Line Agency Research Articles

Human resource devolution, decoupling and incoherence: how line managers manage gender equality reforms

ABSTRACT Public sector human resource management (HRM) has been devolved from central personnel agencies to line agency HRM professionals and further to line managers. While devolution has admirable goals, it has created difficulties as managers have not been sufficiently trained in HRM. We examine these difficulties in Australian public services, through the lens of recent gender equality reforms. We identify that the approach to HRM devolution has contributed to a decoupling of policy and practice and a resulting incoherence, as new policies are introduced by HRM professionals but not effectively communicated to line managers, not effectively implemented, and not monitored.

Adoption or implementation: performance measurement in the city of Guangzhou’s Department of Education

Performance-based budgeting (PBB) has become popular over recent decades in both developed and developing countries. How a line agency evaluates program performance is crucial to understand PBB reform in the Chinese budgeting system. This study uses the Education Department of a major Chinese city that pioneered PBB reform in China. Inspired by the conceptual framework developed by Julnes and Holzer (2001), the author finds that the Education Department ‘adopted’ the techniques of performance measurement at the beginning of the reform then moved to the ‘implementation’ stage shortly thereafter. Unfortunately, after three years of ambitious innovation, the department reverted back to the ‘adoption’ stage. Apart from the technical difficulties involved in the reform, other contextual factors—leadership changes, accountability mechanisms, lack of consensus on the approach reform should take, and organizational capacity—shaped the direction of the PBB reform.

An institutional approach for developing South African inland freshwater fisheries for improved food security and rural livelihoods

South Africa has over 4 700 storage dams, about 700 of which are owned and controlled by Government. Public dams were primarily constructed for domestic, irrigation and industrial water supply. Over time secondary uses for recreation and tourism have been established. Many of the public dams have been stocked with indigenous and alien fish species, predominantly for recreational angling. Given widespread rural unemployment, poverty and undernourishment, the development of inland fisheries on public dams and natural water bodies has much potential for improving rural livelihoods and food security. There is also potential for inclusion of communities in other value chains linked to economic activities around public dams such as recreational fishing and tourism. The public dams and natural water bodies fall under various implicit institutional arrangements depending on primary and secondary activities on a given water body. These determine the existing formal and informal power dynamics and related decision-making arrangements and controls under current use-right practices. This paper analyses the existing property rights that determine access, co-management options and governance arrangements necessary to promote sustainable development of inland fisheries in South Africa. Attention needs to be given to the various ways of explicit definition and enforcement of property and access rights if communities are to realise the potential benefits from use of public dams for fisheries and other economic activities. Achieving this will require a developmental approach based on principles of inclusive, representative, equitable, accountable and effective governance. Leadership by the line agency – Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries – will be critical for success of such an initiative.

Empowering Coastal Communities Amidst Ecological Crisis: The SSC Magallanes Experience, Sorsogon, Philippines

Today’s ecological crises reveal the increasing awareness that the world is threatened not only by poverty, conflicts and injustices but also by lack of respect for nature. Through the tri-fold participatory and partnership approach, the Sorsogon State College (SSC), together with the LGU of Magallanes and its community beneficiaries collaborated in empowering coastal communities and helped address various concerns affecting them. In a purposive sampling technique, a total of 57 respondents composed of the key informants in the coastal communities and line agency heads gathered for this research cum extension project. The descriptive–evaluative method was employed adopting qualitative research technique. In evaluating the risk scenarios, a retroactive analysis was utilized, the results clearly illustrated the sequence of outcomes of two dreadful disasters in the Magallanes. The assessment of the pressures disclosed various vulnerabilities of the town to hazards. The established Hyogo- Framework of Action (HFA) had strengthened the capacities of the municipality to effectively response and recover in future disaster. In conclusion, ecological crisis is the responsibility of everyone since irresponsible human activities were found to have brought major physical, economic and social consequences to the community. Stewardship of resources should be encouraged through outreach/ volunteer participation to a safer healthy environment.

Politics versus Professionalism: The Effect of Institutional Structure on Democratic Decision Making in a Contested Policy Arena

Public administrators have long wrestled with the problem of bringing professional policy knowledge or technical expertise to bear on decision making in a contentious policy arena. A common solution addresses political conflict by developing institutions that buffer decision making from the regular influence of elected official. This article compares the effects of politically buffered decision making relative to politically influenced decision making by drawing on case studies of county efforts to site and develop landfills and incinerators in New York State. Some of these counties created a special district government known as a “public authority” in an effort to remove the “politics from decision making.” Others used their regular line agencies. The cases show that the public authority siting processes were less likely to accommodate political concerns and more likely to focus on research-based policy or technical criteria. However, this professional focus then made them vulnerable to political conflict and likely contributed to the high failure rate of the public authority projects. In contrast, the more successful line agency processes, influenced by elected officials' political concerns, tended to arbitrage away political conflict at the expense of professional or technical considerations-but these processes were more likely to succeed. One case provides a possible middle ground. Rather than arbitraging away points of conflict, the administrators aggressively pushed decision making back into the political process, making elected officials choose the policy options. This process required elected official leadership, education, and commitment and resulted in decisions that were professionally and technically informed as well as resilient to political conflict.

Evaluating an Intervention for the Elderly at Increased Risk of Suicide

This article presents an evaluation of Link-Plus, a social work service provided over the telephone under the auspices of a suicide prevention hot line agency. The program targets the elderly at increased risk of suicide by virtue of depression, social isolation, and unmet needs. A two-group pretest-posttest design with randomization was used to test its effectiveness After receiving standard crisis intervention, 31 participants provided a wait-list control group, whereas 30 participants received immediate treatment. At 4 months, the amount of social contact was improved, and there was a trend toward the reduction of depressive symptomatology. At an 8-month observation, the difference between the clients' pretest scores and posttest scores on unmet needs was marginally significant, with clients having fewer unmet needs after receiving services. This outreach strategy and telephone intervention is moderately effective in treating older adults with depressive symptomatology, social isolation, and unmet needs.

Tourism and Canadian parks: fiscal relationships

Parks at the provincial and federal levels in Canada are widespread, valued and endangered. Over the last decade a fundamental shift has occurred in societal attitude towards these institutions; more parks were created while government monetary allocations were reduced. This attitude shift saw society expressing a higher importance for parks, while providing less tax money for operations. As a result many parks have insufficient funds for proper facility maintenance, enforcing carrying capacity decisions and halting deprecative activities. Canadian parks are therefore starting to shift more of the costs of operation to park users. The Province of Ontario recently restructured the provincial parks management agency. This new approach sees parks managed by a line agency with internal financial operations. The operation of public parks by the equivalent of a crown corporation is a bold experiment. The implications of such an approach are discussed. Tourism is an essential component of the future. Since park ...

Reflections on helping I: sustainable development, capacity building and participation

This selection focuses on the useful sense of what “help” means in development context. “Sustainable development is the goal, in sum; this requires the building of both individual and group capabilities; and broad participation is the major vehicle underlying the formation of solid capabilities. “If you have come to help me you can go home again. But if you see my struggle as part of your own survival then perhaps we can work together.” -Australian Aborigine Woman(1) (Manila 1991, p. 217) What does it mean to “help” a person like this Aborigine woman in Australia, -- or a community, or line agency in Nepal, the Philippines, Thailand, or here in Calgary? One response to this question might be in terms of the intended outcomes of my “helping”. A second response could be to consider the means I use to help the other move in the direction of their intended outcomes. A third view is to include the concerns for outcomes and process with an interest in the mutual influence of the helper and the helpee on each ot...

DOD's Office of International Security Affairs: The Brief Ascendancy of an Advisory System

Foreign policy and national security advisory systems for the president and secretary of state have been given careful treatment in a number of studies. ' Foreign policy advisory staffs for the secretary of defense, however, have received scant attention. Until changes made in 1979 by the Carter administration, the defense secretary's foreign policy advisory and general policy development staff was the Office of International Security Affairs (ISA), part of the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD). One of the reasons for its relative obscurity in the literature is that after the Johnson administration, ISA's influence declined dramatically. This article examines the factors that enhanced or diminished the influence of ISA. As the current administration struggles with the problems of foreign policy management, the experience of one cabinet-level advisory agency offers a better understanding of what has been effective. From the Truman through the Carter administrations, ISA filled two very different functions. It was a line agency,2 administering the Defense Depart-

The Vetlesen prize to M. King Hubbert

The Vetlesen Prize is awarded for outstanding achievement in the sciences, resulting in a clearer understanding of the earth, its history, or its relation to the universe. The award is given by Columbia University, and the prize is given by the G. Unger Vetlesen Foundation, which was endowed from the estate of the late G. Unger Vetlesen, former president of the Norwegian‐American Line Agency, Inc. The prize consists of a medal and $50,000.The award was given in December 1981 to M. King Hubbert for his outstanding contributions to earth science by applying principles of physics in solving problems of great geological significance.

Soviet Tractor Stations- Policy Control by Auxiliary Services

A UXILIARY services providing specialized assistance to the line units in such fields as typing, printing, purchasing, or public relations have a clear place in American public administration theory. On the whole, auxiliary service units are to serve the line almost as though they were outside agencies hired to do it. In practice, however, American administrators are sharply aware of the power of auxiliary services to control the timing of programs and often to modify the method, with the result, at least occasionally, that program content also is modified. The central purchasing office, set up to save the line agency trouble and provide expertness in seeking out the best product at the lowest price, the personnel office, established to save the line agency trouble and provide professional advice on recruiting or training, in practice often control how to purchase or how to recruit and train, and this control can produce a strong effect on program content. The Soviet Machine Tractor Station, famed not only as a system for channeling scarce and expensive capital equipment for greatest output but even more as the eyes and ears of the central government in the field(s), should not,