The changing manufacturing environment requires more responsive and adaptable manufacturing systems. The theme of the 4th International Conference on Changeable, Agile, Reconfigurable and Virtual production (CARV2011) is “Enabling Manufacturing Competitiveness and Economic Sustainability”. Leading edge research and best implementation practices and experiences, which address these important issues and challenges, are presented. The proceedings include advances in manufacturing systems design, planning, evaluation, control and evolving paradigms such as mass customization, personalization, changeability, re-configurability and flexibility. New and important concepts such as the dynamic product families and platforms, co-evolution of products and systems, and methods for enhancing manufacturing systems’ economic sustainability and prolonging their life to produce more than one product generation are treated. Enablers of change in manufacturing systems, production volume and capability scalability and managing the volatility of markets, competition among global enterprises and the increasing complexity of products, manufacturing systems and management strategies are discussed. Industry challenges and future directions for research and development needed to help both practitioners and academicians are presented.

The underappreciated but surprisingly successful implementation of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) helped rescue the economy during the Great Recession and represented one of the most important achievements of the Obama presidency. It tested all levels of government with urgent time frames and extensive accountability requirements. While ARRA passed most tests with comparatively little mismanagement or fraud, negative public and media perceptions of the initiative deprived the president of political credit. Drawing on more than two hundred interviews and nationwide field research, Governing under Stress examines a range of ARRA stimulus programs to analyze the fraught politics, complex implementation, and impact of the legislation. Essays from public administration scholars use ARRA to study how to implement large federal programs in our modern era of indirect, networked governance. Throughout, the contributors present potent insights into the most pressing challenges facing public policy and management, and they uncover important lessons about policy instruments and networks, the effects of transparency and accountability, and the successes and failures of different types of government intervention.

The two volumes IFIP AICT 397 and 398 constitute the thoroughly refereed post-conference proceedings of the International IFIP WG 5.7 Conference on Advances in Production Management Systems, APMS 2012, held in Rhodes, Greece, in September 2012. The 182 revised full papers were carefully reviewed and selected for inclusion in the two volumes. They are organized in 6 parts: sustainability; design, manufacturing and production management; human factors, learning and innovation; ICT and emerging technologies in production management; product and asset lifecycle management; and services, supply chains and operations.

Hearing held in Toledo, Ohio, to investigate how the People¿s Republic of China¿s (PRC) efforts to create a powerful green technology exporting sector affect Ohio¿s efforts to develop clean and alternative energy technology. Witnesses: Ethan Zindler, Bloomberg New Energy Finance; Julian Wong, Center for Amer. Progress Action Fund; Devon Swezey, The Breakthrough Institute; Megan Reichert-Kral, Clean & Alternative Energy Incubator, Univ. of Toledo, OH; David McCall, United Steelworkers Union; Ty Haines, WIRE-Net; Kathleen Weiss, First Solar; Greg Noethlich, Elyria Foundry; Patrick Valente, Ohio Fuel Cell Coalition; J. Ross Bushman, Cast-Fab Technologies. This is a print on demand publication.