Conceptualizing the Third Sector in Ireland,North and South

While there is a long established and deeply embedded tradition of voluntary action and nonprofit organizing in Ireland, there has been very limited debate on a philosophy of voluntary action or on the place of the third sector in a modern democratic state. It is against this background that practitioners and academics are beginning to articulate their individual understandings of the role of the third sector in Irish society. This paper presents a framework developed from three questions to consider the place of the third sector in a modern democratic state. The questions are: What are the roles of the third sector in a society? What relationships exist between the third and other sectors? How are third sector organizations resourced within that societal context? Answering these questions contributes to a conceptualization of the third sector in Ireland, North and South.

     

Child Protection,Voluntary Organizations,and the Public Sector in Sweden

This paper presents an analysis of the role of Swedish voluntary organizations within the field of child protection as well as processes of institutionalization within such organizations. The empirical focus is on the two most important voluntary organizations within the field today, namely Rädda Barnen (Save the Children) and BRIS (Children's Right in Society). And their importance within the child protection discourse, as well as their role as producers of welfare, is discussed. In the latter respect two different processes of professionalization—professionalization of volunteers and avant-garde professionalism—are identified. It is demonstrated that the relationship between the state and voluntary organizations is a key issue when understanding the nature of the organizations and their role in the organizational landscape.     

“地缘维权”组织与农民工的权益保障——基于对福建泉州农民工维权组织的考察

维护农民工权益的现行策略难以切实发挥有效作用,维权困境的根源在于农民工缺乏真正代表自身利益的组织。“以地缘为纽带的维权组织”的出现说明了农民工对于组织资源的渴望,这种维权方式有其特点与功能,同时也存在局限。建立正式的、合法的、以地缘为纽带的农民工维权组织,是维护和保障农民工权益的可能之举,政府应采取有效措施给予恰当的引导,以使其健康发展。     

政府公共服务外包的实践与思考——以南京市鼓楼区为例

政府直接供给公共服务的模式已呈现诸多弊端,一些地方政府正在尝试把公共服务外包给社会组织.南京市妓楼区公共服务外包的实践取得一定的成效,推动了政府公共服务职能的转变,提升了财政使用效率,促进了社会组织的发展,较大程度上满足了社会公众对服务"质"与"量"的需求.但该模式在实践过程中也产生了一些新的问题.只有建立适度可操作化...     

非政府组织在中国的发展策略探讨

NGO(Non GovernmentalOrganizations)即我们常说的非政府组织,它在中国的发展并不如西方发达国家一般生机勃勃,在中国刚刚从计划经济走向市场经济的转型时期,在政府逐步退出市场从而依靠市场这只“无形之手”进行资源配置的时期,如何与新兴的NGO保持良好的战略合作关系,日益成为我们公共管理界研究者、学习者关注的新问题。本文除了从NGO的意义上分析其重要价值之外,还结合中国实际进一步讨论了中国政府应当与NGO建立协同发展关系的策略。     

The civic elite: A network perspective on elite consolidation among community-based organizations, 1998–2016

Is an elite consolidating among the leadership of community-based organizations (CBOs) in U.S. cities? Ethnographers identify a privatized turn in urban governance, with some nonprofit civic leaders becoming a cohesive group with enormous influence in local affairs. However, while researchers propose elite consolidation has occurred and created a more hierarchical, technocratic, and unipolar civic field, these structural changes have not been directly assessed. In this paper, I reintroduce an interorganizational network perspective to elite consolidation and evaluate how interlocking directorates among CBOs in Cleveland, OH, and Austin, TX constitute relationships among civic leaders over twenty years. Results indicate boards of directors are constituting a new civic elite, and that hierarchical interlock tendencies doubled in both cities between 1998 and 2016. The core of the networks appear to be organizations traditionally important in urban governance, though, and community analysis reveals power sharing among elite groups in the cities rather than singular dominant communities, indicating as situation of "elitist pluralism." These findings offer a new perspective on the problem of elite consolidation in civil society, and offer a benchmark for future analysis of civic elites.     

Rethinking Risk Assessment for Public Utility Safety Regulation

To aid in their safety oversight of large‐scale, potentially dangerous energy and water infrastructure and transportation systems, public utility regulatory agencies increasingly seek to use formal risk assessment models. Yet some of the approaches to risk assessment used by utilities and their regulators may be less useful for this purpose than is supposed. These approaches often do not reflect the current state of the art in risk assessment strategy and methodology. This essay explores why utilities and regulatory agencies might embrace risk assessment techniques that do not sufficiently assess organizational and managerial factors as drivers of risk, nor that adequately represent important uncertainties surrounding risk calculations. Further, it describes why, in the special legal, political, and administrative world of the typical public utility regulator, strategies to identify and mitigate formally specified risks might actually diverge from the regulatory promotion of “safety.” Some improvements are suggested that can be made in risk assessment approaches to support more fully the safety oversight objectives of public regulatory agencies, with examples from “high‐reliability organizations” (HROs) that have successfully merged the management of safety with the management of risk. Finally, given the limitations of their current risk assessments and the lessons from HROs, four specific assurances are suggested that regulatory agencies should seek for themselves and the public as objectives in their safety oversight of public utilities.     

Civic engagement among student veterans

Abstract

Objective: The purpose of this study was to assess participation rates in civic volunteering among service member and veteran students. Participants: Data for the present cross-sectional study were obtained from the American College Health Association’s (ACHA) 2011–2014 National College Health Assessment II (NCHA). Methods: Demographic characteristics of the study sample were explored by calculating frequencies and percentages by military service status. Research questions were explored with either Fisher’s exact test or maximum likelihood multiple logistic regression. Results: Service member and veteran students were more likely to engage in volunteerism than their non-veteran counterparts. Additionally, student veterans and non-veteran students reported that engagement in volunteer efforts both reduces their feelings of depression and increases their use of mental health services. Conclusion: The findings of this research suggest that the promotion of civic engagement and participation in volunteerism for service member and veteran students on college campuses might contribute to successful reintegration outcomes.     

Organization without actorhood: Exploring a neglected phenomenon

Most scholars explicitly or implicitly build on the assumption that organizations have to be externally recognized as actors to become constituted as organizations. Although recently some scholars have reported on instances of organization without actorhood, the phenomenon still remains widely neglected. Moreover, so far, organization without actorhood is seen as something very limited in terms of complexity and permanency. In this paper, we will draw a different picture. Drawing on the concept of degrees of organizationality (Dobusch & Schoeneborn, 2015) and a decision-based understanding of organization (Ahrne & Brunsson, 2011; Luhmann, 2003), we develop a framework that allows us to explore how much organization is possible without actorhood. Drawing on a qualitative case study of an inter-organizational collective concerned with ensuring public safety, we illustrate that highly complex organization is possible without constituting an actor. Our study presents evidence contradicting the common assumption that complex organization relies on the external attribution of actorhood. We also add to debates on responsibility of organizations and inter-organizational relations by pointing out that organization without actorhood has certain implications, i.e. it allows for a specific avoidance of responsibility.     

音组群中多音列融合的结构研究——以重庆市綦江区汉族民歌为例

音组群网状织体中多音列融合的结构研究，是从民歌表意的角度，对五声旋律构成要素进行动态结构的数理研究。通过对民歌结构要素数理差异的比较，探讨民歌个体之间、歌种之间结构差异形成的原因，同时获得民歌差异结构的信息。从民歌结构动态数据的量化中，获得结构数据与民歌风格之间相关联的理论依据。