European Civil Societies Compared: Typically German–Typically French?

According to the ‘social origin theory’ of civil society studies (Salamon and Anheier, Voluntas, 9(3): 213–248 (1998)), the nonprofit sector of today constitutes a ‘repository of former societal struggles and conflicts’. Correspondingly, nonprofits are embedded in administrative and organizational settings, which in many cases date as far back as the latter half of the 19th century—a time when industrialisation and urbanisation started to exert influence in the western world. France and Germany stand for very different societal traditions, political legacies and administrative structures. Traditionally, France is a highly centralized country in which local governments do not enjoy much autonomy. In contrast, Germany is a federalized country where self-government of local communities was introduced as early as at the beginning of the 19th century. Against this background, it comes as a surprise that, aside from few exceptions, the nonprofit sectors in the two countries are very similar. How does this come? We argue that the reason why the French nonprofit sector of today is very similar to the German nonprofit sector is closely linked to the growth of the welfare state in the two countries.     

Lifestyle habits,substance use and predictors of job burnout in professional working women

Abstract

This study explores differences in self-reported lifestyle habits, substance use (alcohol, drugs and smoking) and predictors of job burnout in a sample of 879 professional working women employed in dental health ofices in a cross-sectional design. Job burnout was measured using the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) and self-reported substance use and lifestyle habits were assessed using the Stress Assessment Profile. Self-reported drinking, smolung and drug use were only modestly correlated with each other in this sample. Employed women with higher levels of drinking reported significantly lower quality overall lifestyle practices, eating/nunition habits, and more frequent use of avoidant coping strategies in the face of work and life hassles compared to non-drinkers. Women who smoked also reported significantly lower overall lifestyle practices and eating/nutrition habits. Those who reported using drugs for recreational purposes reported significantly greater hassles, poorer lifestyle habits, a less hardy outlook on life, and more frequent use of dysfunctional coping strategies. Although women who reported using drugs experienced significantly higher interpersonal burnout (depersonalization) compared to non-drug users, in general, self-reported substance use was not significantly related to job burnout. After controlling for age and psychological distress, perceived stress, type A behaviour, cognitive hardiness and lifestyle habits significantly contributed to predictions of job burnout in multiple regression analyses. Despite methodological limitations, the prevalence of substance use found in this study supports previous research findings. Professional working women who practise poor lifestyle and health habits appear to be at risk of experiencing job burnout.     

Adolescent group therapy membership selection

Conclusions Social agency practitiooners can employ adolescent group therapy as an effective treatment mode, as long as a great deal of attention and planning is put into the details of group membership selection. The authors have presented suggestions and guidelines that can be used in overcoming the logistic problems inherent in forming an adolescent therapy group. We feel that proper pregroup planning is just as important in determining group results as is the ongoing group process. Group treatment does not necessarily incease a therapist's productivity or reduce the amount of time spent in therapy, but it does offer a unique experience which has certain qualitative advantages for teenagers experiencing behavioral and relationship problems within and, particularly, outside of the family system.     

Können Organisationen nicht lernen? Facetten organisationaler Lernkulturen

Recently, the concept of ‘learning culture’ has entered the discussion on learning organizations and organizational learning, especially in the German speaking countries. Most of the academics, but also practitioners seem to use the term ‘learning culture’ in a particular sense as nurturing a self-directed, on-the-job learning of all employees. An implicit, often neglected assumption of this conception is that organizations can be divided into those who have a learning culture and those who do not. Although this idea of a dichotomy is also found in the discussion on learning organizations, it can be called into question. Past research has shown that (organizational) learning is a multifaceted phenomenon. Different organizations engage in very diverse kinds of learning due to the fact that they are facing varying environmental conditions. This brings us to doubt the idea of a ?one-best-way“ learning culture. Following the basic question, who learns what, how, when and why, the article presents a set of distinguishing attributes to distinguish between different types of learning cultures. Finally, yet unanswered questions and paths for future research are discussed.     

Virtuelles Selbstcoaching — Konzept und erste Erfahrungen

Combining management consultation with psychotherapy in the early nineties, coaching is a real innovation. Its success story grounds on a huge market demand. Nevertheless, actual market observations revealed a declining success progress over the past years caused by two factors. The first one refers to economic reasons since coaching is a high-budget-product and focuses mainly on managers and important specialists. The second factor is a psychological one: many potential clients associate coaching with psychotherapy and therefore react with resistance. To continue the progress, it is necessary to overcome both restrictions. The solution is virtual self-coaching as an innovative combination of coaching and e-learning. It is an online-tool that guides the user through a well-defined path of problem solving questions. This is for many users attractive because of the low costs in combination with the fact that working with an online-tool is associated with further education and not therapy. Our tests have demonstrated that the program is useful for a big variety of different problems and that best results can be expected if virtual self-coaching is combined with telephone coaching.     

Parental involvement laws, religion, and abortion rates

This article explores whether policy endogeneity partially explains the negative relationship generally reported between parentll involvement laws and abortion rates, since parental involvement laws are found to be negatively related to both teen and adult abortion rates. Since parental involvement laws may be more likely to be passed in jurisdictions with a higher level of antiabortion sentiment, both the law and anti-abortion sentiment may be responsible for lower abortion rates. To explore this possible interrelatedness, a religiosity level variable was used as a proxy for anti-abortion sentiment, since anti-abortion sentiment might affect abortion rates directly and indirectly through the greater likelihood of the enactment of parental involvement laws. The relationship of parental involvement laws and religiosity level to abortion rates was analyzed for teens and adults; regressions were estimated for four age groups: 15–19, 20–24, 25–29, and 30–34 years old. Residence county-level 1995 abortion rates were regressed against parental involvement laws and religiosity levels as well as several control county-level variables—restrictive public funding, unemployment rate, population density, percent of college graduates, extent of poverty, percent of married-couple families, and geographic region. The sample consisted of the 1,008 counties from the 17 states that reported abortion numbers by county and by age group. Using log transformations of the dependent variable abortion rates, log-linear weighted regression models were run for the four age groups. Parental involvement laws were highly statistically significantly related (p<0.1) to lower abortion rates for all four age groups; the coefficient was larger, however, when the religiosity level variable was excluded from the model. The coefficient for the religiosity level was highly statistically significant (p<01) for all four age groups when the parental involvement variable was excluded from the model; when the parental involvement variable was included in the model, the coefficient for the religiosity level decreased for all four age groups and was statistically significant for only three of the four age groups. Since the coefficients for both the religiosity level and the parental involvement law decrease when both variables are included, the negative relationship between parental involvement laws and abortion rates does seem to reflect some policy endogeneity so that the reported impact of parental involvement laws may be overstated. Her primary research interestes are gender-related, currently in the area of abortion rates.     

The journal readership survey

In the early part of last year the Editorial Board commissioned a study to investigate readers' attitudes to this journal. The journal is produced for a highly specialist audience, located in a wide spectrum of industries and institutions, with considerable diversity in their application of the planning function. The board was therefore concerned to discover the extent to which the journal satisfied the varied interests of readers and to identity any aspects of the content and presentation of the journal which could be improved in the future.     

“I've been independent for so damn long!”: Independence, masculinity and aging in a help seeking context

This paper draws on semi-structured interviews conducted with 36 older men to examine how older men's understandings of independence relate to their help seeking behaviours and health service use. We argue that discourses of masculinity and successful aging are both represented in men's talk about independence. Recognising that these discourses are intertwined is important for understanding how older men seek help and use health services. We outline the practice and policy implications of viewing older men's help seeking behaviours in this way, and how it might be useful for promoting older men's health.