Accountability in action?: the case of a database purchasing decision 1

The increasing prevalence of audit in university settings has raised concerns about the potentially adverse effects of invasive measures of performance upon the conduct of research and generation of knowledge. What sustains the current commitment to audit? It is argued that in order to address this question we need to understand how and to what extent notions of accountability are played out in practice. This is illustrated through the analysis of materials from an ethnographic study of ‘good management practice’ in the deployment of technologies in university settings. The paper examines the ways in which ideas of accountability — involving considerations such as ‘value for money’— inform the practical processes of deciding about the purchase of a new database technology.     

Managerial audit and community mental health: a study of rationalising practices in Finnish psychiatric outpatient clinics

In many European welfare states the reform of mental health services has been accompanied by the implementation of new forms of governance, including the introduction of managerial audit systems. While such systems have been developed for ‘good causes’, such as quality assurance, financial management and monitoring staff performance, they may simultaneously produce diverse and contradictory effects on practice. The aim of this article is to examine the role of one managerial audit system, introduced in psychiatric outpatient clinics in central Finland, and assess its impact on practice. Reference is made to modernising mental health policy in the UK as that has producedsimilar practics outcomes. The research was an empirical study of practice using a mixed-method case study design involving documentary research and semi-structured interviews. Insights from Mitchell Dean's notion of governmentalisation of government were utilised in the analysis. It was found that, although the audit system primarily served administrative needs, it began to reshape practice by reinforcing certain modes of working and excluding others. The analysis of community mental health work in Finland, with similar trends in the UK, highlights the connection between documentation, resource allocation and managerial priorities that reinforce particular styles of practice. In community mental health services it would appear that the problems of professional practice have become the problems of administration.     

Governing Global Supply Chain Sustainability through the Ethical Audit Regime

Over the past two decades multinational corporations have been expanding ‘ethical’ audit programs with the stated aim of reducing the risk of sourcing from suppliers with poor practices. A wave of government regulation—such as the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act (2012) and the UK Modern Slavery Act (2015)—has enhanced the legitimacy of auditing as a tool to govern labor and environmental standards in global supply chains, backed by a broad range of civil society actors championing audits as a way of promoting corporate accountability. The growing adoption of auditing as a governance tool is a puzzling trend, given two decades of evidence that audit programs generally fail to detect or correct labor and environmental problems in global supply chains. Drawing on original field research, this article shows that in spite of its growing legitimacy and traction among government and civil society actors, the audit regime continues to respond to and protect industry commercial interests. Conceptually, the article challenges prevailing characterizations of the audit regime as a technical, neutral, and benign tool of supply chain governance, and highlights its embeddedness in struggles over the legitimacy and effectiveness of the industry-led privatization of global governance.     

Measuring corporate social performance: The problem of values

Debates over the social performance of corporations have carried with them implicit evaluations of that performance. The apparent subjectivity and bias of these informal evaluations has led to the development of more formalized corporate social performance assessment methodologies — social audits. In this paper it is argued that these social audits are also influenced by subjectivity and bias considerations; and thru the case study of a social audit of a corporate safety program, the underlying value issues at the core of these influences are explored. The value implications of the various social audit methodologies in use are discussed; and several value sensitive stages/elements of social audit research and evaluation research in general are identified. Recommendations set forth for minimizing the negative consequences of value-influenced evaluations are a value-explicit evaluation approach, greater standardization of evaluation procedures, a dialectic evaluation approach, and better informed evaluation consumers.     

The social practice of sustainable agriculture under audit discipline: Initial insights from the ARGOS project in New Zealand

One of the most interesting recent developments in global agri-food systems has been the rapid emergence and elaboration of market audit systems claiming environmental qualities or sustainability. In New Zealand, as a strongly export-oriented, high-value food producer, these environmental market audit systems have emerged as an important pathway for producers to potentially move towards more sustainable production. There have, however, been only sporadic and fractured attempts to study the emerging social practice of sustainable agriculture - particularly in terms of the emergence of new audit disciplines in farming. The ARGOS project in New Zealand was established in 2003 as a longitudinal matched panel study of over 100 farms and orchards using different market audit systems (e.g., organic, integrated or GLOBALG.A.P.). This article reports on the results of social research into the social practice of sustainable agriculture in farm households within the ARGOS projects between 2003 and 2009. Results drawn from multiple social research instruments deployed over six years provide an unparalleled level of empirical data on the social practice of sustainable agriculture under audit disciplines. Using 12 criteria identified in prior literature as contributing a significant social dynamic around sustainable agriculture practices in other contexts, the analysis demonstrated that 9 of these 12 dimensions did demonstrate differences in social practices emerging between (or co-constituting) organic, integrated, or conventional audit disciplines. These differences clustered into three main areas: 1) social and learning/knowledge networks and expertise, 2) key elements of farmer subjectivity - particularly in relation to subjective positioning towards the environment and nature, and 3) the role and importance of environmental dynamics within farm management practices and systems. The findings of the project provide a strong challenge to some older framings of the social practice of sustainable agriculture: particularly those that rely on paradigm-driven evaluation of social motivations, strong determinism of sustainable practice driven by coherent farmer identity, or deploying overly categorical interpretations of what it means to be ’organic’ or ’conventional’. The complex patterning of the ARGOS data can only be understood if the social practice of organic, integrated or (even more loosely) conventional production is understood as being co-produced by four dynamics: subjectivity/identity, audit disciplines, industry cultures/structure and time. This reframing of how we might research the social practice of sustainable agriculture opens up important new opportunities for understanding the emergence and impact of new audit disciplines in agriculture.     

Gender,Organizational Cultures and the Practices of Manager‐Academics in UK Universities

The article explores gendered management in UK universities in the context of moves to introduce new managerialism to higher education. Qualitative data are drawn from an Economic and Social Research Council funded project (R00023 7661) in which interviews were conducted with 137 male and female manager‐academics, from Heads of Department to Vice Chancellors, in 16 universities. The career trajectories of female and male manager‐academics are analysed to see if gender power relations, expectations and discrimination have affected their careers and organizational experiences. Also examined are whether and how gender relations and cultures are perceived to be relevant to management, the practices of women and men manager‐academics and the extent to which the differential value and status attached to teaching, research and management are gender‐related. It is suggested that women's participation in management roles, their perceptions of their practices and the expectations others hold of them are still marked by gender, even though some women have benefited, through promotion, from the greater emphasis on management now evident in UK universities.     

“I had to get married to protect myself”: Gay academics’ experiences of managing sexual identity in China

Drawing on interviews with 40 gay academics, this article explores their experiences of managing sexual identity in Chinese universities. Three strategies of identity management are identified: passing via marriage or heterosexual relationships, self-distancing from people on campus, and demonstrating outstanding professional performance. This article argues that Chinese universities are heteronormative spaces in which queer identities are excluded. By highlighting gay academics’ transgression of heteronormativity within the closet, this research also unpacks gay academics’ expression of agency in subtle forms.     

Drittmittel als Performanzindikator der Wissenschaftlichen Forschung

Resources within and between higher education and research institutions are increasingly allocated according to scientific performance. Evaluation exercises and the measurement of research performance take on a new role in this context. Third party research income is a performance indicator which is rather easy to measure and is used in most of the new performance-based evaluation procedures. This paper sets out to scrutinize the meaning and validity of third party research income. We studied research teams from three different research fields with a mixed quantitative / qualitative approach. The focus is on the causal relations between institutional / input indicators, third party research income as another input indicator, and a variety of output indicators of scientific production. An important result is that third party money has a positive effect on performance only below a certain and discipline-specific threshold. Further analysis shows that output performance is to a great extent field-specific. The context conditions for scientific production differ greatly, so that comparative performance assessments are only valid within homogeneous research fields. Another important result is that output performance is multidimensional and cannot be measured by bibliometric indicators only. These findings have implications for the rationality of the evaluation assessment exercises as well as for the funding decisions of science foundations, ministries of science and — increasingly, the heads of universities and departments. These topics are discussed in the last chapter as well as the implications for further research.     

“We Actually Trust the Community:” Examining the Dynamics of a Nonprofit Funding Relationship in New Zealand

Funding relationships in nonprofit management are increasingly defined by a philosophy of rational management, characterized by measurement of outputs and benchmarking, which represents an audit culture system (Burnley, Matthews, & McKenzie, 2005). There is concern that these approaches are constantly undermining the mission of community service nonprofit organizations (Darcy, 2002). In this research, we analyzed the management of funding relationships by examining dynamics within a nonprofit funding relationship in New Zealand. Through focus groups we explored the relationship between 17 representatives from nonprofit organizations and four Board members of a funding Trust. The management of this funding relationship was characterized by an appreciation of the diverse nature of nonprofit organizations, a balance between trust and control, and communication. We suggest that elements of these dynamics could be incorporated into nonprofit funding relationships in order to challenge an over-reliance on audit culture systems, and to re-establish relationships characterized by interaction between nonprofit organizations and their funders. Finally, we call for future research in this area.     

Our perverse reliance on prescribed standardized processes as proxies for quality in Ontario Children's Aid Societies: Towards the establishment of direct service and outcomes standards

The Ontario child protection system has, over the past 13 years, gone through two waves of reform but a recent government audit has highlighted ongoing concerns with performance and cost. In response, the Ontario Government set up a “Commission to Promote Sustainable Child Welfare” to address these concerns. The Ontario reform strategy has introduced much standardization and a compliance regime to ensure service quality. In this article, the bona fides and costs of such a strategy are examined and the author proposes that continuous outcomes monitoring and a standard to safeguard direct service time to clients are essential if child protection services are to improve.     

Teaching crisis management in Arab universities: A critical assessment

This research looks at the teaching of crisis management at the colleges and departments of communication and public relations in the Arab world. Major findings of the study suggest that out of 24 colleges and departments of communication and public relations surveyed by this research, only two universities teach the course crisis management in their curriculum. The latest developments in the Arab world dictate new mechanisms in managing information and news and dealing with publics and the mass media locally and internationally. The new trends of teaching crisis management focus on the multidisciplinary approach which consists of a good knowledge of news management, dealing with the media, dealing with people, business administration, information technology, social and anthropological context. All these fields of knowledge are indispensable for understanding the general background of the issues and for choosing and selecting the best communication and persuasion techniques and tactics to manage crises effectively and successfully.     

浅析新校区建设中的高校基建管理

本文在阐述高等学校新校区建设的必要性后,针对目前新校区建设中的高校基建管理提出了建议,并对高校基建管理的现状进行分析.总结出高校基建管理存在的问题,提出实现高校基建管理的策略.     

The Corporate Elite and the Architecture of Climate Change Denial: A Network Analysis of Carbon Capital's Reach into Civil Society

This study employs social network analysis to map the Canadian network of carbon‐capital corporations whose boards interlock with key knowledge‐producing civil society organizations, including think tanks, industry associations, business advocacy organizations, universities, and research institutes. We find a pervasive pattern of carbon‐sector reach into these domains of civil society, forming a single, connected network that is centered in Alberta yet linked to the central‐Canadian corporate elite through hegemonic capitalist organizations, including major financial companies. This structure provides the architecture for a “soft” denial regime that acknowledges climate change while protecting the continued flow of profit to fossil fuel and related companies.     

基于众创空间的大学生创新创业教育对策

当前高校创新创业教育存在教育经验不足,服务与需求难匹配;教育模式单一,理论与实践难统一;教育系统壁垒,高校与社会难互动等现实问题。众创空间为高校的创新创业教育提供了全新的环境,弥合校内创新创业教育与社会创新创业教育相对割裂的状态,打通社会资源参与高校创新创业教育的通道。基于众创空间的高校创新创业教育,在探索适合高校创新创业教育的良性生态系统中推进高校创新创业教育的升级转型,如规范高校创新创业教育的管理,营造创业生态环境氛围,完善创业指导扶持系统,构建创新创业教育合作新模式。     

对提高高校新校区建设中基建管理工作的探讨

高校基本建设一直呈现规模大、投资大、管理压力大的特点。为了提高高校新校区基建工程管理水平,提出了如何强化高校基建管理工作的具体措施和相关建议。     

高校经济管理类专业实践教学体系建设探讨

经济管理类专业发展和教学改革要适应培养跨专业人才的社会需求,就要改变传统人才培养模式,构建信息技术环境下的高校经济管理类专业实践教学体系。文章简述了高校经济管理类专业实践教学的国内外研究情况,探讨了高校经济管理类专业人才培养实践教学体系与机制建设问题,对高校经济管理类专业开展实践教学具有指导意义。     

提高高校图书馆读者服务质量的思考与建议

随着信息社会的迅速发展,人们获取信息的途径和方式也发生了很大变化,计算机网络技术、数据库技术被广泛应用,这对现代高校图书馆的管理提出了新的要求。文章从改善阅读环境、改进服务方法、提高从业者素质和技能三个方面对提高高校图书馆服务质量提出了建议。     

高校固定资产内部控制体系探讨

固定资产是高校生存发展不可缺少的物质基础,在资产总额中所占的比重极大,是进行教学、科研等活动的物质基础.但是目前高校固定资产管理方面存在着许多问题,主要原因是内部控制较弱.针对高校固定资产管理存在的问题,从内部控制的角度探讨如何切实做好固定资产管理,提高固定资产使用效率.     

Time to Exchange the Exchange‐Rate Regime: Are Hard Pegs the Best Option for Low‐Income Countries?

This paper revisits the debate over the most appropriate exchange‐rate regime for low‐income countries. The debate revolves around: the effect of the exchange‐rate regime on macroeconomic management, particularly inflation; the links between the exchange‐rate regime and vulnerability to crisis (often in the form of twin banking and currency crises); and the effect on international trade and competitiveness. The theoretical and empirical literature and the views of international organisations are reviewed. It is concluded that a hard peg might constitute the most appropriate regime but this is contingent on a number of important preconditions. This view, supported by recent empirical research, is shown to be at odds with the current orthodoxy of international organisations such as the IMF.     

学分制下高校辅导员工作的探讨

学分制是目前各高校普遍实行的一种教学管理制度,它的实施冲击了传统学年制下大学生思想政治教育与管理工作模式,给高校辅导员带来全新的挑战。高校辅导员只有认清形势,转变观念,以积极的姿态去研究工作过程中出现的新情况和新问题,才能把大学生思想政治教育与管理工作做得有针对性和实效性。