published_or_final_version / Asian Studies / Master / Master of Arts

published_or_final_version / Urban Studies / Master / Master of Social Sciences

published_or_final_version / Urban Planning / Master / Master of Science in Urban Planning

Thesis (B.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning, 1976. / MICROFICHE COPY AVAILABLE IN ARCHIVES AND ROTCH / Bibliography: leaves 66-67. / by Carl Raymond Strauss. / B.S.

There have been various approaches to studying the effectiveness of government performance in public administration. While some have focused on broad organizational factors, others have taken an individual level approach by applying concepts and methods from psychology and behavioral economics. This three-essay dissertation continues this latter approach by examining the role of cognitive mechanisms in explaining citizen attitudes toward government performance as well as collaborative behaviors in the public sector. The first essay explored the role of detailed versus abstract mental construals in understanding the relationship between expectations of public service performance and attitudes toward a government. Type of thinking, when it fit well with the information about either how or why public services were provided, was predicted to produce more positive attitudes toward government than in the absence of fit. However, these predictions were not confirmed. The second essay induced either an abstract or a detailed mode thinking in participants. Because abstract thinkers are more likely to focus on the desirability of outcomes, and detailed thinkers are more likely to focus on the feasibility of outcomes, it was predicted that abstract thinking, compared to detailed thinking, would create higher expectations of public services and lower perceived government performance. The findings were inconclusive. The final essay, combining prospect theory and expectancy-disconfirmation concepts, proposed a new model testing the relationship between citizen attitudes and collaborative behavior. Using a cross-sectional data set of US citizens, the results revealed a predicted non-linear relationship between citizen satisfaction with government performance and co-production.

This study is on coproduction as a governing policy instrument. Coproduction can be understood as the joint production of services by local officials and individual citizens intended to raise the quality and or amount of service provision. The concept of coproduction as developed in this study suggests that urban services are not simply created by officials and delivered to a passive public. Rather that actions of citizens are an integral part of the service production process. The study purposes are two-fold: (1) to construct a model of coproduction which provides a basis by which citizen involvement in the provision of public services can be fully understood and appreciated; and (2) to examine the usefulness of this model by using it to frame and guide evaluative research on a specific program which targets coproductive participation of citizens. The research examined efforts to implement a program to encourage recycling by residents in multifamily complexes in the City of Portland by involving the direct participation of the managers of the complexes. The research conducted in this study addressed both the inputs and outcomes of citizen involvement in coproduction. Findings of this research are suggestive of the potential importance of both inclusion and volition to furthering citizen involvement in the coproductive process. The level of citizen involvement in producing the programmatic outcomes was by most measures demonstrated to be very important. The results of the investigation in demonstrating the importance of involvement in coproduced programs in generating broader levels of community awareness and involvement, however, were not as conclusive. The model of coproduction developed in this study provides a potentially useful conceptualization of the process and outcomes of coproduction. The empirical investigation provides an assessment of the nature and strength of the relationship between citizen involvement and the coproductive process in the case of Portland's multifamily recycling program. Both the economic and civic considerations of coproduction which were specified and measured in the research contribute to a number of observations about coproduction as a policy instrument leading to several policy recommendations for programs which are built on citizen involvement.

The main problem investigated is how successful Australia???s citizen soldiers would have been in fulfilling either their anti-invasion or their anti-raid roles between 1919 and 1939. The organization, command, training, equipment, social composition, recruitment and retention of Australia???s citizen soldiers are examined in an effort to discover the solution to this problem. The conclusion reached is that Australia???s citizen soldiers could not have fulfilled their roles, the nature of which was widely debated by British and Australian defence planners because of their differing threat perceptions. Inter-Service rivalry over money also encouraged this debate. Basically, the A.M.F. did not have the equipment and trained troops to enable it to concentrate in time to repel a Japanese raid or invasion. Motor vehicles could have provided this mobility but their expense was prohibitive. However, in other respects the Military Board failed to make the best use of its resources. Slight changes in organization and the command structure might have made the C.M.F., once concentrated, more efficient and better able to fight the Japanese. More attention paid to ensuring that training was imaginative and interesting then might have led to higher retention rates, thereby eliminating the expensive and wasteful requirement for constant recruiting campaigns

Urban decay has become a serious problem in many countries around the world, and urban renewal has been widely adopted as an important national strategy to encounter such problem. After decades, public participation as a soft part was taken into account to supplement the physical reconstruction. In developed countries and regions such as Hong Kong, Singapore, U.K., etc, the spirit of public participation has permeated in the whole society, and has been applied in the urban renewal process, while in developing countries such as Mainland China, public participation is more like a slogan. In the real practice, to complete urban renewal as fast as possible, participation is generally ignored by the government, and the public do not have the consciousness of participation. General conditions and specific cases of public participation in urban renewal in both Mainland and Hong Kong are illustrated. In this dissertation, however, unlike most scholars’ judgment, advantages of Mainland’s mode are confirmed, and disadvantages of Hong Kong public participation are a little different from common argument. Based on literature review and international best practices, four factors are extracted to establish an ideal framework of public participation in urban renewal, namely special executive agency, comprehensive and detailed legislations, public’s consciousness of participation and rich free social resources, which mainly refers to non-government organizations. Recommendations to both Mainland and Hong Kong will be proposed on account of the model in the end of the dissertation. / published_or_final_version / Urban Planning and Design / Master / Master of Science in Urban Planning

This master thesis analyses two citizen initiatives; the flood action plan of LLanddowror, Wales and the mount plan of the Overdiepse Polder, the Netherlands. It uses the collaboration theory, the ladder of citizen participation, cross-scale interaction and community resilience to explain the role of citizens in flood risk management. The aim of this research is to see how governments facilitate citizens and if culture and context influence the roles of governments and citizens. The Welsh system is bottom-up with an increasing role for market and civil society to take responsibilities. Citizens generally insure themselves against flood damage. The Welsh system has enhanced community engagement and creating awareness is important. Dealing with big strategic issues seems to be difficult. The Dutch flood governance is more top-down which means less room for citizen initiatives. Citizens are not insured for flood damage since the government profiles itself responsible for floods therefore awareness amongst citizens is low. The Dutch system has benefits when dealing with large scaled projects but has issues with creating awareness as well as engaging citizens in water development. Assumingly there are opportunities for both countries to learn from each others’ way of dealing with flood risk management and citizen engagement.

published_or_final_version / Urban Studies / Master / Master of Social Sciences