The use of performance information is the backbone of performance management. Performance information use refers to the willingness of public managers or other relevant stakeholders to incorporate quantitative or qualitative data in their decision-making. Both routine and nonroutine performance information is considered essential in managers’ decision making. Understanding the organizational factors that motivate public managers to use performance information is an important topic in the literature and practice of performance management. Although the number of studies on information use is growing, little is known about the impact of Organizational Social Capital (OSC). OSC is composed of the sub-dimensions of social interaction, trust, and shared goals. The main argument of this study is that OSC fosters performance information use in public administrations. It is expected that departments with high levels of organizational social capital are more likely to use both routine and nonroutine performance information. To test the hypothesized effect, department heads, middle managers, and other individuals with a supervisory role from 513 Florida County Government departments were surveyed. Furthermore, interviews, focus groups, and analysis of secondary data were performed to provide the context and the narrative surrounding the hypothesized effect. Analysis of the survey data reveals evidence in support of the hypothesized effects. Furthermore, the comparative case study analysis shows the existence of substantial differences in the history, background, organizational culture, and management between the two counties. The main findings show how reorganization processes as well as a lack of leadership may have detrimental effects to organizational social capital. Organizational social capital could be considered a relevant predictor of performance information use and thus deserves further attention from both researchers and practitioners.

This study examines how public management practitioners in small and medium-sized Florida cities perceive globalization and its impact on public management practice. Using qualitative analysis, descriptive statistics and factor analysis methods, data obtained from a survey and semi-structured interviews were studied to comprehend how public managers view the management and control of their municipalities in a time of globalization. The study shows that the public managers’ perceptions of globalization and its impact on public management in Florida’s small-medium cities are nuanced. Whereas some public managers feel that globalization has significant impacts on municipalities’ viability, others opine that globalization has no local impact. The study further finds that globalization processes are perceived as altering the public management functions of decision-making, economic development and service delivery in some small-medium cities in Florida as a result of transnational shifts, rapidly changing technologies, and municipalities’ heightened involvement in the global economy. The study concludes that the globalization discourse does not resonate among some public managers in Florida’s small-medium cities in ways implied in extant literature.

The permitting process to determine whether high volume hydraulic fracturing (HVHF) should be allowed in New York State has been controversial and protracted. There have been intense disputes between those who see HVHF as an economic benefit and those who assert it will jeopardize health and the environment. Using the case study research method, perceptions of directly affected stakeholders regarding the issues, benefits and limitations associated with the public participation process were explored. Purposive sampling yielded participants from the natural gas industry, municipal governments, local landowners and residents. Data collection methods involved in-depth interviews, focus groups and document analysis. Since the HVHF conflict concerned a future possibility of environmental degradation, theoretical foundations included complex systems and green ideology, the enactment of power and social dominance, environmental conflict resolution, and principles of collaborative management. Findings demonstrate that the public participation process was embedded in a traditional top-down policy development approach that did not accommodate conditions of high uncertainty, nor did it allow for the broader and deeper discourse needed when development involves socio-economic and environmental justice issues. Implications include the potential to apply principles and methods of collaborative management typically used for natural resource management. In particular, the adaptive co-management approach provides a framework for managing issues that require problem solving over time, an essential missing element of the current HVHF stakeholder engagement process where diverse stakeholders identified issues of trust, empowerment, rights and fairness.

Effective citizenship practice in the United States has several important characteristics, which can provide the foundation for young people to access opportunity in employment and education. A continuum of policies, programs, and strategies meant to alleviate poverty have central themes of providing education and vocational opportunities, and yet large numbers of young minority people remain disenfranchised with no chance to succeed. There is even greater loss in the population of African American males who otherwise could achieve stable and strong economic life styles. Large unemployment and under-employment of African American males is documented through U.S. data sources where declining rates of labor force participation of black males is starkly evident (U.S. Census 2000). Geographic influences for minority youth also increase limited access to educational and employment opportunities (Slack & Jenson, 2002). What is clear is that minority youth are faced with a disproportionately difficult access to educational and employment opportunities as a result of diminished community social support, which should be the encouraging force in directing their goal achievements. Resiliency, as a strengths-based perspective, gained convincing prominence through the 1970s and 1980s. Initiative, self-control, self-esteem, and attachment are four protective factors of resiliency. Risk and protective factors are vital for intervention practices with individuals, families and communities. This study utilized protective factors that promote the skills and abilities necessary for encouraging resiliency and creating effective citizenship. iii Resiliency and the awareness of citizenship practices may bolster African American male youth successes in educational and employment opportunities. Youth who consistently and routinely engage in employment can increase the well-being of themselves, their families, and their communities. This study utilized a self-administered survey design to obtain responses from rural African Americans male youth, between the ages of 12 and 19 inclusive, to determine their resiliency skills and their awareness of citizenship practices (p=.005, one-tailed). In a pre-post test for significance, participants were asked to take a citizenship practices survey after the viewing of the video. This paired t-test displayed statistically significant results (p= .0015, t= 2.998, df =98). It is important to examine resiliency in rural African American male youth and how that resiliency interacts with the awareness of citizenship practices. There is little known about how rural African American, male youth perceive effective citizenship based on their level of resiliency. African American youth are better served toward successful employment and education through programs that are designed to increase citizenship practices awareness. There is reason to believe that citizenship practices, by way of training and community affirmation, with an infusion of resiliency skill techniques modeling, could open the doors wider for African American male youth who, for some, suffer from poverty, but for most suffer from the lack of free and open educational access which inhibits viable entry level employment opportunities.

Policing is more difficult than ever before in today’s world since types of crime and criminal profiles change as a result of technological development and globalization. Police organizations should review their organizational and operational strategies to improve the fight against contemporary crimes and criminals. Behaviors and performance of police officers are very important in fighting crime. In this struggle, especially today, officers should exhibit organizational citizenship behaviors and perform better. One of the most important factors affecting these two concepts in organizations is organizational support. The literature stresses the social exchange cycle and reciprocity rules in the relationships of organizations and their members. In this cycle, if the organization cares about its members and if members perceive that the organization is supportive, they feel obliged to behave positively, perform better, and help the organization to reach its goals and objectives. If they don’t perceive organizational support, they won’t care about the organization, either. Hypotheses were developed based on these assumptions in the literature. This study tested these assumptions in Crime Scene Investigation units of the Turkish National Police (TNP). Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was used to analyze the relationships among variables of Perceived Organizational Support (POS), Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB), and Perceived Performance (PP). Measurement models for these three latent constructs were developed by deriving the indicators from the literature. Most earlier studies tried to figure out reasons of the OCB. This study has a different perspective that investigates both reasons and results of OCB. A survey was developed to measure the latent variables of the study, and 405 of approximately 3,000 Crime Scene Investigators in the Turkish National Police responded to the iv survey. Results of the study showed that the relationship between POS and OCB is positive and significant. This is consistent with the literature. The relationship between OCB and PP is also positive and significant, and this is also consistent with the literature. However, the relationship between POS and PP is negative and insignificant. This result contradicts the results of previous studies in the literature and can be attributed to the subjective nature of measuring individuals’ perceptions. According to the literature, perceptions are subjective rather than objective; therefore, data coming from reports of individual perceptions may not reflect the actual situation. Demographic information of the participants served as the control variables of the study. Information about the education level, rank, age, gender, size of the unit, and tenure of the respondents was collected by way of the conducted survey, and the effects of these variables were analyzed on the endogenous variable of the study, Perceived Performance. This study found no significant relationships between these control variables and Perceived Performance. Therefore, all these control variables were removed from the Structural Equation Model of the study. This study revealed that the TNP needs to be more supportive toward its members in order to have officers show organizational citizenship behavior and perform better. The TNP should revise its policies, especially regarding rotations from one province to another, working hours, rewards, and overtime pay. These are all indicators of organizational support and will result in a higher performance level among officers.

Previous studies suggest that the organizational dynamics of police organizations and the nature of police work contribute to law enforcement stress, which in turn reduces job satisfaction and increases burnout. It is also well documented that undesirable organizational factors are more hazardous to the well-being of employees than are the stressors due to nature of police work. The present study examines whether, and to what degree, organizational and operational stresses in law enforcement are associated with job satisfaction, work-related burnout, and supervisor support, holding the effects of age, rank, education, gender, tenure, and shift type constant in the analysis. A total of 538 Turkish National Police (TNP) employees from seven cities in Turkey, comprising 407 regular police officers and 131 ranked police officers, completed the study survey. The influence of organizational and operational stresses on the work-related well-being of TNP employees as measured by job satisfaction and work-related burnout was analyzed by structural equation modeling (SEM) under the theoretical framework of Kahn and Byosiere‟s (1992) causal theory. The results of the study indicate that TNP employees‟ perceived organizational stress has a statistically significant positive effect on work-related burnout and a negative effect on job satisfaction. The more TNP employees experience their organization as stress inducing, the lower their job satisfaction levels and the higher their burnout levels. Perceived operational stress of TNP employees was found to be significantly associated with their work-related burnout, but iv not with their job satisfaction. This study suggests that there is an indirect causal effect of both organizational and operational stresses on job satisfaction via supervisor support as mediator. Supervisor support fully mediates the relationship between operational stress and job satisfaction, and partially mediates the relationship between organizational stress and job satisfaction. After controlling the influence of several demographic variables, job satisfaction made a statistically significant contribution to predicting work-related burnout. This finding suggests that as job satisfaction of TNP employee increases, their work-related burnout decreases. The findings of the study revealed that among the six demographic variables, only education level of TNP employees and rank make statistically significant contribution to their job satisfaction levels. As rank and education level of TNP employees increase, their job satisfaction also increases. The predictor variables of organizational stress, operational stress, and supervisor support, along with education and rank collectively, explain 56 % of the total variation in job satisfaction. On the other hand, organizational stress, operational stress, job satisfaction, and supervisor support together account for 34 % of the total variance in work-related burnout. Overall, the findings of this study illustrate a need for internal policy reform and managerial change in how the executives of TNP organize their agencies and policies, since organizational stressors are the most prevalent factors determining the work-related well-being of TNP employees.

The question of policy origination is the very essence of state public policy analysis. This study provides an overview of the previous research on innovation, as defined by Rogers (1962, 2003) and Walker (1969), and determinants models of state policy formulation, as they relate to innovation and policy adoption on the state level. The literature review indicates that previous research mostly focused on the internal state characteristics such as political and socioeconomic variables to explain state differences in policy adoption. The literature also indicates a general lack of empirical research relating diversity to innovation and policy adoption. State governments have to deal with diversified populations and workforces whether they want to or not. The number of immigrants from other countries as well as migrants from other states is constantly growing. For instance, in just the five years from 2000 to 2005, we added almost 5.5 million immigrants, and that figure represents only those who are documented. These people are coming from all over the world. They speak different languages, are accustomed to different foods, and have different religious affiliations. It would be unrealistic to expect them to have social and political values similar to those of people born and raised in the United States. The impact and the overall influence of such diversity on state policy formulation have not yet been fully explained. The growing importance of diversity in the United States calls for its inclusion into state policy adoption models. This study proposes a new model including a construct of diversity as one of the determinants of state policy adoption. The reasoning for the new model is twofold: first, to determine the potential influence of diversity on innovation, and second, to determine whether iv diversity also influences state policy adoption. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) is used to test the proposed model in five different policy areas: education, health care, criminal justice, economic development, and environmental policies. Results of the analysis indicate that, while state diversity is positively associated with state innovation and state policy adoption, inclusion of state socioeconomic and political variables in the analysis decreases the relative influence of state diversity on innovation and policy outcomes. Furthermore, the relative influence of diversity, socioeconomic, and political variables differs among the policy areas used in this study. Three major themes are noticed here: the overwhelming significance of state political characteristics to state innovation, the relatively moderate significance of state socioeconomic characteristics to state policy outcomes and state innovation, and the low significance of state diversity variables to state policy outcomes.

Teacher attrition and retention has become a major issue facing education policymakers and practioners as our nation's school age population continues to grow, but the teaching workforce does not. This study seeks to examine the impact of certification by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) on burnout levels in educators. The potential benefits to teachers who pursue NBPTS certification include a sense of professional pride, new leadership roles and responsibilities for teachers, recognition of outstanding teaching practice, and higher salaries (Shapiro, 1995). Some of these potential rewards seem to address a number of the factors that are related to the onset burnout, and therefore may reduce teacher attrition. The study utilized the Maslach-Leiter conceptual framework to examine burnout, which breaks the burnout construct into three separate dimensions; emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduced personal accomplishment. The research questions sought to determine if there was a difference between National Board Certified Teachers (NBCTs) and their non-certified peers in each of these dimensions of burnout. The research sample consisted of the NBCTs and a comparable random sample of their non-certified peers from a large urban school district in the Central Florida area. The Maslach Burnout Inventory Educators Survey was used a basis of comparison of the burnout levels. The two groups were compared utilizing an independent samples t-test. The instrument utilized in this study also included demographic questions, as well as questions that were designed to measure the various elements of the Maslach-Leiter theoretical model of burnout. These questions and the independent variable NBPTS certification were included in a multiple regression analysis in order to determine if the differences noted between the groups using the independent samples t-tests were in fact a result of NBPTS certification, and not the theoretical model itself. The instruments were mailed in the fall of 2006, and were returned to the researcher anonymously. A total of 476 surveys were returned, for a response rate of 52%. The independent samples t-tests revealed significant differences between NBCTs and their non-certified peers on all three dimensions of burnout. An examination of the individual scores for each group revealed that in each of the dimensions showed that the NBCTs demonstrated lower levels of experienced burnout in each dimension. The multiple regression analyses that were conducted to confirm that NBPTS certification was in fact a significant factor in the development of each burnout dimension revealed mixed results. Emotional exhaustion and reduced personal accomplishment were both found to have a significant negative relationship with NBPTS certification, which indicates that the NBCTs are significantly less burned out then their non-certified peers. Despite the initial finding of significance in the independent samples t-test, NBPTS certification was not found to be a significant factor in the onset of the depersonalization dimension of burnout. This relationship needs further exploration in future studies. The significant difference between the research and control groups in this study suggests that NBPTS certification may reduce burnout levels in at least two dimensions. Legislators and policymakers at the state and federal levels have provided millions of dollars to support NBPTS certification. These findings seem to indicate that this financial support has impacted burnout levels in educators, and may therefore warrant examination as a strategy to address the issue of teacher attrition.

Crisis management has become one of the most important public policy areas in recent decades with greater numbers of manmade and natural disasters. History showed that well-implemented crisis management policies can save lives and reduce costs in a disaster. Literature offered various suggestions for more effective crisis management policies with different techniques utilizing different theoretical frameworks. Informal relationships among crisis management employees were suggested to have a positive impact on crisis management effectiveness. Yet it was not demonstrated with advanced statistical tools if there is such a relationship. This study considers crisis management effort as a network effort and employs complex adaptive systems theory in order to understand factors influencing effectiveness of crisis management networks. Complex adaptive systems theory presents that more open communication lines in a given network or an organization would increase effectiveness of it since inner processes of the network or organization would obtain more information from the chaotic environment. Quality of informal relationships (casual relationships, social capital etc.) was hypothesized as a tool to open more communication lines within an agency which would eventually increase effectiveness of the network constructed by the organization. Based on the theoretical framework, adaptiveness capacity of the agencies was also tested in order to understand a correlation between adaptation and effectiveness of crisis management networks. Multiple case-study method was employed to identify incidents that can represent crisis management in full perspective. Terrorist attacks carried upon by the same terrorist network hit New York in 2001, Istanbul in 2003, Madrid in 2004, and London in 2005 were selected. First response phase of crisis management and policy changes after and before the attacks were discussed. Public administration processes and other social-economical conditions of countries were examined in terms of crisis management structure. Names of key agencies of selected crisis management systems were suggested by a social network analysis tool-UCINET. Six key agencies per incident were targeted for surveys. Surveys included a nine-item-quality of informal relationships, four-item-adaptiveness capability, and ten-item-perceived effectiveness of crisis management networks-scales. Respondents were asked to fill in online surveys where they could refer to their colleagues in the same incidents. 230 respondents were aimed and 246 survey responses were obtained as a result. Surveys formed a structural equation model representing 23 observed factors and 2 latent constructs. Confirmatory factor analysis was utilized to validate hypothesis-driven conceptual models. Quality of informal relationships was found to have a significant positive impact on perceived crisis management network effectiveness (Standardized regression coefficient = .39). Two of the adaptiveness variables, openness to change and intra-organizational training were also positively correlated with the dependent variable of the study (Standardized regression coefficient = .40 and .26 respectively). Turkish and American groups' differences suggested a social-economical difference in societies. Majority of the respondents were some type of managers which made it possible to generalize the results for all phases of crisis management. Discussions suggested improved informal relationships among crisis management employees to provide a better crisis management during an extreme event. Collaborative social events were offered to improve crisis management effectiveness. An agency's openness to change proposed that a crisis management organization should be flexible in rules and structure to gain more efficacy. The other adaptiveness variable, intra-organizational training efforts were proposed to have certain influence on effectiveness of crisis management network. Factors built latent construct of perceived crisis management effectiveness were also found out to be important on crisis management, which of some are ability to carry out generic crisis management functions, mobilize personnel and resources efficiently, process information adequately, blend emergent and established entities, provide appropriate reports for news media etc. Study contributed to the complex adaptive system theory since the fundamentals of the theory were tested with an advanced quantitative method. Non-linear relationships within a system were tested in order to reveal a correlation as the theory suggested, where the results were convincingly positive. Crisis management networks' effectiveness was demonstrated to be validated by a ten-item-scale successfully. Future research might utilize more disaster cases both natural and manmade, search for impact of different communication tools within a system, and look at the relationships among members of crisis management networks instead looking within an organization.

Contemporary health care systems in the United States are not equitable. Indeed, as the literature indicates, there are substantial differences in the variety and scope of service delivery based on age, income, and other socio-economic indicators. The recent passage of health care reform in the United States illustrates that Americans are seeking to bring balance and equity to health care. However, as learned in this study, county governments across the country have been working in their communities to ensure some balance and equity, by making a safety net available for those citizens who are unable to access health care. Perhaps this is because health care quickly becomes a local government problem. In this current economic climate, county governments are being pinched between declining revenues and rising demands for services (Eaton, 2009; Phaup, 2009). The Orange County Primary Care Access Network is one example studied here that provides clear evidence of how organizations can work together to develop and maintain a sustainable health care safety net for the underinsured and uninsured. This study is the first of its kind to examine county government influences, environmental pressures, and community resources in the context of health care network performance. The methodological research question for this study is what determinants (exogenous constructs) contribute to a health care network and its performance (endogenous construct) within the framework of county government participation? Further, is the model supported by the data and can prediction, direction, and strength of relationships among the variables be identified? The simple answer is yes. For this study, the responses from 123 counties were analyzed with a variety of statistical techniques, culminating in structural equation modeling. The outcome of these analyses provided a reasonable explanation for the variation among the variables leading to network performance improvement in meeting the health care needs of uninsured and underinsured people. These quantitative data were also supported in their results with the inclusion of a case study analysis of a particular health care safety-net, the Orange County Primary Care Access Network in Orange County, Florida. Ultimately, this study learned three valuable lessons that can be used by county government decision-makers and health care providers alike. First, county involvement in community based health care networks results in a benefit that reverberates during economic stress- the leveraging of resources. Second, public-private initiatives are fundamental to reducing disparities in health care access. Third, health care networks improve access to health care for uninsured and underinsured people. Ultimately, county government participation is the largest predictor of network performance in this study.