The topic of municipal incorporation is increasingly reemerging as a topic dissevering of our attention. Metropolitan regions continue to grow and residents maintain a desire to live beyond the cities' borders. As these processes continue, we must recognize that individuals will seek to create new municipal governments that fulfill the wishes they hold for the new communities. Theories of incorporation rests on a great deal of theorizing, but have not been the subject of numerous attempts to empirically test these theories. One treatment, however, that involved extensive testing of theories of incorporation was provided by Burns (1994). While Burns' work has received a great deal of recognition, the work displays significant flaws which limit the conclusions that can be drawn from the findings presented by Burns. These shortcomings are taken as an opportunity to recast the research approach taken when investigating this topic. I argue that qualitative research methods offer the best mechanism to uncover the true meaning of incorporation. I use these methods to conduct several interviews with participants of an on-going incorporation effort. These interviews highlight two facts. First, people behave based on value rationality, rather than instrumental rationality. Second, people will support incorporation when they spend less time outside the community. The implications of these findings for the literature are discussed. / A Dissertation Submitted to the Ruebin O'D. Askew School of Public Administration and Policy in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of
Philosophy. / Summer Semester, 2008. / June 9, 2008. / Municipal Government, Unincorporated Communities, Incorporation / Includes bibliographical references. / Lance deHaven-Smith, Professor Directing Dissertation; Charles Connerly, Outside Committee Member; Richard Feiock, Committee Member; Ralph Brower, Committee Member.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_176229 |
| Contributors | Sides, Jason C. (authoraut), deHaven-Smith, Lance (professor directing dissertation), Connerly, Charles (outside committee member), Feiock, Richard (committee member), Brower, Ralph (committee member), School of Public Administration and Policy (degree granting department), Florida State University (degree granting institution) |
| Publisher | Florida State University, Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, text |
| Format | 1 online resource, computer, application/pdf |
| Rights | This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s). The copyright in theses and dissertations completed at Florida State University is held by the students who author them. |
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