This timely book questions the premise that Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) have a performance advantage over traditionally procured projects, an assumption that motivates policymakers worldwide to enter into such contracts. Taking stock of novel research comparing the differences in performance between PPP and traditionally procured infrastructure projects and services, the chapters in this book thoughtfully scrutinise this supposed advantage.
Each year, the federal government awards hundreds of billions of dollars in contracts for goods and services more than $500 billion in FY 2010 alone. It uses this buying power to maximize procurement opportunities for small businesses through long-standing policies such as set-asides and requiring large contractors to set goals for using small business subcontractors. The Small Business Admin.'s (SBA) Procurement Center Representatives (PCR) and Commercial Market Representatives (CMR) play an important role in helping ensure that small businesses gain access to contracting and subcontracting opportunities. Previous reports noted resource constraints that limited the ability of PCRs and CMRs to effectively perform their functions. In Sept. 2010, SBA contracted with a consulting firm to conduct a studyto define the optimal environment in which a PCR's efforts would have the maximum impact on directing contracts to qualified and capable small businesses. This report identifies (1) measures SBA uses to determine the effectiveness of PCRs and CMRs in carrying out their responsibilities; (2) key challenges PCRs and CMRs cited related tocarrying out their responsibilities; and (3) options PCRs, CMRs, and other key stakeholders cite to increase the effectiveness of PCRs and CMRs, including advantages and disadvantages. Figures. This is a print on demand report.
Funded by taxation, public spending cannot be separated from politics and ensuring efficiency and effectiveness is always high on the political and policy agenda. Accounting, accountability, governance and auditing are essential ingredients in evaluating public sector performance. Australia and New Zealand are world leaders when it comes to public sector accounting—such as being the first to introduce transaction-neutral accounting standards. This edited collection considers current issues impacting the public sector by primarily drawing upon experiences of Australia and New Zealand. Then, by combining history (from the time of the Domesday book, early sovereignty and Shakespeare) with current practice (differential reporting, international financial reporting standards, government performance, voter turnout, joined-up government and auditing practices), we use these experiences to illuminate the global issues of public sector accounting, accountability and governance. Based on rigorous research by top public sector researchers, this edited collection offers a multitude of future research ideas to enable those interested in following this pathway—whether they are in Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Europe, the United States of America, Africa or anywhere else in the world—an avenue to traverse.
Transforming conflict through social and economic development examines lessons learned from the Northern Ireland and Border Counties conflict transformation process through social and economic development and their consequent impacts and implications for practice and policymaking, with a range of functional recommendations produced for other regions emerging from and seeking to transform violent conflict. It provides, for the first time, a comprehensive assessment of the region’s transformation activity, largely amongst grassroots actors, enabled by a number of specific funding programmes, namely the International Fund for Ireland, Peace I, II and III and INTERREG I, II and IIIA. These programmes have been responsible for a huge increase in grassroots practice which to date has attracted virtually no academic analysis; this book seeks to fill this gap. In focusing on the politics of the socioeconomic activities that underpinned the elite negotiations of the peace process, key theoretical transformation concepts are firstly explored, followed by an examination of the social and economic context of Northern Ireland and the border counties. The three programmes and their impacts are then assessed before considering what policy lessons can be learned and what recommendations can be made for practice. This is underpinned by a range of semi-structured interviews and the author’s own experience as a project promoter through these programmes in the border counties for more than a decade. The book will be essential reading for students, practitioners and policymakers in the fields of peace and conflict studies, conflict transformation, peacebuilding, post-agreement reconstruction and the political economy of conflict and those interested in contemporary developments in the Northern Ireland peace process.
Each year more people die in health care accidents than in road accidents. Increasingly complex medical treatments and overstretched health systems create more opportunities for things to go wrong, and they do. Patient safety is now a major regulatory issue around the world, and Australia has been at its leading edge. Self-regulation by professional and industry groups is now widely regarded as insufficient, and government is stepping in. In Patient Safety First eading experts survey the governance of clinical care. Framed within a theory of responsive regulation, core regulatory approaches to patient safety are analysed for their effectiveness, including information systems, corporate and public institution governance models, the design of safe systems, the role of medical boards, open disclosure and public inquiries. Patient Safety First includes chapters by Bruce Barraclough, John Braithwaite, Stephen Duckett and Ian Freckleton SC. It is essential reading for all medical and legal professionals working in patient safety as well as readers in public health, health policy and governance.
