This dissertation examines the role of agency in county level decision making regarding Wal-Mart development within Florida counties. Framed by the theories of principal-agent, local government decision making and open systems this research examines key factors that influence a decision to allow or disallow a Wal-Mart. The method Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) is employed to both theory test and theory build around the factors of agency, with the findings demonstrating that county poverty rates and staff recommendation are significant factors in a decision to allow a Wal-Mart. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Middle and Secondary Education in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Summer Semester, 2006. / June 14, 2006. / Local Government, QCA, Agency, Decision Making / Includes bibliographical references. / Nancy T. Davis, Professor Directing Dissertation; J. Anthony Stallins, Outside Committee Member; Penny J. Gilmer, Committee Member; Sherry A. Southerland, Committee Member.

This is a study to critically explain how Korean street-level fire service officials make sense of problematic working situations in which they find themselves. The study wanted to three interrelated questions. First, how do Korean street-level fire service officials, through the process of conscious meaning construction, enact their problematic situations and adjust their meanings to the enacted situations? Second, how do the officials consciously draw upon existing institutional practices in the constructions of meaning and develop these institutional practices through such meaning constructions? Third, how do they, through social interactions with others, accomplish the meanings of problematic situations? My answers to these questions were drawn from a grounded analysis of forty five sensemaking episodes that I collected from individual interviews. To clarify the ways in which my research participants had handled their unstructured working situations, the analysis included a multi stage iterative process. First, I examined their personal stories of the situations. Second, I developed codes inductively from their stories. Third, I generated theoretical assertions of the process in which they had constructed particular meanings of the problematic situations before them. As patterns and anomalies emerged, I used data to validate them in an iterative way, going back and forth between theory and data. Finally, the analysis concluded with a grounded model of the meaning construction (sensemaking) process. On the basis of such a data analysis, the study shows Korean street-level fire service officials' sensemaking process as one in which they consciously update the initial working relationship that they have to the physical things in their world of work, or actively construct a new dimensional working relationship with the physical things in-relation-to the social encounterers in the field of their work. / A Dissertation submitted to the Reubin O’D. Askew School of Public Administration and Policy in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester, 2006. / October 31, 2006. / Interpretive Understanding, Phenomenological Approach, Grounded Analysis, Relation Making, Meaning Construction, Sensemaking / Includes bibliographical references. / Ralph S. Brower, Professor Directing Dissertation; Susan C. Losh, Outside Committee Member; Mary E. Guy, Committee Member; Samuel M. McCreary, Committee Member.

What factors account for local institutional choices such as adoption of impact fees? Is there a pattern to impact fee adoptions? These questions are of critical importance because in the United States, local governments are primarily responsible for defining property rights concerning how people use land and providing basic public services to citizens. The theoretical framework to investigate impact fee adoption combines political market approaches based in interest group theories of property rights and diffusion theories of innovation. This framework identifies the local demanders and suppliers, intergovernmental institutions, administrative capacity, diffusion, and financial conditions. Empirical analysis focuses on adoption of impact fees—transportation, parks, fire/EMS, police/corrections, school, and library—in 66 Florida counties from 1977 to 2001, using event history analysis. The first impact fee in Florida was parks impact fees adopted by Broward County in 1977. The first ten adoptions occurred in counties located in the southern and central regions of Florida except for Holmes County, and the adoptions spread to the northern counties in the mid- and late 1980s. Counties have frequently changed impact fee schedules. Parks impact fees have been changed more often—about 4 times on average—than any other type of fees. The empirical results regarding determinants of impact fee adoptions provide several key lessons. First, the results suggest that interest groups such as high-income citizens and the development community have a significant influence on impact fee adoptions. Second, motivations of local government decision makers promote controversial impact fee adoptions such as school impact fees. Third, Florida counties experienced significant increase in the impact fee adoptions after the Growth Management Act of 1985 and case laws in 1983. Fourth, counties are more likely to adopt impact fees if more neighboring counties have adopted impact fees. Fifth, administrative capacity as a critical resource influences impact fee adoptions. Counties having employees with professional and skilled expertise are more likely to adopt impact fees. Sixth, previous studies on determinants of impact fee adoptions attributed the adoption of impact fees to local growth, especially population growth. The empirical findings provide consistent and strong effects of local growth on impact fee adoptions. / A Dissertation submitted to the Askew School of Public Administration and Policy in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Summer Semester, 2004. / July 6, 2004. / Fiscal Stress, Infrastructure, Land Use, Growth Manament, Geimpact Fees / Includes bibliographical references. / Richard C. Feiock, Professor Directing Dissertation; Keith Ihlanfeldt, Outside Committee Member; Frances S. Berry, Committee Member; Robert B. Bradley, Committee Member; Earle Klay, Committee Member; Gabriela S. Wolfson, Committee Member.

The achievement gaps between White and Black students remain prevalent in American public schools. To resolve the problem, many school districts have developed equity-centered practices to improve high school graduation rates. The purpose of this quantitative study was to determine whether the (a) duration of exposure to educational equity policies, (b) percentage of economically disadvantaged students, (c) percentage of students with disabilities, and (d) percentage of limited-English-proficient (LEP) students are predictive of high school graduation rates for Black students in large school districts. This study was grounded in Schneider and Ingram’s social construction of target populations theory. Archival data of 466 case files from the regulatory 4-year adjusted cohort graduation rates and duration of exposure to educational equity policies were evaluated using a one-way ANOVA and a multiple linear regression. A statistically significant ANOVA indicated that large school districts without educational equity policies in place were associated with the numerically largest mean level of high school graduation rates (M = 79.73), while large school districts with 4 or more years of having educational equity policies in place were associated with the numerically smallest mean level of high school graduation rates (M = 75.48). The negative regression relationship between the percentage of economically disadvantaged students variable and the outcome variable predicted that an increase in low income students (22%) results in a 3% decrease high school graduation rates for Black students. While expressing reservation in interpreting the students with disabilities variable, the LEP variable was not significant. The findings of this study could contribute to positive social change through public policy development to increase chances of closing the education divide in America.

A country’s institutional context determines how resource rents are managed. Where institutions are weak and resource rents are not productively managed, this is referred to as the institutions curse to emphasize the intermediate relationship between natural resources and underdevelopment via institutional quality. The international community brought forward transparency and accountability through Transparency and Accountability Initiatives as potential solutions to underdevelopment in natural resource rich countries. This paper explores whether the EITI, a transparency and accountability initiative, is enough to ameliorate the institutions curse. It relies on Kolstad and Wiig’s (2009a) theory on impartiality enhancing institutions and argues that sanctioning those who benefit from opaque transparency is important to ameliorate the institutions curse. Furthermore, that an independent civil society, that represents vulnerable host communities, must be supported in an effort to counter-balance the power that is mostly skewed to Trans National Oil Companies (TNOCs) and governments. Through a case study approach that focuses on Nigeria, this paper finds that the lack of enforcement and the lack of civil society independence and participation in the Nigerian EITI’s Multi-Stakeholder Initiative (MSI) are the major constraints that hinder the Nigerian Extractive Transparency Initiative (NEITI) success in achieving accountability. In addition, due to the persistent nature of institutions, the EITI and its focus on revenue transparency, is not enough to address the institutions curse. This paper thus recommends a global human rights approach that will connect the struggles of locals to international struggles in the form of a binding treaty alliance. A binding treaty alliance will ensure that TNOCs are held accountable and that there will be positive spillovers in countries that have weak institutions.

Economic development is always a central concern for local governments, and has become increasingly important as the federal role in this area has been reduced in the last two decades. More recently, county governments have extended their activities in order to be closer to the people having greater needs and preferences resulting from economic decline and suburbanization. Economic development has become a major priority among counties. This dissertation takes an encompassing approach to institutions that focus primarily on institutions as organization-level governing structures, but also views organizations and their choices of institutional structures as shaped by the larger institutional environments in which they are embedded. Local organizations have obvious importance for development priorities, policies, and success, but we know very little about the organizations and institutions for promoting local growth, or how and why they have chosen and changed over the past two decades. Especially, there is greater importance of local organizations in counties, because they have larger resource bases than municipalities, and stronger local identification which can facilitate economic development programs and policies. This study asks these three questions focusing on organizational choices for economic development in U.S. counties. How do communities organize themselves to promote economic development? Have county governments changed their organizational arrangements for promoting economic development? What accounts for organizational choice in three dimension of county economic development organizations: 1) internal organizations in departmental function; 2) locus of active organizations; 3) regional partnership organizations? With 500 respondents of the survey for statistical analyses, in internal organizations of county governments, the dominant choice was to place the department under the control of the county commission, administrator or manager, while the second was a separate department type in 2009. Also, the results indicate that counties with economic decline rely on separate type to robust economies, and specific interests and inter-local networks influence change of organizational arrangements positively in the structure of county governments. In the locus of development authority, public organization was the most dominant organizational arrangement for economic development in counties. Public-private organization was the second in 2009. In addition, the results of statistical analyses show that counties with economic decline and a reformed form of government rely more on public-private organizations to promote economic condition, while stronger environmental interest choose public organizations as the active actor for county economic development. Specific interests (pro-development interest and pro-environment interest) have affected change of development groups for the last 10 years. In 2009, about 80% of county governments joined in regional partnership organizations. The analysis indicates that stronger environmental interest, a reformed form of government, and a closer inter-local network are positively related with participating in the regional partnership organizations. Also, specific interests (pro-development interest and pro-environment interest) and a reformed form of government have made the county governments affiliate with the regional organizations between 1999 and 2009. Finally, this dissertation confirms that counties have chosen and changed their organizations for economic development reflecting public demands, specific interests, and inter-local relationships. / A Dissertation submitted to the Reubin O'D. Askew School of Public Administration and Policy in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester, 2009. / October 26, 2009. / Economic Development, Organizational Choice, Local Governance / Includes bibliographical references. / Richard C. Feiock, Professor Directing Dissertation; Charles Barrilleaux, University Representative; Lance deHaven-Smith, Committee Member; Keon-Hyung Lee, Committee Member.

Community-based care networks have become more prevalent in health and human services over the past twenty years (Rice 2001; Romzek and Johnston 2002; Smith and Smyth 1996; Provan and Milward 1995, 2001; Lynn 1996), spurred on by the twin trends to privatize substantial service delivery and decentralize social services to local communities. Research has flourished to study how these networks operate and what types of performance outcomes result from their operation. Within the field of public management, network research has evolved from a study of policy implementation to discussing types of networks, management skills, and even the impact of networking on broader agency goals. While researchers who study interorganizational relationships provided new insights into the design of public networks (e.g., Goldsmith and Eggers 2004; Keast et al. 2004; Klijn and Koppenjan 2006) or suggested approaches to managing the coordination process in network-settings (e.g., Whetten 1981; Kickert et al. 1997; Lynn, Carolyn, and Hill 2001; Agranoff and McGuire 2003), their analysis has generally failed to capture empirically the dynamic processes of network development although there are exceptions (e.g., Ring and Van de Ven 1992; Romzek and Johnston, 2002; Agranoff and McGuire, 2003; and Mandell and Keast, 2008). Through extensive fieldwork and using a variety of theoretical literatures, this study develops a framework of three stages of network development, using the example of community-based care (CBC) networks in Florida that deliver children's welfare and protective services. In Florida, the state Department of Children and Families has awarded contracts to formally designated lead agencies (including nonprofit, private and public sector agencies) in twenty two districts to coordinate and manage the delivery of services through service providers that contract with the lead agency. This CBC network has existed since 1997 and thus a comparative case study assessment of that development process is timely and able to capture the dynamic development of the CBC networks. This dissertation builds a comprehensive framework for community-based network governance. I posit that there are three orders of the network development process: Order One is network configuration; Order Two is network coordination, and Order Three is network self-regulation. In the first sage—network configuration—the network managers focus on assessing the internal and external conditions of the potential network, and then selecting the best fitting network governance structure to fit those conditions. Important conditions related to the external community include market competition and community resources, while the internal conditions include prior cooperation experience, resource dependence, and homophily. Theoretical insights from population ecology and transaction cost economics are used in this framework. In the second stage—network coordination—managers draw upon incentives and sanctions from theories of performance management, psychology, principal agency theory, social coordination, and stewardship theory to build strong coordination and performance mechanism so the network achieves is goals. The third stage is called network self-regulation, and draws on social capital and public management theories for how lead agency managers involve middle managers, attend to network stability issues and bring all the service provider partners into a close working relationship to continue improving operations and strategic goal achievement. The study answers three major questions that relate to the three order network governance framework: 1. How does one understand and describe the three stages of network development, the network configuration order, the network coordination order, and the network self-regulation order as they are linked together in a CBC network system? 2. What are the critical internal and external conditions of the CBC networks affecting network development direction as well as network configuration? What type of network configuration and what modes of network coordination are important for explaining how and why CBC network systems developed and are maintained over time? What relationships exist among these factors that impact the CBC network development over time? 3. What network developmental strategies and managerial approaches are used to drive the network development process from one stage to another? The dissertation finds empirical support for the three network development stages, and includes the development of twelve propositions that should be further tested through larger samples of networks and with different types of networks. The case studies allow us to detail a variety of coordination activities that are crucial for the successful achievement of the second order network coordination stage and the subsequent development of the third order network self-regulation stage. Finally, the dissertation develops two typical process frameworks called the linear development process, and the recursive development process, that describe the issues and tribulations that networks face depending on whether they begin with weak and/or strong internal and external conditions as they develop towards having both internal and external conditions strong which should result in the best functioning and performing community-based care networks. / A Dissertation submitted to the Reubin O'D. Askew School of Public Administration and Policy in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester, 2009. / April 7, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references. / Frances S. Berry, Professor Directing Dissertation; T. K. Ahn, Outside Committee Member; Richard Feiock, Committee Member; Kaifeng Yang, Committee Member.

THE ABSTRACT IS STILL UNDER REVISION. IT WILL BE COMPLETED BEFORE THE NEXT SUBMISSION. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Political Science in partial fulfillment of the Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester 2016. / March 2, 2016. / Complex Governance, Environmental Policy, Public Policy / Includes bibliographical references. / John T. Scholz, Professor Directing Dissertation; Frances S. Berry, University Representative; Eric A. Coleman, Committee Member; Richard C. Feiock, Committee Member.

As many as 61% of veterans have sought reintegration services after the Transition Assistance Program (TAP) to help them cope with culture shock. TAP is not designed to address cultural transition. However, culture shock has resulted in disassociating behavior, unemployment, and homelessness in the veteran community. The purpose of this study was to identify the unmet reacculturation needs of post-active duty veterans in Chester County, Pennsylvania, who have utilized the United States’ Department of Defense’s TAP. Using an ethnographic approach, this study identified the extent that the TAP helps 13 post-active duty veterans obtain the autonomy stage of culture shock theory to the extent of career transition preparation only. In areas of reacculturation, veterans reported feeling on their own to manage mounds of paperwork during a perceived pointless “check the box” out process course set to calibrate an individual to civilian life through “toxic positivity.” This study found that veterans do not perceive separation from the military as solely a career change but as a cultural and lifestyle change. TAP does not address the needs of cultural and/or lifestyle changes, which impedes veterans' reacculturation through autonomy obtainment. It is recommended that TAP expand the application of 10 U.S.C. §1142(b)(10) to include cultural transition as a part of the transition plan. Addressing veterans' culture shock will help reduce the 20 veteran suicides per day due to readjustment issues leading to positive social change.

A key challenge facing developing countries is the high failure rate of electronic government (e-government) programmes. Since its inception, e-government has been implemented globally with the aim that it will enhance the quality-of-service delivery, transform government's internal and external processes and make the public sector more effective and efficient. However, the majority of e-government initiatives have failed to meet their objectives, particularly in developing countries. Therefore, this research considers the factors facilitating and inhibiting the successful implementation of e-government in developing countries. The methodology adopted for the thesis was a qualitative research approach. Secondary data was collected through a literature review of various sources, namely government publications, annual reports compiled by international development agencies and relevant books. To address the research question, I identified literature from journal articles with expertise in information systems such as the Electronic Journal for E-government. The research findings indicate that e-government in developing countries is impacted by various infrastructural, financial, political, socio-economic, organisational and human related aspects. Some of these include the digital divide, resistance to change, limited ICT skills and a lack of robust regulatory frameworks. The study concludes that successful e-government does not solely rest on technology. Instead, developing countries need to understand the impact of the various local contextual factors. These are the fundamental aspects that must be considered during the strategic design of e-government initiatives to ensure they are appropriate for and relevant to local conditions.