Abstract not available

In the past two decades collaboration has been proposed as a means for reducing alienation in the workplace, for increasing productivity, and for increasing the capacity of organizations to adapt to fast-changing environments. However, to date very few thorough studies have investigated precisely what collaboration is and how it functions in the workplace. The purpose of this study was to describe collaboration in enough detail so that practitioners will be able to vary specific aspects within the organization, thereby increasing the likelihood of collaboration occurring. A three-sided analytical model was developed in this study that looked at work groups according to the type of unit involved (individual, small group, organization, society), the perspective taken (purpose, structure, process), and the degree of collaboration (more collaborative, less collaborative). Using this model it was proposed that collaboration has six general characteristics: (1) It meets group purposes requiring creativity and innovation. (2) It meets individual purposes for self-actualization and social interchange. (3) It takes place in small group settings. (4) The small groups exist within a larger context which fosters both autonomy and interdependence. (5) Processes foster formation of goals and productivity. (6) Processes are synergetic. It was further demonstrated that these six characteristics are based on some basic assumptions and beliefs which, taken together, form a coherent value structure. The elements are a belief in human potential, a belief in living in harmony with nature, a present and future time perspective, a "being-in-becoming" action modality, and a value on both individual and cooperative relationships. General terms describing this value structure are synergy and holism. The six characteristics and underlying values were then used a framework to explore the literature on small group and organizational structures and processes. It was demonstrated that small group variables which support collaboration are: the conceptualization of power as empowerment; a small sized group with stable boundaries and a heterogeneous membership; roles differentiated by function; norms supportive of collaboration; leadership seen as empowering and differentiated; decision making, efficient, creative and shared; conflict resolution, confrontive and constructive; and communication widely shared. Furthermore, group processes that facilitate change (socialization, termination, learning, and group development) are exercised in ways congruent with collaborative principles. Systems variables that support collaboration include the existence of many small groups within the system, norms of forming and disbanding groups regularly, and an organizational structure based on the definition of power as a nonscarce resource. Models of organizational structures, which act to increase power in the system, were explored, including the matrix and network organization. Furthermore, the systems concept was used to differentiate among freestanding collaboratives, intraagency, and interagency collaboratives. This more detailed analysis of collaboration was then used as an analytical model in three practical applications. First, four familiar case studies were analyzed, using the model to deepen understanding of successes and failures. Next, the model was used to diagnose and make suggestions to an on-going work group. Third, the model was used as a basis for a training design which had, as one of its purposes, the increase of collaborative functioning. These three applications proved promising enough to suggest that more long-term comprehensive research be designed to test various components of the model. Specific designs were proposed that would address the three expressed needs for collaboration: the need to reduce alienation, to increase productivity and to increase the ability of organization to adapt to a change environment.

Colleges and universities in the United States have attempted for years to implement policies and procedures to promote racial diversity in their student bodies, as well as to ensure reflective minority representation in student programs at their institutions. I have done an independent evaluation assessment of the necessity and program theory for a policy aimed at assuring diversity of the undergraduate student government at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, covering the period 2003-2005. The policy in effect during those years was a system which guaranteed minority representation reasonably mirroring the known minority population of the undergraduate student body by reserving 13 percent of Senator positions in the Student Government Association for students affiliated with the African, Latino/a, Asian/Pacific Islander, and Native American caucus. The policy intent was to achieve campus fair and just minority representation in UMass student government. In reality, however, that policy produced unintended consequences instead – bitter, and sometimes violent racial tensions, and widespread and prolonged charges of reverse and illegal discrimination. As a result of this evaluation of that policy, and its attendant procedures for implementation, in the conclusion I offer recommendations which would allow UMass to replace a problematic policy with one which could achieve reflective minority representation in student government acceptable to, and supported by, the majority of the undergraduate population.

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No description available.

The point of this study is to elucidate and expand upon the concept of "irrationality" in the work of Max Weber and, to a lesser extent, in that of Vilfredo Pareto, whose viewpoints are antithetical, but whose goals for social theory were similar. This attempt, to compare two exemplars of classical social theory who are often considered absolutely alien to one another, is carried out through "hermeneutic" interpretation. To the end of determining the utility of hermeneutics to the study of social thought, a lengthy Appendix is provided in which various hermeneutical theories (including those of Ast, Wolf, Schleiermacher, Dilthey, Heidegger, Betti, and Gadamer) are assayed. With propositions drawn from this subordinate study, a detailed analysis is performed upon Weber's writings, which seeks to remain within the boundaries of a proper hermeneutics, to the end of determining Weber's approach to "irrationality" as part of "social action." These results are compared with a more cursory analysis of Pareto's Trattato. Finally, ramifications for contemporary social theory are briefly introduced, with special attention to the changing relationship between "rational action" and "meaning" for "social actors" in contemporary life.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Family Studies and Human Services / Jared R. Anderson / Parental school involvement is associated with positive social, psychological, and academic child outcomes. Beyond school, demographic, and individual influences, research is limited regarding the link between family-level processes and parental school involvement. Guided by family systems theory, this study used data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (n = 1,896) to examine the link between coparenting support and mothers’ and fathers’ home-based school involvement and school-based school involvement when the child was nine years-old. Additionally, this study tested if parental union transitions (e.g., parental union dissolution; parental union formation; stably coresident relationship) significantly moderated these relationships. Latent variable structural equation modeling results revealed that higher levels of coparenting support was associated with higher levels of mothers’ and fathers’ home-based school involvement, and higher levels of mothers’ and fathers’ school-based involvement. Union transition was not a significant moderator between coparenting support and mother and father home- and school-based school involvement.

<p> This dissertation investigates the relationship between marital history and individuals&rsquo; retirement resources, namely Social Security, employer-sponsored pensions, and non-housing wealth. Prior research provides a foundation for understanding marriage&rsquo;s positive relationship to retirement security, and suggests that marriage is financially beneficial and can even lessen some external factors that would otherwise damage a family&rsquo;s financial situation. Yet changing demographics, with fewer people in first marriages and rising numbers of individuals experiencing divorce and choosing to remain unmarried, suggest our understanding of this relationship for today&rsquo;s retirees may be limited. The purpose of this research is to identify which aspects of complex marital histories are associated with individuals&rsquo; retirement security, paying particular attention to gender differences. Using data from nine waves of the Health and Retirement Study (1992-2008), four facets of marital history are examined: marriage type, frequency, timing, and duration. Currently married and currently unmarried respondents are separated during the analyses in order to adequately capture the association between previous marital events and retirement resources. The results indicate that marital history is associated with Social Security, employer-sponsored pensions, and non-housing wealth differently, and that these relationships vary by gender and current marital status. The findings provide support for the argument that marital history, and in particular marital duration, has a strong relationship to retirement resources. Contrary to expectations, currently married women with longer marriages have less Social Security and pension income than married women who experienced shorter marriages. Marital history has no relationship to the retirement security of married men. For the unmarried groups, never married men have the lowest odds of receiving an employer-sponsored pension and have less non-housing wealth than both divorce and widowed men. Unmarried women&rsquo;s retirement security is associated with the type of disruption experienced; women with multiple past marriages have more resources if they are currently widowed but less if they are currently divorced. Further study is needed to understand how and why complex marital history factors have a relationship to retirement finances, and to expand our knowledge about certain understudied populations such as remarried women and never married men.</p>

<p> By now scholars, practitioners, government officials and others in the global community have witnessed a number of countries and their populations going through extreme destruction and trying to rebuild in the aftermath. Country case studies are invaluable for their in-depth, continuous look at how a nation-state collective and the individuals who make up that collective recover, regroup, develop, but also remain very harmed for a long time. They must live among and beside their former enemies.</p><p> Studies of the resettlement of refugees in a third country offer a different view: there are varied populations arriving with different socio-cultural and economic histories and experiences, and different definitions of a normalcy to which they aspire. They are in a setting that is much different than what characterized their pre-war experiences, and they do not have to rebuild out of ashes in the place that they were born.</p><p> Refugees from various countries resettling in a third country have so much in common with each other from the experience of extreme violence and having to resettle in a foreign land that one key informant suggested that we think about a &ldquo;refugee ethnicity.&rdquo; Though they would not have wished for them, they have gained numerous new identification possibilities not available to those in the country of origin: U.S. citizen, hybrid, diaspora, cosmopolitan global citizen; refugee/former refugee survivors.</p><p> But the &ldquo;fit&rdquo; of these identities vary, because the receiving society may perceive individuals and families along a continuum of belonging vs. &ldquo;othering.&rdquo; In the post-9-11 era in the U.S., the &ldquo;belonging&rdquo; as a citizen and member of the imagined community of the nation that a refugee or former refugee is able to achieve may be precarious. Will refugees resettling turn out to be vectors of socio-political disease, infecting the new host? Or will they be vectors of development and agents of host revitalization as they realize adversity-activated development in a new environment?</p><p> The U.S. &ldquo;host environment&rdquo; has changed considerably since the modern era of resettlement began in the 1970s and then passed through the dramatic incidents of 9-11. The &ldquo;hosts&rdquo; have now also undergone an experience of extreme political violence. U.S. institutions are responding to the events and subsequent wars, and have themselves been changed as they adjust practices and policies in response to the trauma experienced by the people they are meant to serve.</p><p> Much is in play. The times beg for a better understanding of refugees&rsquo; social experiences of resettlement in a new country, the forms of suffering and marginalization they face, and the healing processes in which they engage. We need a far better understanding of what it takes to assist refugees as they work to re-constitute social networks, recover economically, find opportunity and meaning, pursue goals, and&mdash;with receiving communities--express solidarity across social dividing lines.</p><p> This dissertation calls out this problematic; and analyzes it at the multi-stakeholder site of refugee resettlement.</p>

<p> This work describes prison chaplains and chapel volunteers from three perspectives: (1) a historical perspective which is used to investigate the role of religion in prisons, (2) the chaplains&rsquo; perspective on the partnership between chaplains and chapel volunteers, and (3) the volunteers&rsquo; perspective on the predictors of volunteering in prison ministry. </p><p> First, the study provides a historical perspective on the role of prison ministry workers in prisons by examining: (a) the role of religion in the philanthropic life of John Howard, an eighteenth century prison reformer, (b) the role of religion in satisfying socio-economic pre-conditions that led to prison reform during the period of the Industrial Revolution, and (c) the role of religion during the development and evolution of the penal systems in the USA. </p><p> Second, the study explores the partnership between paid chaplains working for over three months at ten state, medium to high-level security, men&rsquo;s prisons in Indiana, and chapel volunteers providing in-person ministry work. The study is primarily based on in-person, in-depth interviews with 25 chaplains. Using modified analytic induction, the research leads to identification of four roles adopted by chaplains: Pastoral Counselor, Religious Coordinator, Administrative Minister, and Advocate for Prisoners. The study describes the partnership in general and explains how chaplains in each of these different roles perceive conflict and collaboration with volunteers. </p><p> Third, the study constructs a sampling frame consisting of an estimated 916 to 1,132 chapel volunteers working in the ten prisons. The study is based on responses to a survey based on a convenience sample of 106 of these volunteers. The study uses OLS regression to test 32 hypotheses. Among other things, the study finds that statistically significant predictors of higher amount and higher frequency of volunteering to prison ministry include: being retired, shorter length of commute to prison, tenure as prison ministry volunteer, lower motivation to develop and strengthen social ties, and higher frequency of attending religious services. </p><p> The work concludes with a summary and discussion of the findings, implications for theory and practitioners (including policymakers, prison administrators, chaplains, and volunteers), as well as limitations and suggestions for future research.</p>