Beryl A. Radin - Böcker

In this analysis of the National and State Rural Development Councils (NRDC and SRDC), the authors examine the successes and failures of the original eight councils in Kansas, Maine, Mississippi, Oregon, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas and Washington.

Much has changed in US politics since the historic 2008 election. While the press covers the actions and agendas of the new administration, other impacts of this political shift have not received as much attention. These changes have forced the nation to rethink the necessary role of government, the role of the private market, the impact of science, technology, and information, and, ultimately, our place in the world.What Do We Expect From Our Government? provides a glimpse at this set of developments by focusing on a number of policies, such as climate change, immigration, and terrorism, as well as governance processes such as oversight, elections and campaigns, and regulation. It highlights the role of research in public sector decision-making, the role of the academy, the relationship between economic imperatives and scientific information, and dealing with uncertainty and change. In addition, it includes attention to broader issues such as national economic and fiscal policies and strategies for assuring equity and access in programs.

For much of its life, the field of policy analysis has lived with a wide range of definitions of its goals, work and significance in the society. This Element seeks to sort out these differences by describing the issues, players and developments that have played a role over the life of this field. As a result of the relationships that have developed an environment has emerged where both academics and practitioners who self identify as 'policy analysts' are not always recognized as such by others who use that same label. This Element explores the reasons why this conflictual situation has developed and whether the current status is a major departure from the past. While these developments may not be new or found only in policy analysis, they do have an impact on the status of the academics as well as the practitioners in the field.

"Accountability" is a watchword of our era. Dissatisfaction with a range of public and private institutions is widespread and often expressed in strong critical rhetoric. The reasons for these views are varied and difficult to translate into concrete action, but this hasn't deterred governments and nongovernmental organizations from putting into place formal processes for determining whether their own and others' goals have been achieved and problems with performance have been avoided. In this thought-provoking book, government and public administration scholar Beryl Radin takes on many of the assumptions of the performance movement, arguing that evaluation relies too often on simplistic, one-size-fits-all solutions that are not always effective for dynamic organizations. Drawing on a wide range of ideas, including theories of intelligence and modes of thought, assumptions about numbers and information, and the nature of professionalism, Radin sheds light on the hidden complexities of creating standards to evaluate performance. She illustrates these problems by discussing a range of program areas, including health efforts as well as the education program, "No Child Left Behind".Throughout, the author devotes particular attention to concerns about government standards, from accounting for issues of equity to allowing for complicated intergovernmental relationships and fragmentation of powers. She explores in detail how recent performance measurement efforts in the U.S. government have fared, and analyzes efforts by nongovernmental organizations both inside and outside of the United States to impose standards of integrity and equity on their governments. The examination concludes with alternative assumptions and lessons for those embarking on performance measurement activities.

Proposals for reform have dotted the federal management landscape in the United States for more than 50 years. Yet these efforts by public management professionals have frequently failed to produce lasting results. In her new book, "Federal Management Reform in a World of Contradictions", renowned public administration scholar Beryl A. Radin reveals what may lie behind the failure of so many efforts at government management reform. To spur new thinking about this problem, Radin examines three basic sets of contradictions between the strategies of the reformers and the reality of the US federal system: contradictions in the shared powers structure, contradictions in values, and contradictions between politics and administration. She then explores six types of reform efforts and the core beliefs that guided them. The six reform areas are contracting out, personnel policy, agency reorganization, budgeting, federalism policies and procedures, and performance management.The book shows how too often these prescriptions for reform have tried to apply techniques from the private sector or a parliamentary system that do not transfer well to the structure of the US federal system and its democratic and political traditions. Mindful of the ineffectiveness of a "one-size-fits-all" approach, Radin does not propose a single path for reform, but calls instead for a truly honest assessment of past efforts as today's reformers design a new conceptual and strategic roadmap for the future.