This volume presents and discusses evidence on collaboration between government, businesses and non-profits, focusing on an inter-organizational perspective of managing at the boundaries between sectors.

This book seeks to answer the unsolved questions related to hybrid organisations, adopting a multifaceted approach focussing on different national contexts, including the UK, Italy, Australia, and Sweden, as well as global organisations. Authors consider policy sectors including humanitarian aid, local transport, healthcare, and welfare services.

A comprehensive guide to public sector collaboration with private and nonprofit organizations for better service delivery Governing Cross-Sector Collaboration tackles the issues inherent in partnerships with nongovernmental actors for public service delivery, highlighting the choices available and the accompanying challenges and opportunities that arise. Based on research, interviews with public, private and nonprofit sector leaders, and considerable analysis of organizations involved in public-private-nonprofit collaborations, the book provides insight into cross-sector collaboration at the global, federal, state, and local levels. Through an examination of the primary modes of cross-sector collaboration, including collaborative contracting, partnerships, networks, and independent public services providers, the book presents a clear case for how public managers can assess the trade-offs and use these options to improve public service delivery. Nonprofit organizations, businesses, and third-party contractors are increasingly partnering with government to deliver public services. Recognizing the types of collaborative approaches, and their potential to solve public policy problems is quickly becoming a major task for public managers, with new methods and techniques constantly emerging. Governing Cross-Sector Collaboration provides specific examples and a framework for public managers to make strategic choices about how to engage private and nonprofit actors in delivering public goods and services while ensuring the public interest. The book provides effective methods for choosing, designing, governing, and evaluating networks, partnerships, and independent public-services providers, with in-depth discussion encompassing: Analysis and engagement of cross-sector organizations Fostering democratic accountability in the public interest Collaborative approaches (including contracts, networks and partnerships) and the issues associated with each type of arrangement Leadership and organizational learning in cross-sector collaboration Included case studies illustrate effective application of the concepts and methods described, providing both practicing public and nonprofit managers and public policy/administration students with insight into these emerging strategic alliances. The first comprehensive guide to public governance collaborations, Governing Cross-Sector Collaboration is an important and timely contribution to the field of public management.

In the past two decades, governance theories have arisen semi-independently across multiple disciplines. In law and regulation, planning, democratic theory, economics, public management, and international relations, among other disciplines, scholars have sought to describe new strategies of governing. As a result, the notion of governance is now one of the most frequently used social science concepts in the world. No single theory encompasses this diverse body of work, but rather multiple theories with different aims and perspectives. The Handbook on Theories of Governance collects these theories of governance together as an analytical resource for governing in an increasingly complex, fragmented and dynamic society.

Context in Public Policy and Management will prove insightful to academics, as well as to advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students in government, public policy, public management, public administration and political science.

Information systems (IS) seem prevalent in modern societies and have resulted in the rapid digitalisation of different societal sectors. One application domain of IS is emergency response, which is responsible for delivering essential services to save lives and minimise environmental damage in both small , frequent and large-scale emergencies. Specific IS applications are in turn used in emergency response to support such aspects as decision-making, communication, information sharing and the dispatching of resources. Public-sector cut-backs and a lack of professional resources have affected emergency response at the same time as natural disasters (e.g. forest fires, tsunamis, storms, terror attacks, and wars in the Middle East leading to mass migration) have intensified in recent decades. At the same time, frequent, small-scale accidents continue to occur on a regular basis, both in urban and sparsely populated areas. As a result, emergency response actors, first responders, are often placed under severe pressure. An emerging trend in response to these challenges, both in Sweden and internationally, is to create cross-sector forms of collaboration, by combining alternative resources from various sectors. Such collaborations are relatively new and involve heterogeneous stakeholders. Therefore, the thesis objective is to explore IS-related opportunities, challenges and needs aimed at supporting heterogeneous actors in emerging cross-sector collaborations in emergency response in order to enable and facilitate future related IS development. To achieve this, a user-centred approach was applied. A baseline study was performed followed by three case studies on ‘co-location of actors’, ‘co-operative use of resources’ and ‘semi-professionals as first responders’ by performing interviews, focus groups, participant observation, Future Workshops, an exercise and an after-action review. The thesis is based on case study research and qualitative research methods. Sociotechnical systems theory, the sociotechnical ensemble view, and network governance were used as the analytical framework. As part of achieving the thesis objectives, experiences from applying user participation in the context of cross-sector collaboration are also presented as part of the results. A context-specific framework developed to systematise and explore various important aspects of cross-sector collaboration in emergency response is also described. The results of this thesis indicate that the needs for IS in cross-sector collaborations vary from simple smartphone applications to manage alarms, positioning and the dispatching of new resources, to more sophisticated tools for sharing and viewing incident data. The results also indicate that these collaborations have the potential (e.g. resource redundancy, pooled competencies to increase total capacity) to improve Swedish emergency response if supported by adequate IS/IT support. The major challenges are organisational, economic and juridical and the most prominent are ambiguities in actors’ tasks and responsibilities, and how to prioritise between ordinary work and ‘new’ first-response tasks. They must be addressed to enable certain IS-functions, e.g. information sharing and positioning of resources The results also highlight several institutional factors (e.g. mutual interest between members, collective problem-solving, secrecy aspects) which are believed to play a key role in the success or failure of the collaborations and which must be adressed in the development of IS-support. The actors also have substantial basic needs for training (e.g. fire extinguishing, first aid) and emergency supplies (e.g. fire extinguishers, healthcare kits). Applying user participation also faced challenges, the major one being the development of a future cross-sector collaboration in a context that does not yet exist, and involving stakeholders from resource-strained organisations in doing so. The stakeholders, and sometimes also the primary end-users, are partly unknown and tasks are undefined. As a response to these challenges, a combination of activities based on multiple design groups, scenario-based Future Workshops, focus groups, the context-specific framework, a practical exercise and an after-action-review was provided. The framework, which was used to support data collection and user participation, includes 15 dimensions each intended to represent important aspects of cross-sector collaboration. The thesis major contributions are the identified opportunities, challenges and need as a ’sociotechnical ensemble’ and generated and from several studies, thus being comparable. The thesis more theoretical contributions is the combined application of the sociotechnical ensemble view and network governance where the studied collaboration forms are characterised as a hybrid form of networks and more traditional government mechanisms and where it is pointed out that network governance lacks explicit IS/IT aspects. In a wider perspective, the research fields of IS and political science may cross-fertilise each other when studying emerging cross-sector collaboration in the public sector. Identified user participation challenges relevant to the cross-sector collaboration context, suggestions on how they can be handled and the context-specific framework are contributions that can be used in practical user-centred IS development in similar contexts. Informationssystem (IS) används idag i de flesta verksamheter inom respons och räddningsområdet t.ex. för beslutsstöd, kommunikation, informationsutbyte och resurspositionering. Fel i systemen kan bidra till misslyckad samverkan vid räddningsinsatser som i sin tur kan riskera människors liv och orsaka skador på miljö och infrastruktur vid såväl små, frekventa olyckor som storskaliga händelser, kriser och katastrofer. Budgetnedskärningar, brist på professionella resurser, naturkatastrofer (t.ex. skogsbränder, stormar) och terrorattacker är några exempel på utmaningar som har intensifierats under de senaste decennierna. Samtidigt fortsätter frekventa, småskaliga olyckor att inträffa, både i urbana och i glesbygdsområden. Därför är responsaktörerna ofta under hård press. Ett sätt att hantera utmaningarna, både i Sverige och internationellt, är tvärsektoriella samverkansformer som i sin tur involverar ofta heterogena samhällsresurser. Samarbetskontexten är förhållandevis ny och de involverade aktörerna och deras behov delvis okända. Avhandlingen syftar därför till att utforska IS-relaterade möjligheter, utmaningar och behov för att stödja heterogena aktörer inom nya tvärsektoriella framväxande samverkansformer i svensk respons och räddning. För att utforska detta användes en användarcentrerad ansats. Därför genomfördes en bakgrundsstudie och tre fallstudier på ’samlokalisering av aktörer’, ’sambruk av resurser’ och ’semi-professionella som förstainsatspersoner’ genom att utföra intervjuer, fokusgrupper, deltagande observation, Future Workshops, och en övning med följande After-Action-Review. Avhandlingen bygger därmed på fallstudieforskning och kvalitativa forskningsmetoder. ’Socioteknisk systemteori’, begreppet ’socioteknisk ensemble’ och ’network governance’ teori används som forskningens analytiska ramverk. Som ett led i att uppfylla syftet presenteras dessutom erfarenheter från användarmedverkan i kontexten tvärsektoriell samverkan som ett delresultat samt ett kontext-specifikt ramverk utvecklat för att systematisera och utforska olika viktiga aspekter av tvärsektoriell samverkan i respons- och räddningsverksamhet. Avhandlingens resultat visar att behoven av IS i tvärsektoriella samverkansformer varierar från enkla smartphoneapplikationer för larmhantering, positionering och utryckning av nya resurser, till mer sofistikerade verktyg för informationsdelning och gemensamma lägesbilder. Resultaten pekar också mot att med rätt IS stöd har samverkansformerna potential (t.ex. i form av resursredundans, gemensam pool för ökad kapacitet) för att förbättra svensk räddningsverksamhet. De stora utmaningarna är organisatoriska, ekonomiska och juridiska. De mest framträdande är otydligheter i aktörernas uppgifter, roll och ansvar, och hur man prioriterar mellan sitt befintliga arbete och "nya" förstainsatser. Utmaningarna måste lösas för att möjliggöra IS-funktioner, till exempel vid informationsdelning och resurspositionering. Resultaten belyser också explicit flera institutionella faktorer (t.ex. gemensamt intresse och mål, kollektiv problemlösning, sekretesshantering) som tros ha en nyckelroll i samverkansformernas realisering och som måste hanteras i utveckling av relaterat IS-stöd. Aktörerna har också grundläggande behov av träning (t.ex. brandsläckning, första hjälpen) och utrusning (t.ex. brandsläckare, sjukvårdskit). Tillämpningen av användarmedverkan visade också på utmaningar, varav den främsta var att utveckla framtida tvärsektoriell samverkan i ett sammanhang som ännu inte existerar och att involvera intressenter från organisationer med ansträngda resurser för att genomföra detta. Intressenterna, ibland även de primära slutanvändarna, är delvis okända och uppgifterna är odefinierade. Som ett sätt att hantera utmaningarna genomfördes en kombination av aktiviteter som baserades på multipla designgrupper, scenariobaserade Future Workshops, fokusgrupper, ett kontextspecifikt ramverk, en övning och en After-Action-Review samt det kontext-specifika ramverket. Ramverket som användes för att stödja datainsamling och användarmedverkan innehåller 15 dimensioner som är tänkta att representera viktiga aspekter av tvärsektoriella samverkansformer. Avhandlingens främsta bidrag är de identifierade möjligheterna, utmaningarna och behoven som en ’social ensemble’ och som genererade och jämförbara ur flera studier. Avhandlingens mer teoretiska bidrag är den kombinerade tillämpningen av ’sociotechnical ensemble’ och ’network governance’ där de studerade samverkansformerna lyfts fram som en blandform av nätverk och mer traditionella styrmekanismer och där det påpekas att network governance saknar explicita IS/IT delar. I ett större sammanhang kan forskningsfälten IS och statsvetenskap kan komplettera varandra vid studier av framväxande tvärsektoriell samverkan i offentlig sektor. Relevanta utmaningar vid användarmedverkan i kontexten, förslag på hur de kan hanteras och det kontext-specifika ramverket är bidrag som kan används i praktisk användarcentrerad IS-utveckling i liknande sammanhang.

Drawing on theoretical research and empirical studies, this book examines how public governance can be transformed in order to enhance innovation. It scrutinizes the need for public sector reforms and analyzes how the gradual transition towards New Public Governance can stimulate the exploration and exploitation of new ideas.

This report finds that the Government's desire to deliver localism is neither supported consistently across Whitehall nor implemented coherently by each department of state. MPs warn that the Minister for Decentralisation will need to bring coherence, rigour and clear priorities to the Government's programme. The MPs call for a more explicit statement about where the dividing line will be drawn between a central, light-touch framework for local services and unwarranted interference from ministers in local affairs. So far the Government has shown itself all too eager to impose its preferences on local decision-making. Ministers have also introduced policies that circumvent rather than empower local government: elected police commissioners, free schools, academies and health service reform, threaten to fragment rather than integrate delivery of better public services at local level. As devolution proceeds, the manner in which local decisions are taken come under greater scrutiny. Any reduction in the inspection and performance management required by Whitehall must be accompanied by stronger local democratic accountability. Broadening the provider base for public services is an important plank of the government's decentralisation agenda, but it remains unclear how far the 'Big Society' can expand to take on services and functions shed by statutory bodies. Localism should not be adopted purely as a way to curb public sector costs not least because the financial benefits of more tailored services may not offset the loss of efficiencies of scale. Stimulating greater democratic participation and civic activism will itself cost money if it is to be successful and sustainable.

This state-of-the-art book develops the parameters of ‘governance analysis’ as a critical mode of enquiry. From a synthesis of theoretical approaches to public policy and governance, it offers a critical analytical perspective for empirical research and the development of theories of governance. This perspective is applied to seven detailed examples, from local to international and comparative public policy. Both innovative and unique, Governance Analysis shows that the messy real life of policymaking and its implications can be analysed systematically and insightfully without retreating to outdated ‘models’ of public policymaking or case-specific critique. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Arial} span.s1 {font: 10.0px Helvetica}

Government-Nonprofit Relations in Times of Recession brings together contributions by international scholars to examine how the relationships between governments and nonprofit organizations have shifted as a result of the global recession. Each chapter provides a detailed analysis of the impact of the recession on government operations and on the nonprofit sector. It is essential reading for academics and practitioners interested in the current policy agendas with regard to the nonprofit sector. This book is the sixth volume to emerge from the Public Policy and Third Sector Initiative in the School of Policy Studies at Queen's University, and is based on the Tenth Annual National Forum of the Initiative, which brought together public servants, experts, and practitioners to discuss the evolution of government-nonprofit relations. Contributors include Nicholas Acheson (University of Ulster), John Butcher (Australian National University), John Casey (City University of New York), Gemma Donnelly-Cox (Trinity College), John A. Healy (Atlantic Philanthropies), Rachel Laforest (Queen's University), Barbara Levine (Carleton University), Carmen Parra (University Abat Oliba Ceu), Colin Rochester (University of London), Björn Schmitz (University of Heidelberg), Steven Rathgeb Smith (American University, The University of Washington), Marilyn Taylor (University of London), Evren Tok (Hamad Bin Kkalifa University), and Meta Zimmeck (Roehamptom University).