Presidents and the Dissolution of the Union

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fred I. Greenstein ◽  
Dale Anderson
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Organizational Capacity ◽  
The United States ◽  
Abraham Lincoln ◽  
George Washington ◽  
Personal Strengths ◽  
History Of ◽  
Civil War Era ◽  
American Leader ◽  
Policy Vision

The United States witnessed an unprecedented failure of its political system in the mid-nineteenth century, resulting in a disastrous civil war that claimed the lives of an estimated 750,000 Americans. This book assesses the personal strengths and weaknesses of presidents from George Washington to Barack Obama. The book evaluates the leadership styles of the Civil War-era presidents. The book looks at the presidential qualities of James K. Polk, Zachary Taylor, Millard Fillmore, Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, and Abraham Lincoln. For each president, the book provides a concise history of the man's life and presidency, and evaluates him in the areas of public communication, organizational capacity, political skill, policy vision, cognitive style, and emotional intelligence. The book sheds light on why Buchanan is justly ranked as perhaps the worst president in the nation's history, how Pierce helped set the stage for the collapse of the Union and the bloodiest war America had ever experienced, and why Lincoln is still considered the consummate American leader to this day. The book reveals what enabled some of these presidents, like Lincoln and Polk, to meet the challenges of their times—and what caused others to fail.

Political Steering and Bureaucratic Autonomy

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Morten Egeberg ◽  
Jarle Trondal
Keyword(s):  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Organizational Capacity ◽  
The Political ◽  
Questionnaire Data ◽  
Public Governance ◽  
Bureaucratic Autonomy ◽  
Large N ◽  
New Public ◽  
Political Steering

This chapter draws attention to the effects of vertical specialization of organizations and how it affects public governance. The chapter documents that agency officials pay significantly less attention to signals from executive politicians than their counterparts within ministerial (cabinet-level) departments. This finding also holds when controlling for variation in tasks, the political salience of issue areas, and officials’ rank. In addition, it is documented that the greater the organizational capacity available within the respective ministerial departments, the more agency personnel tend to assign weight to signals from the political leadership. Expert concerns are strongly emphasized at both levels; however, agency personnel are more sensitive to the influence of affected parties. The chapter applies large-N questionnaire data at four points in time (1986, 1996, 2006, and 2016) that spans three decades and shifting administrative doctrines: New Public Management as well as post-New Public Management.

scholarly journals A guide for evaluation of online learning in medical education: a qualitative reflective analysis

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nourhan F. Wasfy ◽  
Enjy Abouzeid ◽  
Asmaa Abdel Nasser ◽  
Samar A. Ahmed ◽  
Ilham Youssry ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Medical Education ◽  
Online Learning ◽  
Best Practice ◽  
Online Courses ◽  
Learning Experience ◽  
Organizational Capacity ◽  
Expert Consensus ◽  
Educational Effectiveness ◽  
Education Community ◽  
Rapid Shift

Abstract Background With the strike of Covid-19, an unprecedented rapid shift to remote learning happened worldwide with a paradigm shift to online learning from an institutional adjuvant luxury package and learner choice into a forced solo choice. This raises the question of quality assurance. While some groups have already established standards for online courses, teaching and programs yet very little information is included on methodology of their development and very little emphasis is placed on the online learning experience. Nevertheless, no work has been done specifically for medical education institutions. Aim To develop a set of descriptors for best practice in online learning in medical education utilizing existing expertise and needs. Methods This work utilizes a qualitative multistage approach to identify the descriptors of best practice in online learning starting with a question guided focus group, thematic analysis, Delphi technique and an expert consensus session done simultaneously for triangulation. This was done involving 32 institution in 19 countries. Results This materialized into the development of a set of standards, indicators, and development of a checklist for each standard area. The standard areas identified were organizational capacity, educational effectiveness, and human resources each of which listed a number of standards. Expert consensus sessions identified the need for qualification of data and thus the development of indicators for best practice. Conclusion Standards are needed for online learning experience and their development and redesign is situational and needs to be enhanced methodologically in axes that are pertaining to the needs of the education community. Taking such axes into consideration by educators and institutions will lead to planning and implementing successful online learning activities, while taking them into consideration by the evaluators will help them conduct comprehensive audits and provide stakeholders with highly informative evaluation reports.

Evading the Patronage Trap: Organizational Capacity and Demand Making in Mexico

2019 ◽  
Vol 52 (13-14) ◽  
pp. 2097-2134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Palmer-Rubin
Keyword(s):  
Social Class ◽  
Small Business ◽  
Organizational Capacity ◽  
Process Tracing ◽  
Economic Interest ◽  
Business Organizations ◽  
Economic Sectors ◽  
Private Goods ◽  
Original Survey ◽  
Interest Organizations

When do organizations broadly represent the interests of their economic sectors and when do they narrowly represent the interests of members? This article investigates how agricultural and small-business organizations in Mexico make demands for programmatic policies or patronage benefits. Contrary to explanations based on the class of members, I show that the source of organizational capacity shapes demand-making strategies. Organizations that generate selective benefits internally are able to engage in programmatic policies that shape sectoral competitiveness, whereas organizations that fail to solve membership challenges internally are vulnerable to the patronage trap, a self-reproducing cycle wherein they become specialized in demand making for discretionary private goods. I generate this argument through process tracing of two agricultural organizations in Mexico. Analysis of an original survey of economic interest organizations provides broader evidence that organizational capacity is a better predictor of policy demands than social class.

Building Capacity for Heart Health Promotion: Results of a 5-Year Experience in Nova Scotia, Canada

2003 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 202-212 ◽  
Author(s):  
David R. MacLean ◽  
Jane Farquharson ◽  
Stephanie Heath ◽  
Kari Barkhouse ◽  
Celeste Latter ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Health Promotion ◽  
Nova Scotia ◽  
Organizational Development ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Organizational Capacity ◽  
Heart Health ◽  
Organizational Changes ◽  
Building Capacity ◽  
Partnership Development ◽  
Organizational Consultation

Purpose. To present the outcomes of a capacity-building initiative for heart health promotion. Design. Follow-up study combining quantitative and qualitative methods. Setting. The Western Health Region of Nova Scotia, Canada. Subjects. Twenty organizations, including provincial and municipal agencies and community groups engaged in health, education, and recreation activities. Intervention. Two strategies were used for this study: partnership development and organizational development. Partnership development included the creation of multilevel partnerships in diverse sectors. Organizational development included the provision of technical support, action research, community activation, and organizational consultation. Measures. Quantitative data included number and type of partnerships, learning opportunities, community activation initiatives, and organizational changes. Qualitative data included information on the effectiveness of partnerships, organizational consultation, and organizational changes. Results. Results included the development of 204 intersectoral partnerships, creation of a health promotion clearinghouse, 47 workshops attended by approximately 1400 participants, diverse research products, implementation of 18 community heart health promotion initiatives, and increased organizational capacity for heart health promotion via varied organizational changes, including policy changes, fund reallocations, and enhanced knowledge and practices. Conclusions. Partnership and organizational development were effective mechanisms for building capacity in heart health promotion. This intervention may have implications for large-scale, community-based, chronic-disease prevention projects.

Centralization and Subnational Capacity: The Struggle to Make Federalism Work Equitably in Public Education

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Susan L. Moffitt ◽  
Cadence Willse ◽  
Kelly B. Smith ◽  
David K. Cohen
Keyword(s):  
Public Education ◽  
Organizational Capacity ◽  
Interrupted Time Series ◽  
Two Dimensions ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Education Reforms ◽  
Interrupted Time Series Analysis ◽  
Administrative Capacity ◽  
American States ◽  
Technical Capacity

Vast disparities between and within American states’ responses to the COVID-19 pandemic have evoked renewed attention to whether greater centralization might enhance investments in subnational capacity and remedy subnational inequalities or instead erode subnational organizational capacity. Developments in American public education (1997–2015) offer perspective on this puzzle, which we examine by applying interrupted time series analysis to a novel dataset to assess the implications of centralization on subnational investments in administrative and technical capacity, two dimensions of organizational capacity. We find simultaneous subnational erosion in administrative capacity and growth in technical capacity following centralization, both of which appear concentrated in low-poverty areas despite centralization’s explicit antipoverty purposes. Public education reforms highlight both the challenge of dismantling subnational inequality through centralization and the need for future research on policy designs that enable centralization to yield subnational capacity that is able to remedy inequality.

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