Describes some of the sociological and psychological effects of organizational conflict and offers 10 operational principles to guide public administrators of schools and social agencies in meeting the confrontation tactics of activist groups. (JH)

A study in Wake County, North Carolina, designed to determine how racist structural barriers influence role perceptions of Black decision makers, identified the following discriminators of role perceptions: 1) officials' perceptions of themselves as decision makers or decision influencers; 2) age; 3) racial composition of organization; 4)…

Recognizes the media's influential position in policymaking. Compares two traditional approaches to involving social scientists in policymaking with a policy analysis approach for identifying strategies to deal with social issues. Considers the interplay between the mass media and policymakers, interest groups, the public, and policy analysts.…

Discussed are the conflict-of-interest provisions of the Federal Ethics in Government Act of 1978 that limit the activities of high level officials after they leave government service. Designed to deal with officials with inside information who return to private positions of influence, the law's brovisions are seen as much too broad. (JMP)

This article focuses on technology policy recommendations for elected officials and educators. Highlights include state government's role, state funding policies, regulatory changes, and county government's role. (LRW)

Explores the pattern of British higher education, known as the binary system, from the 1960s to the 1980s through the exploration of two questions: (1) Why did the binary solution appear to officials not just desirable, but necessary?; and (2) How did the officials ensure that the "necessary" solution became government policy? (CMK)

This author believes the NCLB is a masterpiece of language manipulation. She feels that she can almost live with NCLB's flawed funding and unrealistic expectations. What she can't live with is its blatant failure and the hubris of those who willingly trade personal and political gain for our children's futures, regardless of skin color, accent,…

In the 1980s and 1990s the discipline of philosophy of education had an impact on schooling and the public service in New Zealand because of the contracted work of James Marshall and Michael Peters. This personal reflection by Robert Shaw is a tribute to James Marshall and provides insight into the relationship between Ministry officials, the…

In recent years, there has been a good deal of media and academic interest in the ways in which Japanese history textbooks represent Japan's wartime past. However, the discussion has tended to revolve primarily around a number of symbolic textbook issues, such as government censorship of the term "aggression," without much consideration…

Corruption is a complex and multifaceted phenomenon. Forms of corruption are multiple. Measuring corruption is necessary not only for getting ideas about the scale and scope of the problem, but for making simple comparisons between the countries and conducting comparative analysis of corruption. While the total impact of corruption is indeed…

The author forthrightly declares in this book of essays on school reform that teachers are no more saintly than anyone else, that poor schools should be closed and lousy teachers should be fired, that philanthropy may sometimes do more harm than good, that teaching experience is not essential to being a school principal, that schools should be…

Managing migration has become a priority for policy makers both in developed and developing countries. Large immigration or emigration flows relative to domestic population's impact on almost all aspects of an economy and society: family structures, community life, educational and health systems, labour markets, security systems, governance and…

Achieving full compliance with the accountability provisions of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) federal legislation poses major challenges for most of the nation's states. Structured, open-ended interviews were conducted with ranking representatives from a number of so-called high-readiness states: California, Florida, New York, South Carolina,…

Like many urban reform strategies, mayoral leadership in education has both proponents and skeptics. On the one hand, proponents argue that mayor-led initiatives have the potential to transform low-performing schools and to hold schools and students accountable to systemwide standards. On the other hand, skeptics see mayoral involvement as…