This dissertation examines the organizational characteristics of support-level nongovernmental organizations (SNGOs). Described as the most important associational development of the twentieth century, SNGOs provide a link between two significant developments in management practice and theory. First is a call to extend management theory beyond its parochial roots and to redirect its focus toward cultural change and social justice. Second is an organizational revolution that is creating a global network of nongovernmental organizations. Examination of the characteristics of SNGOs offers opportunities to extend organizational theory into a new domain and to address issues of social justice, empowerment, and inclusion. The SNGOs considered in this research are nine Intermediary Funding Bodies (IFBs) included in the EU Peace Programme in Northern Ireland. The IFBs are an innovative mechanism for delivering EU funding directly to community organizations working to overcome conflict and division. Acting as intermediaries between the EU and community organizations on both sides of the prolonged conflict, the IFBs face a complex task of building bridges of peace in a turbulent and hostile environment. Q-methodology is used to explore the characteristics of the IFBs. More than thirty semi-structured interviews were conducted in Northern Ireland, and twenty-nine Q-sorts were completed by IFB staff and management. This data was analyzed using qualitative methods and factor analysis. Results are presented separately for the qualitative analysis of the interview data and the factor analysis of the Q-sort data. An additional chapter discusses and summarizes the combined findings. The results show the main factor determining organizational processes is the need to respond in two directions—upwards to funding agencies and downwards to community groups. This produces contradictory demands that are imported into the organizations as a set of internal tensions—legitimacy vs. independence, planning vs. responsiveness, control vs. autonomy, and accountability vs. flexibility. Different structures and capabilities have been developed by the IFBs to maintain organizational unity and integrity in response to these tensions. Four organization types are identified by the factor analysis. The characteristics of these types are discussed and it is argued that they represent different means for managing external tensions and maintaining internal control.

Mexico liberalized its banking system in 1989 and 1990 and privatized it from mid-1991 to mid-1992. This study first sets those institutional changes in the context of past Mexican financial development, examining the role of the financial sector in achieving macro balance and demonstrating the close relationship between changes in fiscal policy during the 1980's and financial liberalization. Next it examines the behavior of the banking sector and of the larger individual banks during the 1989-1993 period, arguing that especially after privatization these institutions behaved in risk-seeking ways that sought short-term profits at the expense of long-term viability. A remarkable part of this search for near-term profit was the very rapid expansion of consumer lending. The dissertation then turns to the behavior of the large private firms listed on the stock exchange, with particular attention to their rapid accumulation of dollar-denominated debt and peso-earning liabilities. It is argued that both bank lending and patterns of investment by firms were skewed to the nontraded sectors, which can certainly be attributed to the way that the pegged exchange shifted relative prices against traded goods, but which is nonetheless difficult to defend as a long-term strategy. These firms may have expected the kind of post-devaluation bailouts they received after the 1982 crisis. Finally these investigations are brought together to examine the macroeconomic coherence of Mexican government policy, and to root the failures of the liberalization process in the country's political economy. Orthodox financial liberalization theory is shown to make institutional assumptions about the real economy, and particularly about the behavior of large firms, that may not be warranted. If these assumptions do not hold financial liberalization may damage growth and stability.

This case study illustrates how agency bureaucrats within the Connecticut State Department of Education played a prominent role in crafting a comprehensive education policy agenda, launched by the Education Enhancement Act of 1986. This was an example of bureaucratically-driven state education reform in which leadership, a clearly articulated policy agenda, and a policy making model embedded in the notion of ideas and persuasion were instrumental in establishing, implementing, and sustaining that policy agenda over time. It is out of this case study that a theory of bureaucratic entrepreneurship emerges—that is, when non-elected public managers and professional staff devise successful strategies to persuade legislators and other constituency groups to accept their policy agenda, develop and sustain policy innovations over time, and devise policy instruments that rely on inducements and capacity-building to leverage changes in educational practice at the local school district level. This case study examines bureaucratic entrepreneurship within two contexts. First, a comparison of two state-level education reform attempts is made: the first a successful bureaucratically-driven policy initiative culminating in the Education Enhancement Act (EEA) of 1986 and the second being a largely unsuccessful reform effort launched by the business community in the early 1990s through the Commission on Educational Excellence in Connecticut (CEEC). Second, the development and evolution of Connecticut’s teacher standards initiatives, an outgrowth of the EEA of 1986, is examined to illustrate the prominent features of bureaucratic entrepreneurship, including the exercise of leadership, opportunistic behavior in the face of rapidly changing environmental circumstances, and engagement in “creative subversion” and risk-taking in order to pursue innovative research and development. This study concludes that (1) successful bureaucratically-driven education reform requires strong leadership and technical capacity, (2) bureaucratic entrepreneurship is critical to sustaining policy innovation over time, (3) bureaucratic entrepreneurs can be “grown” by creating a climate within an organization conducive to innovation, learning and group problem-solving and fostering conditions for “team entrepreneurship,” that is, when a collection of individuals combine their efforts to produce innovations, and (4) there is a strong role to be played by state departments of education in shaping educational public policy.

This study in fiscal sociology explores the extractive and distributive effects of the Massachusetts State Lottery (MSL) on the state's 351 cities and towns. In Massachusetts, lottery profits are distributed as local aid that is intended to have an “equalizing” effect. This investigation was prompted, in part, by political controversy over the MSL's redistributive impact. Critics of the MSL argue that it functions as a “reverse Robin Hood,” whereas proponents stress its “fiscal friendliness” to all communities—poor and wealthy alike. This study differs from most previous lottery research in two major respects. First, it examines the tax incidence of the MSL with regard to geopolitical communities, rather than individuals. Second, it examines the MSL's distributive effects in addition to its extractive effects. Conceptualization of lottery ticket expenditure as a property of communities allows for comparison of the dollar amount paid into the MSL system by a community in relation to the amount it receives back in the form of lottery aid. Multiple regression analysis strongly suggests that the relationship between community level of affluence and per capita ticket expenditure is curvilinear, that the proportion of community income spent on lottery tickets decreases as income increases, and that the number of lottery agents per capita decreases as community affluence increases. Although no evidence is found of a “reverse Robin Hood” pattern of redistribution across all communities, a “take from the poor and give to the rich” effect is noticeable with respect to some cities and towns. This research illuminates the Lottery as a mechanism whereby the State exerts power over both individuals and communities as consumers of lottery tickets, payers of the lottery tax, and purported beneficiaries of its proceeds. It demonstrates the fruitfulness of investigating the real, as opposed to purported, effects of state finance policies. By determining who taxation and expenditure policies really benefit, how they benefit, and to what degree, sociologists can illuminate their political content and demonstrate that they are powerful tools of the State—tools that may be used to serve the interests of particular social groups, be they economic classes or geopolitical communities.

Civil Service reform has swept through all levels of government during the last decade. These reforms call for greater managerial flexibility at the expense of civil servant employment security and tenure. This work examines the effects of these reforms on the psychological contract of various generations working in Florida's state government. The psychological contract can be defined as an exchange agreement of promises and contributions between two parties, the employee and employer, and includes an individual's beliefs regarding mutual obligations (Rousseau, 1990, 1995). Psychological contract theory is believed by many to be the most accurate explanation of the varied, albeit primarily negative, reactions of employees to job insecurity (King, 2000). The psychological contract becomes an important and appropriate framework to study employee perceptions of civil service reforms. In this research, three distinct literatures were reviewed to build a theory of worker perceptions based on generational cohort. First, a brief account of the civil service reform efforts taking place. From there, the work outlined streams of research associated with the psychological contract and generational differences. From there, gaps in the literature were identified and hypotheses proposed. The hypotheses fell into four groups: psychological contract obligations, job security, self-reliance, and loyalty/commitment levels. Age (birth year) was converted to generational cohort variables which were used in the exploration of generational differences. Analysis of Variance was used to identify the differences in means. The predicted theory of this research was that various generations hold differences in psychological contract perceptions, self-reliance factors, and various career and organizational commitment measures. This theory was only partially supported by the findings. The findings were significant in the area of continuance commitment. There was also significance found between the hypotheses and various control variables. Possible reasons for this are discussed. Employment conditions are changing rapidly in today's public and private work environments. Researchers have attempted to capture the effects of those changes on perceptions, including their effects on the psychological contract. This research contributes to a better understanding of civil service reform, psychological contract, and generational differences. Moreover, it highlights the need for additional research that will illuminate a more accurate conceptualization of the relationship between generation and worker perceptions. / 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, 2007. / April 23, 2007. / Motivation, Generation, Civil Service Reform, Psychological Contract / Includes bibliographical references. / Mary Ellen Guy, Professor Directing Dissertation; Pam Perrewe, Outside Committee Member; James Bowman, Committee Member; Kaifeng Yang, Committee Member.

The policy of the State of Florida recognizes high-level public administration as a profession and expects administrators to be competent and to practice managerial, political, and ethical roles. Conceptual frameworks of high-level administrators' credentials (knowledge and skills) and behaviors (managerial, political, and ethical roles) in public administration literature are reviewed. Operational definitions are developed for the concepts of professional credentials, managerial roles, political roles, and ethical roles. A model is presented which views a professional public administrator from two different perspectives: (1) knowledge and skills and (2) practices and views of managerial, political, and ethical roles. Hypotheses are developed for specific research questions. Survey instruments were developed and sent via the World Wide Web to State of Florida high-level agency administrators. The response rate was 32.9 percent. Overall, the sample was representative of the population, except that female respondents were under represented. Results indicate that Florida high-level administrators surveyed exhibit high professional credentials based on experience, education, training, political acuity, and public service attitudes. Results indicate that these administrators exhibit and place high importance on many of the expected behaviors or roles. Results fail to show the anticipated positive association between measures of professional credentials and professional behaviors. Results indicate little professional credentials and professional behavior differences in those administrators entering these high-level positions voluntarily (hired into the position) compared to those entering involuntarily (position was converted from the career service system). Overall, Florida high-level administrators exhibit the high level of professional competence and professional behaviors described in the public administration literature and prescribed in Florida public policies. Strengths and weaknesses of these administrators are discussed. Theoretical, policy, and practical implications of the findings are discussed as well as are the limitations and directions for future research. / 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, 2003. / October 20, 2003. / Senior Public Administrators, Ethical Roles, Political Roles, Managerial Roles, Professionalism, State Government / Includes bibliographical references. / Frances S. Berry, Professor Directing Dissertation; Charles J. Barrilleaux, Outside Committee Member; William Earle Klay, Committee Member; James S. Bowman, Committee Member.

Voluntary cooperative arrangements are being established among local governments for economic development purposes. However, there is a lack of empirical research that explains the conditions under which cooperative joint ventures are formed. Extending the Institutional Collective Action framework to the policy area of economic development, this dissertation explores how local government units overcome transaction costs that pose barriers to acting collectively. Survey research methods are used to collect data on intergovernmental relations from 425 local governments with a population of 10,000 or more in 12 metropolitan areas. A logistic regression model is used to test the extent to which a combination of community characteristics and intergovernmental network resources influence voluntary cooperation. The findings suggest that among the factors that influence the formation of joint ventures is frequent communication among economic development officials and planners, cooperative norms and trust, and the competitive development activity of local governments. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Urban and Regional Planning in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester, 2007. / July 19, 2007. / Economic Development, Social Capital / Includes bibliographical references. / Tim Chapin, Professor Directing Dissertation; Richard Feiock, Outside Committee Member; Charles Connerly, Committee Member.

State legislatures face many challenges in obtaining reliable information about the policy choices they face and the effectiveness of previously established programs, and they have limited ability to enforce agency compliance with program directives. To help address these challenges, most state legislatures have created oversight offices and have endowed them with significant resources and access to information. These offices provide program evaluation and policy analysis services to their parent legislatures, and their work is intended to help improve legislative decision making and oversight. However, these intended benefits will not be realized unless legislatures actually use the information produced by these offices. Research utilization literature has identified steps that the offices can take to promote use in legislative environments. These steps can be categorized into two overall strategies—developing strong networks with decision makers, and astute marketing of research products. However, there has been little empirical information on whether these strategies are actually being used, or whether when used are related to increased satisfaction with and use of research products in the legislative environment. This study bridges this gap and identifies and analyzes the strategies that state legislative oversight offices are using to promote use of their work in the legislative process, and assesses how differences in the offices' networking and marketing activities is related to how their work is valued and used by key stakeholders—legislative staff in leadership, appropriations, and committee positions. The institutional design of the offices—whether they are located within auditing or legislative units—and the research standards they have adopted— whether they conform to Government Auditing Standards which stress organizational independence or other standards that stress utility to stakeholders—are found to be key variables related to both the offices' utilization activities and legislative stakeholder satisfaction and use of their work products. The study advances scholarship relevant to knowledge utilization and the policy process and provides practical information that evaluators and policy analysts can use to increase their value and impact and serve as an effective voice speaking truth to power rather than a voice crying in the wilderness. / 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. / Fall Semester, 2006. / October 24, 2006. / Program Evaluation, Policy Analysis, Legislative Oversight, Utilization, Legislatures / Includes bibliographical references. / Frances Berry, Professor Directing Dissertation; Carol Weissert, Outside Committee Member; Lance deHaven-Smith, Committee Member; Earle Klay, Committee Member.

Fragmented local governmental units will cooperate to address needs that span across regional boundaries while retaining local autonomy. These efforts, referred to as institutional collective action (ICA), come forth when local governments voluntarily form institutional arrangements to address common goals. Multiple jurisdictions are seen as working together to enhance their own interests, while still contributing to the needs of the broader region. Such efforts allow local governments to augment the provision of their services and address citizens' demands where doing so on an individual basis may be more difficult, specifically when limitations exist that hinder governments from taxing and borrowing for service production. As with individual collective action, ICA is easier when the number of actors is small and homogenous, and when they share common goals. The costs of acting collectively must also be lower than the costs of individual actions. When these conditions are not met, barriers to ICA will exist leading to fewer incentives to cooperate. This problem creates a need for less voluntary mechanisms to address regional goals, while maintaining some measure of self governance. This research argues that regional special districts provide this mechanism. To explore this proposition, this dissertation investigates when and how local governments create regional special purpose governments. The specific focus is on county governments, and their choices to use multi-jurisdictional special districts when faced with barriers to institutional collective action. This question is addressed using descriptive and empirical analyses. To conduct the descriptive analysis, surveys were conducted among 18 special districts that explored the implications of barriers to voluntary cooperation on regional special district formation. The empirical portion of this study was conducted using data for 790 counties collected from the U.S. Census of Governments for the periods of 1992 and 2002. Logistic and Poisson regression analyses were used to analyze these data. The major lesson which was brought forth tells us that it is important to consider the implications of the service sector when examining special district usage. The consideration of barriers to institutional collective action revealed that conditions did not have uniform effects among the various service sectors. In order for various types to be used, regional needs had to exist; however, the extent of those regional needs were based upon specific contextual factors. / 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. / Spring Semester, 2008. / February 5, 2008. / Regional Governments, Urban Politics Government Institutions, Institutional Collective Action, Special Districts, Local Government Studies, Regionalism, County Governments / Includes bibliographical references. / Richard C. Feiock, Professor Directing Dissertation; Patrice Iatarola, Outside Committee Member; Lance deHaven-Smith, Committee Member; Gabriella S. Wolfson, Committee Member.

Charter schools have now been in operation for two decades in the U.S., and for 15 years in Florida. Florida took the third place in the U.S. in the number of charter schools operated and the student enrollment in 2010. This study examined the assumed effects of charter school policy on the public school system: charter school effect on student achievement in charter schools and in TPSs, and segregation effects and stratification effects on charter schools and traditional public schools (TPSs). I applied three perspectives to investigate charter school effect on student achievement: School effectiveness theory, Market competition theory, and Social inequality theory. The racial/ethnic segregation effect and the socio-economic stratification effect were examined longitudinally and cross-sectionally. Datasets of primary and secondary public schools and county educational and demographic information covering 1998 to 2010 were obtained from multiple sources: the Common Core of Data from NCES, the Florida School Indicator Report, the Florida Department of Education, Florida Statistics Abstract, and Census Bureau. Hierarchical linear modeling was utilized to explore charter school effect in different organizational levels and hierarchical multivariate linear modeling was used to take into account the closely correlated relationships of the demographic compositions in public schools. The analyses of student achievement in charter schools and traditional schools indicated that charter schools and traditional public schools are significantly different from each other, and that the school characteristics were more influential on the school performances than county characteristics or the year effects, especially in the higher grades. Some charter schools achieved better in some subjects and grades in that they started at the lower scores than TPSs but grew faster during the period of 1998-2010. However, the charter school effectiveness turned out to be insignificant or even negative when control variables were introduced such as educational factors and demographic compositions. Market competition theory could not explain the variations in schools' FCAT scores, while social inequality theory explained them better. The findings of this study did not support the School Effectiveness Theory nor the Market Competition Theory in charter school movement. Instead, Social Inequality Theory was proved to be relevant to understand the differences in public school academic achievement. The analyses of segregation and stratification effects showed that charter schools were more racially and socio-economically segregated, and that they exacerbated the segregation and stratification in traditional public schools. The analyses of the Dissimilarity Index (DI) distribution among charter schools and TPSs revealed that the demographic compositions in charter schools deviate more from the county means than do TPSs during the period of 1998 through 2009. Charter schools had much lower proportion of free/reduced price lunch program students than TPSs in every school level, which was negatively related to the percentage of white students but positively to the percentage of black students. The years of charter school policy adoption in a county have similar effects on both groups: The longer it was since a county introduced charter school policy, the fewer black students and the more white students would enroll in charter schools. Overall, charter schools were likely used as pockets for white flight and self-isolation as well and exacerbated socio-economic stratification in public schools. The analyses of charter school DIs supported the warnings of white flight, self-isolation, and socio-economic stratification (Carnoy, 2000; Frankenberg, Lee, & Orfield, 2003; Rivkin, 1994). Findings of this study suggested that the increasing proportion of black students and free/reduced price lunch program recipients have enrolled in TPSs for all school levels along the years during the period of 1998-2009, but that the percentages of white students in TPSs have decreased year by year even though the rates are small. The analyses implied that charter schools were likely to locate around TPSs that had a higher proportion of a certain demographic group: The higher proportion of a certain demographic groups in a certain area would induce charter schools targeting these groups. Hierarchical multivariate linear models (HMLM) were introduced to detect the relative relationships between demographic groups. The multivariate analyses suggested that middle school charters were likely to locate around the TPSs with more white students and fewer Hispanic students, while elementary charter schools opened more around the TPSs with fewer black students. The location and targeting strategies of charter schools affected also the racial/ethnic distributions in high TPSs, even though the relationship got weaker. The proportions of free/reduced lunch program students in TPSs havd a consistently and significantly negative influence on the proportions of white students and a positive influence on the percentages of black and Hispanic students in TPSs. The academic performances of TPSs were highly and negatively related to the proportion of black students, while the relationship becomes much weaker to the percentage of white students and neutral to that of Hispanic students. The cross-sectional multivariate analyses suggested that charter schools created more racially segregated educational institutes in public education in Florida. The racial/ethnic compositions in TPSs were closely interrelated to the issues of the socio-economic stratification and residential division (Carnoy, 2000; Frankenberg, et al., 2003; Rivkin, 1994). The comparisons of the explained variance proportions by HMLM models and those of other models revealed that the percentages of white students were much more sensitive to the socio-economic and residential factors than the proportions of black students were, while the proportions of Hispanic students were much more sensitive to the charter school factors. The findings of this study highlighted the critical role of social context in public educational policies and the importance of policy design. This study rediscovered the old but important principle that charter school policy makers need to take into account the expectable but ignored or unintended consequences of the policy in public education system and the impacts of the policy on the non-choosers in TPSs as well. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Public Administration and Policy in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester, 2012. / March 20, 2012. / Charter School, HLM, Policy Analysis, Public School, Segregation, Student Achievement / Includes bibliographical references. / Frances Stokes Berry, Professor Directing Dissertation; Betsy Jane Becker, University Representative; Ralph Brower, Committee Member; Lance deHaven-Smith, Committee Member.