This volume explores, both in theory and in practice, what “social coordination” is and how public policies can help or hinder the processes of social coordination. In particular, these chapters examine the institutional incentives that motivate public policy decisions and their implementation to achieve specific individual and social goals. Some chapters in this volume are more theoretical, applying insights from the Austrian, Virginia, and Bloomington schools of political economy to public policy issues. Other chapters are more practical, exploring the broader implications of these theories to real-world public policy puzzles. Authored by individuals from a variety of disciplines with diverse interests in public policy, this work includes discussions of topics such as environmental policy, housing policy, and education policy, among others. A unifying theme across the chapters is that policymakers often advise one-size-fits-all solutions to complicated public policy questions but ignore the multitude of incentives faced by the “players of the game” and the subsequent development of diverse forms of social coordination. Social coordination is often left out public policy analysis but is crucial to the success of informal and formal institutional arrangements. The chapters aim to disentangle these issues of social coordination in public policy in theory and practice.

Political discourse in much of the world remains mired in simplistic ideological dichotomies of market fundamentalism for efficiency versus substantial socialism for equity. Contemporary public policy design is far more sophisticated. It blends market, government and community tools to simultaneously achieve both equity and efficiency. Unlike in the twentieth century, this design is increasingly grounded in a deep evidence base derived by way of rigorous empirical techniques. A new paradigm is emerging: hybrid policies. This volume provides a thorough introduction to this technical side of public policy analysis and development. It demonstrates that it is possible to go beyond ideology, and find there some powerful answers to our most pressing problems. An international team of experts, many of whom have experience with the design or implementation of hybrid policies, helps cover the behavioural, institutional and regulatory theories that inform the choice of policy objectives and lead the initial conception of solutions. They explain the reasons why we need evidence-based public policy and the state-of-the-art empirical techniques involved in its development. And they analyse a range of in-depth case studies from industrial relations to health care to illustrate how hybrids can intermingle the strengths of governments, markets and the community to combat the weaknesses of each and arrive at bipartisan outcomes. Hybrid Public Policy Innovations is geared to scholars and practitioners of public policy administration and management who desire to understand the analytical reasons why policies are designed the way they are, and the purpose of evidence-gathering frameworks attached to policies at implementation.

Contemporary Asian society is marked by social processes associated with the loss of stable economic growth and high employment; family structures capable of caring for family members in need; and governmental economic and political competence. Post-financial crisis job uncertainty and income and labor market polarization have become important issue in Asian societies. Family structures are viewed as have been weakened, with a corresponding rise in divorce and domestic violence. Trust in the government is in decline. Against this backdrop it is timely to review three critical issues: 1) policies addressing work-related risks and socio-economic security; 2) changes regarding the structure and stability of families; and 3) issues concerning governance in times of weakened state capacity, declining trust, and the emergence of new politics. Containing chapters written by international scholars, this book introduces the concepts and theoretical approaches of risk and risk and governance and places them within the context of Asian societies.

In August 2005 the nation watched as Hurricane Katrina pummelled the Gulf Coast. Residents did not just suffer the personal costs of a home that had been severely damaged or destroyed; frequently they also lost their entire neighbourhood and the social systems that under normal circumstances made their lives "work". Katrina raised the questions of whether and how communities could solve the complex social coordination problems catastrophic disaster poses, and what inhibits them from doing so? Professor Chamlee-Wright investigates not only the nature of post-disaster recovery, but the nature of the social order itself – how societies are able to achieve a level of complex social coordination that far exceeds our ability to design. By deploying the tools of both political economy and cultural economy, the book contributes to the bourgeoning literature on the social, political and economic impact of Hurricane Katrina. Through a selection of case studies, the author argues that post-disaster resilience depends crucially upon the discovery that unfolds within commercial and civil society. The book will be of particular interest to postgraduate students and researchers in economics, sociology and anthropology as well as disaster specialists.

Contemporary Asian society is marked by social processes associated with the loss of stable economic growth and high employment; family structures capable of caring for family members in need; and governmental economic and political competence. Post-financial crisis job uncertainty and income and labor market polarization have become important issue in Asian societies. Family structures are viewed as have been weakened, with a corresponding rise in divorce and domestic violence. Trust in the government is in decline. Against this backdrop it is timely to review three critical issues: 1) policies addressing work-related risks and socio-economic security; 2) changes regarding the structure and stability of families; and 3) issues concerning governance in times of weakened state capacity, declining trust, and the emergence of new politics. Containing chapters written by international scholars, this book introduces the concepts and theoretical approaches of risk and risk and governance and places them within the context of Asian societies.

'Over recent years Complexity Science has revealed to us new limits to our possible knowledge and control in social, cultural and economic systems. Instead of supposing that past statistics and patterns will give us predictable outcomes for possible actions, we now know the world is, and will always be, creative and surprising. Continuous structural evolution within such systems may change the mechanisms, descriptors, problems and opportunities, often negating policy aims. We therefore need to redevelop our thinking about interventions, policies and policy making, moving perhaps to a humbler, more 'learning' approach. In this Handbook, leading thinkers in multiple domains set out these new ideas and allow us to understand how these new ideas are changing policymaking and policies in this new era.' - Peter M Allen, Cranfield University, UK

This Handbook assembles state-of-the-art insights into the co-evolutionary and precarious relations between science and public policy. Beyond this, it also offers a fresh outlook on emerging challenges for science (including technology and innovation) in changing societies, and related policy requirements, as well as the challenges for public policy in view of science-driven economic, societal, and cultural changes. In short, this book deals with science as a policy-triggered project as well as public policy as a science-driven venture.

What do public administrators and policy analysts have in common? Their work is undertaken within networks formed when different organizations align to accomplish a policy function. This second edition of Governance Networks in Public Administration and Public Policy offers a conceptual framework for describing governance networks and provides a theoretical and empirical foundation in their construction. Based on research and real-life experience, the book highlights the interplay between public actors and policy tools, details the skills and functions of public administrators in the context of networked relationships, and identifies the reforms and trends in governing that lead to governance networks. This practical text makes complex concepts accessible, so that readers can engage in them, apply them, and deepen their understanding of the dynamics unfolding around them. This second edition includes: A dedicated chapter on “complexity friendly” meso-level theories to examine core questions facing governance network analysis. New applications drawn from the authors’ own work in watershed governance, transportation planning, food systems development, electric energy distribution, the regulation of energy, and response and recovery from natural disasters, as well as from unique computational modeling of governance networks. Instructor and student support materials, including PowerPoint® presentations and writable case study templates, may be found on an accompanying eResource page. Governance Networks in Public Administration and Public Policy, 2e is an indispensable core text for graduate and postgraduate courses on governance and collaboration in schools of Public Administration/Management and Public Policy.

Public health activity, and the state’s public health responsibilities to assure the conditions in which people can be healthy, can only be achieved through different means of social coordination. This places law and regulation at the heart of public health. They are fundamental both to methods of achieving public health goals and to constraints that may be put on public health activity. As such, trainees, practitioners, and leaders in public health need to understand the breadth and nature of wide-ranging legal and regulatory approaches and the place of ethics in public health. Public Health Law, written by three leading scholars in the field, defines and examines this crucial area of study and practice. It advances an agenda whose scope extends far beyond that covered in traditional medical law and health care law texts. The authors provide an account of the scale of contemporary public health policy and practice and explain its philosophical depths and implications and its long legislative and regulatory history. They advance a definition of the field and explore how different legal approaches may serve and advance or constrain and delimit public health agendas. This ground-breaking book presents the field of public health ethics and law and goes on to examine the impact within the UK of private law, criminal law, public law, EU and international law, and ‘softer’ regulatory approaches. It is a primary point of reference for scholars, practitioners, and leaders working in public health, particularly those with an interest in law, policy, and ethics.

This book addresses the question of how to achieve social coordination in Socio-Cognitive Technical Systems (SCTS). SCTS are a class of Socio-Technical Systems that are complex, open, systems where several humans and digital entities interact in order to achieve some collective endeavour. The book approaches the question from the conceptual background of regulated open multiagent systems, with the question being motivated by their design and construction requirements. The book captures the collective effort of eight groups from leading research centres and universities, each of which has developed a conceptual framework for the design of regulated multiagent systems and most have also developed technological artefacts that support the processes from specification to implementation of that type of systems. The first, introductory part of the book describes the challenge of developing frameworks for SCTS and articulates the premises and the main concepts involved in those frameworks. The second part discusses the eight frameworks and contrasts their main components. The final part maps the new field by discussing the types of activities in which SCTS are likely to be used, the features that such uses will exhibit, and the challenges that will drive the evolution of this field.