees of the State of Florida, to determine whether sexual harassment of women is a serious problem in the workplace. Determinations are made on how widespread sexual harassment of female employees is, what forms of attention women report are problems, and what personal and work related characteristics result in increased reports of unwanted sexual attention. Hypotheses are empirically tested on women's feelings about their experiences with unwanted sexual attention and the types they have experienced and the relationships between job related and personal characteristics and reports of sexual harassment. / The establishing, through case law and issuance of guidelines by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, that sexual harassment is illegal under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, is analyzed. The study explores the appropriateness of current national public policy and the needs for action at the state and national levels for changes in law. Consideration is given to the obligations of employers to provide a workplace free of unwanted sexual attention, and recommendations are made for actions by employers to protect themselves from unnecessary complaints, and attendant expenses, and to carry out their legal obligations. The dissertation concludes that the ultimate goal of public policy and employer actions should be a higher level of dignity and respect for all persons. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 43-02, Section: A, page: 0543. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1982.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of four ecological factors upon the attitudes of Saudi students toward work values. The ecological factors are divided into two types: informational factors consisting of education and mass media consumption, and societal factors consisting of religious commitment and tribal attachment. On the other hand, the work values examined in the study consist of the following: (1) locational mobility, (2) occupational mobility, (3) impartiality, (4) technical skills receptivity, and (5) time importance. / For the purpose of examining the correlation between the two sets of variables, data were collected in the Spring of 1981 utilizing a 54 item questionnaire distributed to 500 respondents, mainly university students. / Nine scales were developed to measure the nine variables examined in this study. A cross-tabulation (Gamma and R) test was employed to determine the strength of correlation, if any, between the ecological factors and the students attitudes toward work values. / The result of this empirical investigation was useful in a sense that it can be utilized as a basis of classification for the four ecological factors. The four ecological factors were divided into three categories based on the nature of correlation they have had upon the attitudes of Saudi students toward work values. They include: (1) passive factors including those which had no correlation with the attitudes of students toward work values. Factors classified under this category included education and mass media consumption. (2) Positive factors including those which were positively correlated with the attitudes toward work values. Religious commitment was found to be the only factor that can be classified under this category. (3) Negative factors including those which were negatively correlated with the attitudes toward work values. Tribal attachment was found to be the only factor that can be classified under this category. / Such findings have led us to emphasize the urgent need of reviewing such useful mechanism as the educational system and the media of mass communication in order to be rearranged utilizing the deeply rooted progressive values of the religion which have been empirically found effective motivators of people to achieve higher standard levels of productivity. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 42-12, Section: A, page: 5239. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1982.