服务型政府视野中的公共服务分工

建设服务型政府要求强化政府的公共服务能力.公共服务分工是指政府在强化公共服务职能和财政责任的同时,还要充分发挥市场在配置资源和社会在整合资源方面的特有作用,发展公共服务规划者和生产者的专业优势.尽管公共服务分工有利于弥补政府直接生产的局限性,但也不可避免地存在交易成本,需要进行有效的合同治理.对于公共服务分工而言,选择能够节省交易成本和具备激励机制的制度安排至关重要.公共服务的分工还有助于防止政府、市场与社会组织之间的相互对抗,重建新的权利和责任体系,有效地促进社会和谐.     

Taking a Leap Forward: Adult Protective Services and the Elder Justice Act

ABSTRACT

The author outlines factors in the current environment for Adult Protective Services programs in the United States of America in the spring of 2003 and the significance of the Elder Justice Act to those programs. The commentary notes key strengths and challenges in the bill and warns against relying on legislation alone to address the root causes of elder abuse.     

Decision Making in Child Protective Services: A Risky Business?

Child Protective Services (CPS) in the United States has received a torrent of criticism from politicians, the media, child advocate groups, and the general public for a perceived propensity to make decisions that are detrimental to children and families. This perception has resulted in numerous lawsuits and court takeovers of CPS in 35 states, and calls for profound restructuring in other states. A widely prescribed remedy for decision errors and faulty judgments is an improvement of risk assessment strategies that enhance hazard evaluation through an improved understanding of threat potentials and exposure likelihoods. We examine the reliability and validity problems that continue to plague current CPS risk assessment and discuss actions that can be taken in the field, including the use of receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve technology to improve the predictive validity of risk assessment strategies.     

Planning for permanency planning in foster care

The perceived severity of the problem of “drift” in the foster care system has encouraged agencies nationwide to accept permanency planning, but perhaps with limited attention to the planning process. This article examines the phenomenon of permanency planning from a planning perspective by focusing on: (a) definition of the permanency planning problem, (b) understanding of issues relevant to permanency planning (caseworker, program and systemic), (c) appreciation of the operational context (political, economic and social factors), and (d) evaluation of available options and possible consequences in developing or improving a permanency planning program. Permanency planning is not a simple, ready-made program applicable to any situation; it involves coordinated efforts by workers, service systems, and society in general, and requires time, commitment and resources. Successful planning for permanency planning can permit more children to grow up in homes providing continuity and stability.     

如东县计划生育优质服务“三询”评估制

对改进计划生育目标管理责任制考核办法的必要性及建立计划生育优质服务以面询、电询、函询为主的"三询"评估制的必要性进行了论述,并结合如东县"三询"评估制的实践情况,对其科学性、可行性和可操作性进行了阐述,旨在为调整计划生育责任制考核机制,推动计划生育优质服务提供新的思路.     

Controlling health care costs: An evaluation of strategies

There has been much discussion about the factors underlying inflation in the health care sector and the means to moderate increases in health expenditures. This paper identifies various costcontainment strategies and synthesizes research findings that may be helpful in evaluating their effectiveness. The review demonstrates the complexity of the issues and relationships that must be confronted and understood in cost containment. The delivery system is shown to be not well-suited to improving efficiency and restraining health care expenditure. Any single strategy, whether it involves restructuring the market or more direct regulation, cannot in itself accomplish the combination of expenditure control and adequacy of services that is socially desirable. A number of mutually reinforcing strategies are required. Finally, more empirical and analytical information on incentives, provider and regulatory decisionmaking, costs of regulation, and the dynamics of negotiation, is essential for the design of an effective costcontainment program.     

INFORMATIZATION AND PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION: A POLITICAL SCIENCE PERSPECTIVE

In recent years, both academic and policy making circles in the UK have shown a growing interest in the potential uses of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the delivery of government services. Much of the academic literature has been centred around the concept of 'informatization', and it has been suggested that the new technologies are transforming public services. Key theorists in the field of Public Administration have argued that informatization is one of a number of major trends likely to shape public services in the twenty-first century. However, the dominant theoretical approaches within public administration- those rooted in political sciencesuggest that inertia and stability are the norm in the public sector; clearly there is something of a contradiction between these two broad approaches. This paper outlines three political science perspectives that might be used in analysing informatization: the policy networks approach, rational choice and the new institutionalism. Evidence is then drawn from the social security, health care and social care sectors of the British public sector and related to the political science frameworks in order to examine their utility. Not only do these frameworks rightly highlight the incremental nature of change, but they also help to explain important variations in ICT use across the three policy sectors. It is concluded that combining the study of informatization and political science offers a fruitful avenue for future research.     

Staff and youth views on autonomy and emancipation from residential care: A participatory research study

The use of participatory approaches in designing services is still relatively uncommon. In this study, we helped design a service to support the transition of youth from residential care to independent living by exploring the perspectives of staff and of youth regarding: (a) the concept and development of autonomy; and (b) key factors in developing this type of service. We gathered the data through 10 interviews with staff (n = 10) and 4 focus groups with youth (n = 21), and subjected the data to a thematic content analysis. Staff defined autonomy as self-regulation and self-care, and identified three paths to foster autonomy – a sense of normality, meaningful relationships, and planning for emancipation. The staff and youth identified the following important aspects in designing the service: achieving normality (e.g. limited number of residents), promoting youth capacity (e.g. skill-building activities), providing social support (e.g. trust and respect between residents), and assuring guidance and boundaries (e.g. supervision of youth).     

Trauma, coping resources, and family functioning in emergency services personnel: A comparative study

In this study a sample of male, shift-working, operational ambulance officers were compared with a group of male shift-workers from a range of occupations in which exposure to traumatic events was not inherent in the role ( N = 71). Three dimensions of family functioning were examined: intimacy, conflict, and parenting styles, with respect to occupational type (i.e. work-related exposure to trauma) and accounting for personal resources (coping). Personal resources were found to have a significant impact on the dimensions of family functioning. Furthermore, differences emerged in the pattern of coping between the two groups. Ambulance officers demonstrated a more varied repertoire of personal resources than the control group. Social support was found to be the sole predictor of intimacy and conflict levels in the control sample. However, in the ambulance group social support was predictive of intimacy levels, rational-cognitive strategies were predictive of conflict levels, and self-care, social support, and rational-cognitive strategies were all significantly correlated with the three dimensions of family functioning.