The Routledge Handbook of Local Elections and Voting in Europe represents the standard reference text and practical resource for everybody who analyzes issues such as local electoral systems, voting behavior, or political representation in Europe. It provides comprehensive and expert coverage of 40 European countries - organized along the respective local state traditions - and in addressing a wide range of important questions related to local elections and voting, it broadens the scope of existing analyses quantitatively as well as qualitatively. Finally, it affords a more theoretically grounded typology of local elections and voting. Each country chapter is written by a leading expert and follows a rigorous conceptual framework for cross-national comparisons, providing an overview of the local government system, details on the place of local elections within the multilevel political system, specific features of the electoral system, analysis of the main electoral outcomes in recent decades, and, finally, reflective discussion. Representative democracy is as widespread at the local as at the national level, and as the significance of local authorities in Europe has increased in recent decades, local elections represent a crucial area of study. The Routledge Handbook of Local Elections and Voting in Europe is an authoritative and essential reference text for scholars and students interested in local electoral politics and, more broadly, European studies, public administration, and political science.

Comparative analysis of eight countries, and their financial vulnerability during/following the pandemic. Highly relevant for practitioners in local government, as well as students and academics.

Political developments in Georgia have always been baffling to those who did not live there. This work picks up the story of the evolution of Georgia political parties where the author left it in his first book, Politics on the Periphery: Factions and Parties in Georgia, 1783-1806 (1986), carrying the story through 1845, by which date parties in Georgia actually mirrored those at the national level. It is a complicated story, involving, among other things, the legacy of the Yazoo Land Fraud; the development of political parties on the national level; and, especially, the presence of the Creek and Cherokee tribes in Georgia during a period when white Georgians were bent on expanding the culture of cotton. It is an unlovely story, but, by the mid-1840s, parties in Georgia finally resembled those in other parts of the nation, though, if one looked closely at their principles, questions remained.

Cyberthreats are among the most critical issues facing the world today. Cybersecurity Management draws on case studies to analyze cybercrime at the macro level, and evaluates the strategic and organizational issues connected to cybersecurity. Cross-disciplinary in its focus, orientation, and scope, this book looks at emerging communication technologies that are currently under development to tackle emerging threats to data privacy. Cybersecurity Management provides insights into the nature and extent of cyberthreats to organizations and consumers, and how such threats evolve with new technological advances and are affected by cultural, organizational, and macro-environmental factors. Cybersecurity Management articulates the effects of new and evolving information, communication technologies, and systems on cybersecurity and privacy issues. As the COVID-19 pandemic has revealed, we are all dependent on the Internet as a source for not only information but also person-to-person connection, thus our chances of encountering cyberthreats is higher than ever. Cybersecurity Management aims to increase the awareness of and preparedness to handle such threats among policy-makers, planners, and the public.

Available Open Access under CC-BY-NC licence. While the debate on regulating prostitution usually focuses on national policy, it is local policy measures that have the most impact on the ground. This book is the first to offer a detailed analysis of the design and implementation of prostitution policy at the local level and carefully situates local policy practices in national policy making and transnational trends in labour migration and exploitation. Based on detailed comparative research in Austria and the Netherlands, and bringing in experiences in countries such as New Zealand and Sweden, it analyses the policy instruments employed by local administrators to control prostitution and sex workers. Bridging the gap between theory and policy, emphasizing the multilevel nature of prostitution policy, while also highlighting more effective policies on prostitution, migration and labour exploitation, this unique book fills a gap in the literature on this contentious and important social issue.

The book discusses the issue of the correlation between social capital and political participation. The reader is given an extensive overview of the social capital term as well as the conventional and unconventional political participation terms including the historical conceptualization of the paradigm as well as its modern interpretations. Furthermore, the author explores the issue through empirical studies - conducted in 2017 and 2018 as a part of research grant titled 'Political Participation of Poles - New Challenges and Forms of Activity'. Through the study, the Author establishes the indicators of independent variables shaping political participation among Poles. Lastly, the author provides theoretical syntheses in the form of typology of political participation models.

This book provides a comprehensive and up-to-date picture of territorial change on the municipal level across all European countries. Taking a thematic and comparative perspective, the book builds on extensive quantitative data and a large survey of academic experts in 33 European countries. Territorial organisation of the municipal level in Europe is strongly diversified and yet far from stable. Politically speaking, territorial reforms tend to be risky and difficult, as such changes affect vital interests and identities. Despite such difficulties, the last two decades have witnessed considerable changes in territorial divisions at the municipal level across a range of European countries. In this book, the authors describe and analyse these changes comprehensively, making a vital contribution to understanding the reasons and dynamics of territorial reform processes. This book will be of key interest to scholars, students and practitioners in local or sub-national government, institutional design and more broadly to political science, public administration/policy, human geography, sociology and economics.

Whether you are a student preparing for a career in public administration, a mid-career professional manager or a seasoned veteran, A Guidebook for City and County Managers provides policy guidance and advice to local governmental challenges and issues. Assuming a knowledge of the basics of public management, James M. Bourey provides real-world recommendations for issues managers are facing this decade and beyond. Relying on experience from his long career in local government in chief executive positions in city, county and regional council management in locations throughout the United States, Bourey outlines the best approaches to the most critical issues for local governments. The book is comprehensive in its breadth of subject matter yet targeted in the recommendations that focus on the most critical issues. Social equity, environmental protection and global warming, good fiscal management, adequate public infrastructure and active citizen engagement are important themes throughout. Merely being an administrative caretaker is not sufficient; managers must have the knowledge of ways to improve their communities and take the initiative to enhance the quality of life of its residents. Making a difference is both the reason for the job and its reward. This book helps provide a roadmap for the journey.

First published in 1976, Industrial Location and Planning in the United Kingdom investigates in detail the nature of the changes taking place in the location of manufacturing industry since the 1950s and the reasons for them, including the effects of government regional policy and of factors such as market accessibility, labour availability and cost, transport facilities and personal residential preferences by industrialists and workers. The book brings together a wide range of published and unpublished material in discussing and evaluating explanations for regional and local manufacturing growth or decline. Government regional policy and planning is singled out for special attention, in terms of the impact of Development Area grants, of local planning controls, and of the town programmes. Manufacturing movement to new locations and the implications of government regional policies for industrial efficiency are examined in detail, together with the reasons for locational change in key but controversial industries such as steel, motor vehicles and electronics. This book will be of interest to students of urban planning, manufacturing, and development as well as city planners.

This volume intends to make sense of the current 'puzzle' that international parliamentary institutions represent. Their rapid growth in numbers and under a diversity of forms in the post-Cold War emerging new order is a worldwide phenomenon, even if its first expression dates back to the end of the 19th century. Their objectives vary from creating a permanent institutional structure for the peaceful settlement of disputes to promoting transparency in international politics, including the reinforcement of civil society participation in regional integration schemes. Are these goals kept nowadays? Are they being achieved? Which means and interests define the work within these assemblies? The three parts of the book include analyses of supranational and non-supranational regional parliaments and the specific case of the inter-regional relations established by the European Parliament.

This textbook integrates three related fields in economics, namely agricultural/forestry economics, environmental economics, and international trade, by foregrounding cost-benefit analysis as a significant policy tool. Exploring how welfare measures can be used in the analysis of agricultural, trade, and other economic policies, Applied Welfare Economics, Trade, and Agricultural Policy Analysis fills a gap in the literature on agricultural policy analysis by explaining the economic efficiency improvements and income transfers of various agricultural policy reforms in the United States, Canada, and the European Union. G. Cornelis van Kooten addresses methods of identifying and measuring economic surpluses (costs and benefits), the precautionary principle, identification of an appropriate discount rate, the importance of non-market values, and the role of agriculture in trade negotiations and climate change. Applied Welfare Economics, Trade, and Agricultural Policy Analysis draws on new research, brings attention to the existing literature, and includes review questions that challenge programming skills. The techniques developed in this text can be applied to the development and reform of agricultural policies in various regions in response to trade negotiations and many other situations involving government policy.

This book is a comprehensive work which incisively analyses, from a theoretically informed perspective, crucial aspects of India's journey from partial divestiture to privatisation, accompanied by case studies of enterprises being privatised in FY 2022. Naib begins with the economic role of the state followed by theoretical and empirical evidence on the state versus private ownership in the first two chapters. Next, an overview of public sector in India including the New Public Sector Enterprise Policy for Atmanirbhar Bharat-2021 is discussed, before a broader examination of the global experience with privatisation is done. Naib then goes on to explore India's journey from partial divestiture to privatisation from 1991 to 2021 in four time slots based on the political party in power. The book also looks at big ticket privatisation and asset monetisation proposed in FY 2022. Many criticised the design of National Monetisation Plan as it may lead to concentration of wealth, increasing inequalities, asset stripping, and consumers paying higher charges. The book closes by presenting six instances of big-ticket privatisations ranging from airlines, airports, banks, insurance, as well as industries such as petroleum and telecoms. The book's timely data and analysis of key developments will interest researchers in the fields of divestiture and privatisation in India.

In 1990, the New York Times wrote, ""Government corruption was not invented in West Virginia. But there are people who contend that West Virginia officials have done more than their share over the years to develop state-of-the-art techniques in vote theft, contract kickbacks, influence peddling and good old-fashioned bribery, extortion, fraud, tax evasion and outright stealing."" While investigating such events as the Invest Right scandal, Thomas Stafford, a former journalist for the Charleston Gazette, would find himself in a very precarious position. As a reporter he felt obligated to tell the whole truth, and he believed in the need to serve the public and those West Virginians who were being abused by a political machine. In Afflicting the Comfortable, Stafford relates such tales of the responsibility of journalism and politics in coordination with scandals that have unsettled the Mountain State over the past few decades. His probing would take him from the halls of Charleston to the center of our nation's ruling elite. Guided by his senses of duty, right, and fairness, he plunged head first into the misdeeds of West Virginia's politicians. His investigations would be the preface to the downfall of a governor and an adminstration that had robbed the state and the citizens of West Virginia for years.

This book explores the ways that institutions play a role--or fail to--in Japanese and American approaches to regional governance in East Asia. It uses recent studies on the logic and dynamics of institutions to determine the logic of order within the East Asia region. The central focus is on bilateral and multilateral regional institutions, how Japan and the U.S. use these institutions, and what we can learn about the future direction of institutions of governance within the East Asia region.

This book approaches the study of AfroEurope through narrative forms produced in contemporary France, a location which richly illustrates race in European spaces.

The book adopts a transdisciplinary lens that combines critical black and urban geographies, intersectional feminism, and textual analysis to explore the spatial negotiations of black women in France. It assesses literature, film, and music as narrative forms and engages with the sociocultural and political contexts from which they emerge. Through the figure of the black flâneuse and the analytical framework of "walking as method", the book goes beneath spectacular representations of ghettoised banlieues, televised protests, and shipwrecked migrants to analyse the spatiality of blackness in the everyday. It argues that the material-discursive framing of black flânerie, as both relational and embodied movements, renders visible a politics of place embedded in everyday micro-struggles of raced-sexed subjects.

Foregrounding expressive modes and forms that have traditionally received little critical attention outside of the French and francophone world, this book will be relevant to academics, researchers, writers, students, activists, and readers with interests in Literary and Cultural Studies, African and Afrodiasporic Studies, Black Feminisms, Migration Studies, Critical Black Geographies, Francophone Studies, and the comparative framework of Afroeuropean Studies.

Table of Contents

Introduction Part I: The Long Shadow of Marianne 1. I wonder as I wander: AfroFrench visuality and walking as method 2. The map is not the territory: francophonie and the errant writer 3. Black or French: voicing the borders of black France Part II: Blackness Intra Muros 4. Naming into place: Afropeanism as a poetics of relation 5. Zara in the metro: geographic variability and the ethnographic gaze 6. Re-imagining AfroParisianism: blackness encoded; spatiality decoded Conclusion: black spatiality and the search for ouverture

No student of state and local government is more knowledgeable than Colman, so this substantial book is a welcome contribution. . . . strongly recommended for all college and university libraries. "Choice"

State and local governments already bear, or are increasingly assuming, the primary legal, political, and fiscal responsibility for policy and program areas in which the highest degree of institutional capacity, commitment, competence, and integrity are essential. Among the issue areas that confront these governments over the coming decade are: the changing American economy and the requisite retraining of the labor force, poverty and the growing urban underclass, health care and services, day care, transportation and other physical infrastructure needs, housing, and regulatory and legal systems.

Colman examines the present legal, structural, financial, and political underpinnings of those policy areas of domestic government that nationally appear most critical. He describes the current and emerging agenda of state and local governments and of the growing number of private profit and not-for-profit organizations that are assuming ever-widening responsibility for leadership and performance in state and local affairs. Contrasts are drawn to major changes in the nature, resources, and commitment of national, state and local governments and associated private performers in these crucial areas since the mid-1970s. Demography, labor force, and other socioeconomic data provide quantitative bases for comparison. In ensuing qualitative analyses, two or more sides of the major issues in each of the policy areas are presented, along with evaluations of past and potential state and local government and collaborative private sector responses. Because it provides new information and perspectives on emerging power centers in American domestic governance, this unique reference will be important reading for those occupied or interested in state and local government; intergovernmental and public-private sector relationships; public administration and finance; and urban studies. Public officials and private sector leaders concerned with state, local, and community affairs, as well as research organizations in these fields should find a place for it on their desks or in their libraries.

City-regions are areas where the daily journeys for work, shopping and leisure frequently cross administrative boundaries. They are seen as engines of the national economy, but are also facing congestion and disparities. Thus, all over the world, governments attempt to increase problem-solving capacities in city-regions by institutional reform and a shift of functions. This book analyses the recent reforms and changes in the governance of city-regions in France, Germany and Italy. It covers themes such as the impact of austerity measures, territorial development, planning and state modernisation. The authors provide a systematic cross-country perspective on two levels, between six city-regions and between the national policy frameworks in these three countries. They use a solid comparative framework, which refers to the four dimensions functions, institutions and governance, ideas and space. They describe the course of the reforms, the motivations and the results, and consequently, they question the widespread metropolitan fever or resurgence of city-regions and provide a better understanding of recent changes in city-regional governance in Europe. The primary readership will be researchers and master students in planning, urban studies, urban geography, political science and governance studies, especially those interested in metropolitan regions and / or decentralisation. Due to the uniqueness of the work, the book will be of particular interest to scholars working on the comparative European dimension of territorial governance and planning. The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

Originally published in 1987, this title reviews and evaluates the methodologies suitable for highway evaluation, along with the UK transport supplementary grant and TPP (Transport Policies and Programme) system. Examples of current UK practice are briefly described, with more details being given of the technique of priority ranking used in the case study area of the West Midlands. Multi criteria approaches are reviewed in chapter two. Chapter three looks at the choice of highway data input in the light of those available, and the practical structure of factorial analysis applied to the case study area. The book covers following issues: computer structure and requirements; highway problem data; referencing methods; site definition; and weighting methods. The results from this study are described and then analysed by classical factorial analysis. The implications of the technique for the TPP preparation process, for the derivation of priorities, and the highway evaluation process as a whole are given. Specific techniques, such as factorial analysis, bridge problem and bus aid ranking, highway capacity calculations and sensitivity testing, as well as the computer programs used (March and COBA) are described in greater detail in the appendices.

This book offers a comprehensive analysis of the state of political institutions, the military establishment and political parties in Pakistan. It provides a nuanced understanding of the practices of disenfranchisement by theocratic governments in the country which has relegated the people to the margins of their society. The volume provides an in-depth account of the political history of Pakistan focusing not only on national politics and foreign policy but also on their congruences with subnational systems of governance, the criminal justice system, bureaucracy, the electoral system and the police. It discusses challenging issues plaguing the country such as the continued dominance of the military, lagging economic development, lack of accountability within political institutions, sectarianism and terrorism. The author dissects and critically examines Pakistan's hegemonic politics and underlines the need for a new social contract based on the principles of inclusiveness and equality. The volume offers fresh perspectives on the multifaceted problems in Pakistan's politics. It will be of great interest to policy practitioners and to academics and students of politics, law and governance, sociology, international relations, comparative politics, Pakistan studies and South Asia studies.

This handbook provides an authoritative and comprehensive overview of African population dynamics, variations, causes and consequences, demonstrating the real-world applications of research in policies and programmes.

African demography has come of age. Over 50 years, the discipline has grown exponentially in the number of training and research institutions, specialist experts and academic output, all with an aim of addressing the enormous demographic challenges faced by the continent. The book draws on old and emerging analytical tools to explore the relationships between population dynamics and social, economic, cultural and political environments from African perspectives. Key topics include fertility, sexual behaviours, healthcare, ageing, mortality, migration, displacement, the causes and consequences of demographic changes and teaching and research developments in African demography.

The Routledge Handbook of African Demography will be an essential resource for students and researchers of African demography, sociology, development and cultural studies.

Table of Contents

Part 1: Introductory Chapters 1. Introduction, Clifford O. Odimegwu and Yemi Adewoyin 2. Population Structure of Africa - Spatiotemporal Patterns and Development Linkages, Yemi Adewoyin and Clifford Odimegwu Part 2: Demographic Training and Research 3. Demographic Training in African Institutions: Past, Present and Future, Alfred Agwanda Otieno and Lawrence Ikamari 4. African Demographic Research: Progress and Challenges, Michel Garenne 5. Indirect Estimation Techniques and Statistical Modeling in African Demographic Research, Joshua O. Akinyemi and Sunday A. Adedini 6. The Demographic Research in Lusophone Africa: What is Known and What Needs to Be Done?, Carlos Arnaldo, Rogers Hansine and Nelson C. Zavale 7. Old, Contemporary and Emerging Sources of Demographic Data in Africa, Babatunde M. Gbadebo 8. Demographic Operations in distress? The Case of French-Speaking African Countries South of the Sahara, Françoise Gubry and Francis Gendreau Part 3: Marriage, Fertility, and SRH 9. Marriage in Sub-Saharan Africa, Michel Garenne 10. The Construction of Teen Pregnancy and Child Marriage in Africa, Timalizge Zgambo 11. Trends and Patterns in Fertility and its Proximate Determinants in sub-Saharan Africa, David I. Ojakaa 12. Fertility Transition in Africa: What do We Know and What have We Learned about Fertility Stalls?, David A. Sánchez-Páez and Bruno Schoumaker 13. Contraception, Boladé Hamed Banougnin and Obasanjo Afolabi Bolarinwa 14. Before Pills and Injectables: Systematic review of drivers of traditional contraceptive practice in sub-Saharan-Africa, Justin Dansou, Fidelia A. A. Dake and Robert Y. Djogbenou 15. From Post-Colonialism to Cairo to Now: The [un]changing ideas of reproductive health and family planning in Africa, Sasha Frade 16. Demography of Sexuality Studies in Africa, Joshua O. Akinyemi, Nicole De Wet and Clifford O. Odimegwu Part 4: Gender in African Demography 17. Gender in African Demographic Research: A Scoping Review, Lorretta Favour Chizomam Ntoimo and Clifford O. Odimegwu 18. Gender Norms and Sexual Behavior among very Young Adolescents in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Scoping Review 19.Beatrice W. Maina, Chimaraoke Izugbara, Yandisa Sikweyiya, Ivy Nandongwa and Caroline W. Kabiru 20. Gender-Based Violence in Africa, Marifa Muchemwa Part 5: Environment, Health, and Demography 21. The Disaster–Fertility Nexus in Sub-Saharan African Countries, Khandaker Jafor Ahmed and Yan Tan 22. Urban Health Dimensions of Demographic Research in Africa – A Systematic Review, Yemi Adewoyin 23. Demography of Inequality in Healthcare Access in Africa, Samuel Mwangi Wanjiku, Giuseppe T. Cirella, Alex Njeru and Jacob Kazungu 24. HIV/AIDS in the population: its levels, correlates, impact, policies and programs, Pamela Chirwa-Banda 25. The Double Burden of Malnutrition among Adults in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Systematic Review of the Literature, Mpho Keetile, Kannan Navaneetham and Gobopamang Letamo 26. Child Disability and Deprivation: A Conceptual, Theoretical and Empirical Review of the Sub-Saharan African Literature, Arlette Simo Fotso and Larissa Nawo 27. Effect of economic growth on maternal and child health outcomes in Sub-Saharan Africa: A review of the empirical evidence, Helena Yeboah and Sanni Yaya 28. Human Health Effects of Desertification in Sub Saharan Africa: A Systematic Review, Manikandan A.D and Vinod Joseph Kannankeril Joseph 29. Climate Change and Population Displacement in Africa, Roberto Ariel Abeldaño Zuñiga, Gabriela Narcizo de Lima and Daniel Esteban Quiroga Part 6: Migration 29.. Internal migration in sub-Saharan Africa: Dynamics, destinations, and Implications, Vollan Ochieng, Razak M Gyasi and Blessing Mberu 30. Changing Perspectives of Internal Migration in East Africa Revisited, Alfred Agwanda, Mary Muyonga, Milton Adieri and George Odipo 31. International Migration and Development in Sub-Saharan Africa, Aderanti Adepoju Part 7: Demographic Dividend 32.The Demography of Human Capital Formation in Sub-Saharan Africa, 1950-2100, Claudia Reiter, Anne Goujon and Samir K.C 33. Demographic Transition and Development in Africa, Patricia Agupusi 34.The Economic Lifecycle and Africa’s Demographic Dividend: Evidence from National Transfer Accounts, Morné Oosthuizen 35. Demographic Dividend Monitoring Index Conceptual Framework and Case Studies in Africa, Latif Dramani, Edem Akpo, Jean Baptiste Oga, Camille Détondji Guidimé, Silvere Konan, Sam Agbahoungba, Dalomi Bahan, Cheikh Tidiane Ndiaye and Crispin Mabika Part 8: Ageing 36.Ageing in sub-Saharan Africa: Demographic and Historical Perspectives, Ayo S. Adebowale, Obiageli Onwusaka, Mobolaji M. Salawu, Segun Bello and David A. Adewole 37. Intergenerational Family Support and the Health and Well-Being of Older Adults in Sub-Saharan Africa: a Systematic Review, Mark A. Aviisah, Hinke H. Haisma and Tobias C. Vogt Part 9: Mortality 38. Causes of Death and the Double Burden of Disease in Africa: Evidence from the sub-Saharan Africa, N.N. Wekwete and K. Mangombe 39. Dynamics of Adult Mortality in Sub-Saharan Africa: are there Prospects for Decline?, Ayo S. Adebowale, Adeniyi F. Fagbamigbe, Tubosun Olowolafe and Rotimi F. Afolabi 40. Maternal Mortality in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Systematic Review of Measurement, Levels and Determinants, Dorothy N. Ononokpono, Bernard Baffour, Nsidibe Usoro and Olukemi Adebola 41. Estimating Maternal Mortality: Surveillance Methods and Agenda for Improvement, Oluwatosin Ariyo and Henry Victor Doctor 42. Infant and child mortality in sub-Saharan Africa: an overview of levels, determinants, interventions and updates on estimation techniques, Sunday A. Adedini and Joshua O. Akinyemi Part 10: Concluding matters 43.Anthropological Demography in Africa, Daniel Jordan Smith 44. The Role of Quality Data in Changing HIV/AIDS Trajectory and Narratives in Sub-Saharan Africa, Jacob A. Adetunji 45. The State of the African Demographic Transition, 1990-2016, Lungile F. Motsa and Clifford O. Odimegwu

1) This is the first comprehensive book on Federalism and the Response to the Covid 19 Pandemic. 2) It contains 22 case studies from across the globe. 3) This book will be of interest to departments of comparative politics and development studies across UK.

Local government plays a critical role in the provision of governance, infrastructure, and services for local communities. Over the past 30 years this sector has undergone significant reforms because of various superordinate governments policy changes. Continuous improvement and quality programs have been a common tactical response undertaken by various local government organisations to remain sustainable and to continue to deliver value to their local communities. These tactical responses have had varying levels of success. This book seeks to go beyond a tactical focus and uncover the kinds of continuous improvement practices that are enacted in various local government contexts. A focus on practices enables practitioners and researchers alike to gain insights that to go beyond approaches which privilege the application of CI tools over the contextualisation of CI programs. Contextualisation affords the insightful deployment of programs that are specific to the needs and dynamics of local communities and operations. The cases presented share insights on aspects of CI including: embedding performance measurement; harnessing learning; contextualising CI activities to support the ongoing sustainability of these practices. Researchers and practitioners alike can draw benefit from the grounded industry base experiences and insights shared in the book.

Part of the International Library of Policy Analysis series, this book provides the first detailed examination of the practice of policy analysis in Mexico. Whilst shaped by the legacy of the Mexican state's colonial history as well as by recent social, economic and political developments, the study of policy analysis within Mexico provides important comparative lessons for other countries. Contributors study the nature of policy analysis at different sectors and levels of government as well as by non-governmental actors, such as unions, business, NGOs and the media, promoting the use of evidence-based policy analysis, leading to better policy results. The book is a vital resource for academics and students of policy studies, public management, political science and comparative policy studies.

The 1970s era of rapid change, economic and social, made constant demands on the adaptability of a constitutional system. The work of the State expanded, and the expansion was at several levels, delimited by the requirements of geography. Britain's constitutional system has two aspects: one essentially theoretical, concerning such questions as the nature of sovereignty, prerogative powers, and the rights and duties of citizens; the other concerning the way in which the business of government is carried on: how people who make political decisions are chosen, how their activities are subject to checks and influence by the representatives of public interests, formal and informal. Originally published in 1974, this book deals with the second of these aspects. It identifies the changes in constitutional practice which had taken place in the previous two decades, and the trends which could be discerned at the time. It has four main sections. The first deals with the changing structure of government itself: with the recruitment of ministers, the nature of political responsibility and the changes in government departments. The second section deals with both Houses of Parliament, and particularly with the new forms of parliamentary discussion and criticism. The third deals with the process of election, including the regulation of propaganda and the use of the mass media. The final section deals with the different levels of government, including the local, the regional and the supra-national. All through the main concern is with the dynamic aspects of the political constitution. This was a really up-to-date and realistic book on British government at the time and now can be read in its historical context.

This book considers the key critical interventions on short story writing in South Africa written in English since the year 2000.

The short story genre, whilst often marginalised in national literary canons, has been central to the trajectory of literary history in South Africa. In recent years, the short story has undergone a significant renaissance, with new collections and young writers making a significant impact on the contemporary literary scene, and subgenres such as speculative fiction, erotic fiction, flash fiction and queer fiction expanding rapidly in popularity. This book examines the role of the short story genre in reflecting or championing new developments in South African writing and the ways in which traditional boundaries and definitions of the short story in South Africa have been reimagined in the present. Drawing together a range of critical interventions, including scholarly articles, interviews and personal reflective pieces, the volume traces some of the aesthetic and thematic continuities and discontinuities in the genre and sheds new light on questions of literary form. Finally, the book considers the place of the short story in twenty-first century writing and interrogates the ways in which the short story form may contribute to, or recast ideas of, the post-apartheid or post-transitional.

The perfect guide to contemporary short story writing in South Africa, this book will be essential reading for researchers of African literature.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction: The short story in South Africa – new trends and perspectives

Corinne Sandwith, Rebecca Fasselt and Khulukazi Soldati-Kahimbaara

2. “Translated from the dead”: The legibility of violence in Ivan Vladislavić’s 101 Detectives

Kirby Manià

3. Coloured by history, shaped otherwise: A "decolonial" reading of Zoë Wicomb　

Aretha Phiri

4. Hyper-compression and the rise of the deep surface: Flash fiction in "post-transitional" South Africa

Peter Blair

5. Queer temporalities in two short stories by Makhosazana Xaba: The afterlife of Can Themba’s "The Suit"　

Cheryl Stobie

6. Queerying examples of contemporary South African short fiction

Sally Ann Murray

7. Therianthropic power in Mohale Mashigo’s speculative short fiction

Christiaan Naudé

8. Navigating the spectacular in queer African erotic short fiction

Jenny Boźena du Preez

9. Imagining Africa’s futures in two Caine Prize-winning stories: Henrietta Rose-Innes’s "Poison" and NoViolet Bulawayo’s "Hitting Budapest"

Aghogho Akpome

10. On reading, writing and being read: Journeying with the short story

Makhosazana Xaba

11. Short stories born from the womb of the past

Siphiwo Mahala

12. "Concrete fragments": An interview with Henrietta Rose-Innes

Graham K. Riach

13. LongStorySHORT: Decolonising the reading landscape – A conversation with Kgauhelo Dube

Corinne Sandwith, Khulukazi Soldati-Kahimbaara and Rebecca Fasselt

14. "My stories will remain written the way I talk": A conversation with Niq Mhlongo

Rebecca Fasselt and Corinne Sandwith