Resolving complex community problems: Applying collective leadership and Kotter's change model to wicked problems within social system networks

How does collective leadership within social networks resolve chronic and complex problems common to communities? Unfortunately, sometimes it does not, but when it does, the outcome may be truly extraordinary. We use a case study approach to explain how one Midwest community within the USA applied collective leadership within a community network to reduce teen births. It took ten years of what many identified as provocative media campaigns and comprehensive sex education programs to reduce teen births by 65%, significantly exceeding the stated goal. Using Kotter's change model as a backdrop, powerful strategies and provocative creativity reveal courageous leadership within a social network of diverse people and organizations focused on improving the social well being of their community.     

加强自治条例修改工作的必要性与对策研究

自治条例是民族自治地方贯彻实施民族区域自治法,妥善处理自治地方内部的民族关系、维护民族平等的重要保障。但是,由于立法工作者能力不足、立法理论缺失和法律规定不明确等因素的制约,导致自治条例存在对不能变通的法律规定做出变通,违背法律平等要求对法律规定进行细化,超越法定权限为上级国家机关设定义务,脱离实际需要简单复制上位法规定等违背宪法及其相关法要求的问题。为此,应从加强立法队伍建设和立法理论研究,对?宪法?和?民族区域自治法?的有关规定进行必要的解释和修改等几个方面,推动自治地方人大有效开展自治条例修改和完善工作。     

城市空巢老人养老中存在的问题及对策——以苏州为个案

文章以2008年苏州市区老年空巢家庭状况的调查资料为基础,分析了城市空巢老人养老中面临的主要问题,并提出了解决这些问题的对策建议。研究发现,苏州城市空巢老人养老中面临的问题主要有：存在一部分经济相对困难的空巢老人,生病没有钱治是空巢老人最担心的问题之一,空巢老人的社区照料服务需求没有得到很好的满足,部分空巢老人缺乏精神慰藉等等。针对城市空巢老人生活中存在的问题,文章提出了相应的对策建议。     

地方高职院校师资队伍建设中存在的问题与对策

本文对地方高职院校师资队伍建设中存在的问题与对策加以论述。     

Inverse Combinatorial Optimization: A Survey on Problems, Methods, and Results

Given a (combinatorial) optimization problem and a feasible solution to it, the corresponding inverse optimization problem is to find a minimal adjustment of the cost function such that the given solution becomes optimum.Several such problems have been studied in the last twelve years. After formalizing the notion of an inverse problem and its variants, we present various methods for solving them. Then we discuss the problems considered in the literature and the results that have been obtained. Finally, we formulate some open problems.     

Reciprocal relationships between psychosocial work characteristics and sleep problems: A two-wave study

Sleep problems are common and impair the health and productivity of employees. Work characteristics constitute one possible cause of sleep problems, and sleeping poorly might influence wellbeing and performance at work. This study examines the reciprocal associations between sleep problems and psychosocial work characteristics. The participants were 1744 full-time employed individuals (56% women; mean age 38 years in 2007) from the Young Finns study who responded to questionnaires on work characteristics (conceptualised by the demand–control model and effort–reward imbalance model) and sleep problems (Jenkins Sleep Scale) in 2007 and 2012. Cross-lagged structural equation models are used to examine the associations. The results show that low control and low rewards at baseline predicted sleep problems. Baseline sleep problems predicted higher effort, higher effort–reward imbalance, and lower reward. Sleep problems also predicted lower odds for belonging to the low (rather than high) job strain group and active jobs group. The association between work characteristics and sleep problems appears to be reciprocal, with a stressful work environment increasing sleep problems, and sleep problems influencing future work characteristics. The results emphasise the importance of interventions aimed at both enhancing sleep quality and reducing psychosocial risks at work.     

The Role of Behavioral Responses in the Total Economic Consequences of Terrorist Attacks on U.S. Air Travel Targets

U.S. airports and airliners are prime terrorist targets. Not only do the facilities and equipment represent high‐value assets, but the fear and dread that is spread by such attacks can have tremendous effects on the U.S. economy. This article presents the methodology, data, and estimates of the macroeconomic impacts stemming from behavioral responses to a simulated terrorist attack on a U.S. airport and on a domestic airliner. The analysis is based on risk‐perception surveys of these two scenarios. The responses relate to reduced demand for airline travel, shifts to other modes, spending on nontravel items, and savings of potential travel expenditures by U.S. resident passengers considering flying domestic routes. We translate these responses to individual spending categories and feed these direct impact results into a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model of the U.S. economy to ascertain the indirect and total impacts on both the airline industry and the economy as a whole. Overall, the estimated impacts on GDP of both types of attacks exceed $10B. We find that the behavioral economic impacts are almost an order of magnitude higher than the ordinary business interruption impacts for the airliner attack and nearly two orders of magnitude higher for the airport attack. The results are robust to sensitivity tests on the travel behavior of U.S. residents in response to terrorism.     

Computing Optimal Beams in Two and Three Dimensions

The problem of computing an optimal beam among weighted regions (called the optimal beam problem) arises in several applied areas such as radiation therapy, stereotactic brain surgery, medical surgery, geological exploration, manufacturing, and environmental engineering. In this paper, we present computational geometry techniques that enable us to develop efficient algorithms for solving various optimal beam problems among weighted regions in two and three dimensional spaces. In particular, we consider two types of problems: the covering problems (seeking an optimal beam to contain a specified target region), and the piercing problems (seeking an optimal beam of a fixed shape to pierce the target region). We investigate several versions of these problems, with a variety of beam shapes and target region shapes in 2-D and 3-D. Our algorithms are based on interesting combinations of computational geometry techniques and optimization methods, and transform the optimal beam problems to solving a collection of instances of certain special non-linear optimization problems. Our approach makes use of interesting geometric observations, such as utilizing some new features of Minkowski sums.     

Democratic Implications of Public Organizations

The author suggests a Weberian methodology, based on theories of democracy and organization, for assessing normative implications of public organizations. How different organizational models contribute to (re)create democracy and legitimacy is scrutinized with reference to a Swedish IT program. The conclusion is that a system management organization will be an appropriate choice for dealing with tame problems, but it will at the same time promote an elitist democratization. In contrast, a development organization will be more appropriate in dealing with complex problems, and it will most likely promote discursive democratization.     

对高校图书馆开架借阅工作的思考

总结高校图书馆开架借阅工作的优缺点，并针对出现的问题进行分析，进而提出一些解决问题的对策。