Government policy

The complex problems of the twenty-first century cannot be effectively addressed with twentieth century top-down bureaucratic governance alone because of limited stakeholder participation in collective decision making and/or implementation. The somewhat limited stakeholder participation in the policy process, especially, that of target populations, can impact generating viable solutions to complex problems. Collaborative governance has emerged as a promising alternative to traditional management in addressing contemporary complex problems. Collaborative governance is thus a type of governance that promotes joint participation of state and non-state stakeholders in decision making and/or implementation by using agreed upon processes of engagement to collectively address problems. Such governance is especially beneficial for addressing the challenges posed by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). This dissertation uses the collaborative governance concept to explicate the efforts of HIV Health Services Planning Councils in Broward County and Palm Beach County of South Florida with the purpose of accentuating how collaborative governance works in providing various categories of services to meet the needs of people with AIDS (PWAs), as part of the implementation of the Ryan White CARE Act. The study focuses on critical variables of collaborative governance such as facilitative leadership and institutional design, the collaborative process variables such as trust building, commitment to the process and shared understanding, and outputs such as allocation priorities of the Councils. This study employed mixed methods in collecting data from various relevant sources.

the decades after World War II the United States became the most prosperous nation in the world. Yet, that prosperity and growth had a negative impact on the environmental quality of the nation. By the mid 1960s there was a rise in concern over environmental issues in the American public. Consequently, President Richard M. Nixon in his determination to give the American people what they sought decided to enact policies to bring the environmental crisis to an end. Among the environmental policies of the Nixon Administration was the Clean Air Act of 1970, a highly controversial piece of legislation that placed tough regulations on the automobile industry. Due to the significant role of the auto industry in the American economy, and Nixon's concerns over reelection, there were two major shifts in business/government relations during this era. The first one was characterized by determination to protect the environment with little attention to complaints from the industry. The second one was about protecting the profitability of the industry while giving little attention to environmental problems.

The current economic crisis has affected all aspects of life, which has resulted in political instability, personal financial troubles, and a growing number of business bankruptcies. While these are serious issues, simply developoing a government policy that injects an economy with money is not an appropriate means to achieve economic recovery and long-term economic development unless combined with an effective and efficient governing system. The present research studies whether the strong relationship between governance and growth exists during economic crises or only during non-crisis periods. The results of the current research show that the global economic crisis has had an influence on the relationship between governance and economic growth. In addition, this study found that different levels of development affect the relationship between governance and growth differently during times of crisis. Consequently, the results of the current research show the instability in the relationship between governance and economic growth during the economic crisis ; this unsteadiness is a sign of the need for long-term strategies to promote global and national good governance practices that are not adversely affected by crises.

Catastrophic event emergency planning has emerged as one of the most important operations management areas. Much of the successes of a response plan rely on the ability to maintain an operating transportation infrastructure. In recent years urban areas have become susceptible to biological terrorist attacks due to their size and demographics. To mitigate the devastating effects of an attack, a comprehensive catastrophic event response plan is devised. The characteristics of the disease (dormant periods, signs/symptoms), daily traffic operations and trip distributions, patient-choice hospital modeling and emergency center corridor optimization are all elements of an effective response plan. Simulation and optimization modeling of this plan becomes a faster-than-real-time tool in replicating urban area degradation. Therefore, allowing planners to identify "worst case scenarios" within the network and implement Dynamic Traffic Assignment (DTA) techniques and a non-linear departure time slot allocation mathematical model ensuring infected populations receive treatment and/or vaccinations efficiently.

The federal Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) program, authorized in 1986, has gained recognition over the last decade as America's largest place-based subsidized housing production program. The Qualified Census Tract (QCT) provision of the LIHTC program awards developers for projects built in high-poverty neighborhoods. This research examines whether the QCT provision is deconcentrating poverty or instead perpetuating it by comparing QCTs with LIHTC projects against QCTs with no LIHTC projects. In this study, a socioeconomic index is created to examine changes in socioeconomic variables (poverty, income, unemployment, and education) using 1990 Decennial Census data and 2005-2009 American Community Survey data for the twenty most populated MSAs in the United States to determine how LIHTC projects have changed the landscape of poverty in urban QCTs. Control and target groups were established to analyze the impact of LIHTC projects in QCTs. The control group consists of QCTs with no LIHTC projects and the target group contains QCTs with LIHTC projects. In order to determine how the socioeconomic variables have changed over the last fifteen years, the percent change from 1990 to 2005-2009 was calculated for each tract. Independent Sample T-tests were conducted at the national level, MSA level, and county level (when the sample size was large enough) using SPSS to determine if the difference in the target group's derived socioeconomic index and variables were significantly different from the control group. The findings indicate the target groups overwhelmingly outperformed the control groups for the socioeconomic index and every variable except unemployment. The results of this study may be valuable for policymakers to develop thresholds and guidelines for future LIHTC development in areas concentrated by poverty.

Disasters are unavoidable. The United States separates the phases of addressing a disaster into Response and Recovery. There are systems in place for Response; but Recovery, a fundamental process for countries to rebound from disasters, is a topic that is left aside. Recently the U.S. released a framework regarding this topic and it is the intention of this work to further explore recovery by starting a modeling process for disaster management systems by developing a Disaster Recovery Roles Pattern based on the framework and creating flowcharts using the Business Process Modeling Notation for use in future development of systems for the recovery process.

This dissertation explores how local government policies affect pre-and postdisaster business resilience, in the context of institutional and neo-institutional frameworks. The study builds on past research on business vulnerability and resilience to examine government policies in the pre-disaster and response and recovery periods, and explore how government responses of varying types can contribute to different outcomes for local small businesses in the recovery period following hurricane disasters. The project examines two cases surrounding events in 2005 and their impact on business resilience: Hurricane Katrina and its effects on the New Orleans metropolitan area; and Palm Beach County's experience with Hurricane Wilma. The dissertation involves a mixed-method approach to the subject matter. The statistical analysis portion uses multiple regression analysis of surveys of government-registered business owners in the affected areas. Business resilience is examined in light of the p redictive power of the size of the disaster; the influence of the institutional policies in public procurement, and vii economic development through small business programs; the role of institutional culture; and finally business vulnerability. The interview portion involves interviews with public officials, and coding and analysis of the field texts of these discussions, for additional information about the role that institutions play in the resilience of businesses before and after disaster. The statistical results suggest that institutional culture; size of disaster, institutional policies (particularly in procurement practices), and vulnerability can play a role in determining the resilience of a local business community.

Human beings have two apparently conflicting fundamental rights. On the one hand, individuals have a right to health care as the United Nations declared in 1948. On the other hand, individuals have a right to liberty; that is, the freedom to make one's own health related choices, even poor ones. One goal of this essay is to show how to reconcile these two apparently conflicting core American values. This reconciliation is important, because a universal health care system that is fair and just must account for individual rights in tandem with attempts to address matters of social justice. In order for this reconciliation to occur, matters of individual responsibility, social responsibility, and social justice must be central to health care reform.

Public asset management is a critical component of the financial integrity of government. However, in practice, problems exist in the field of public asset management at different levels of government in the United States. This research explores the management of public fixed assets owned, controlled and used by state governments in America. It attempts to answer two major questions: (1) What are the characteristics of a modern public asset management system based on the available literature? and (2) How do public asset management practices at the U.S. state government compare to the system standard described in the first question? Based on systems theory and current research on public asset management and public procurement systems, this research develops an intellectual framework of a public fixed asset management system. This system is composed of six interdependent cornerstones, including legal and regulatory requirements, organization structure, management process throughout th e life cycle of assets, human capital strategies, information and technology resources, and monitoring, integrity, and transparency. Each cornerstone consists of a number of components that reveal the underlying working principles of the relevant cornerstone and together determine the standards of fixed asset management in the relevant area. Survey results demonstrate that state governments fundamentally satisfy the standards identified in the fixed asset management system. However, certain problems obviously exist in the area of each cornerstone. In addition, survey results reveal that the six cornerstones of fixed asset management system are interrelated with one another. In most states, when a management element in the area of one cornerstone is widely implemented, the relevant management elements in areas of other cornerstones are employed and vice versa.

Policymakers and scholars are deeply divided on the purpose and effectiveness of sanctions, but recent work has given attention to the strategy of using positive sanctions or incentives. This study investigates the conditions under which the U.S. uses a punitive sanctions policy (indicated by all negative sanctions) or an engagement policy (indicated by a mix of positive and negative sanctions). Applying materialist (Schelling, 1960, 1966; Snyder and Diesing, 1977; Axelrod, 1984; Fearon, 1994) and sociological (Schoppa, 1999; Wendt, 2000; Lebow, 2007) bargaining perspectives, this study will consider factors such as the level of target threat, the target's nuclear weapons capability, the extent of international support for sanctions, and the relationship between the U.S. and target. This study analyzes the case studies of the U.S-led sanctions against Iraq (1990-2003), North Korea (1993-present), and Libya (1972-2006).