From their experience in nonprofit operations and their understanding of the realities of urban politics, the editors of this wide-ranging volume and their contributors dig into issues seldom explored in the literature. They study the role of nonprofits in local governing coalitions, the potential of nonprofits to replace social welfare programs, their efforts to restructure key elements of the local political process, and the unanticipated internal impacts of the changing roles of nonprofit organizations in the urban community. The result is a compelling argument that to understand life in contemporary American cities, we must take into account the expanding role of nonprofit organizations, their response to increased service demands, and their participation in common efforts to direct policy choices.

Hula, Jackson-Elmoore, and their panel of scholars, researchers, and close observers of urban policymaking focus on the delivery of social services to illustrate the complex and important set of roles that nonprofits have assumed. As social programs are cut at all levels of government, it is often believed that nonprofits can and should take up the slack and restore at least some portion of the cutbacks in such services. They examine how some nonprofit organizations have taken a proactive stance in this regard by implementing efforts that do not simply react to political and social change, but attempt to initiate and guide it instead. They attempt to change the political environment in which they operate, and the result has been to change the face of local politics in many jurisdictions. Each chapter of their book explores these expanding and emerging roles. Themes and focuses vary, which in turn reflects the variation and complexity within the nonprofit sector itself. At the same time, each chapter presents an emerging political or policy role now being played by today's nonprofits and voluntary associations, and a theoretical context in which such activities and behavior can best be understood. Scholars and advanced students in public administration, economics, and nonprofit management, as well as executive-level nonprofit managers, will find here an important update on what is happening in their special worlds, and the knowledge they need to make sense of it.

The environmental legacy of past industrial and agricultural development can simultaneously pose serious threats to human health and impede reuse of contaminated land. The urban landscape around the world is littered with sites contaminated with a variety of toxins produced by past use. Both public and private sector actors are often reluctant to make significant investments in properties that simultaneously pose significant potential human health issues, and may demand complex and very expensive cleanups. The chapters in this volume recognize that land and water contamination are now almost universally acknowledged to be key social, economic, and political issues. How multiple societies have attempted to craft and implement public policy to deal with these issues provides the central focus of the book. The volume is unique in that it provides a global comparative perspective on brownfield policy and examples of its use in a variety of countries.

The environmental legacy of past industrial and agricultural development can simultaneously pose serious threats to human health and impede reuse of contaminated land. The urban landscape around the world is littered with sites contaminated with a variety of toxins produced by past use. Both public and private sector actors are often reluctant to make significant investments in properties that simultaneously pose significant potential human health issues, and may demand complex and very expensive cleanups. The chapters in this volume recognize that land and water contamination are now almost universally acknowledged to be key social, economic, and political issues. How multiple societies have attempted to craft and implement public policy to deal with these issues provides the central focus of the book. The volume is unique in that it provides a global comparative perspective on brownfield policy and examples of its use in a variety of countries.

This guide concentrates on resources that are useful, in an easy-to-use format to enable architects, designers and engineers to access a wealth of knowledge. Information allows users to find, evaluate and contact the resources that can save time and money in day-to-day practice.

This guide concentrates on resources that are useful, in an easy-to-use format to enable architects, designers and engineers to access a wealth of knowledge. Information allows users to find, evaluate and contact the resources that can save time and money in day-to-day practice.

During the past decade, the appropriate role of government in society has been subjected to a sweeping reevaluation throughout the world. An important element in this ongoing debate has been a reappraisal of the form and magnitude of public social welfare policy. The essays that make up this volume examine a variety of aspects of this topic as it applies to family policy in the United States, including both the political debate over who should be served and how programs should be funded, and the intellectual questions surrounding the nature of social organization and its role within the state. Divided into three major subject areas, the work reexamines basic elements of current policy debate surrounding family life. The first section explores fundamental features of family policy, considering whether there is a conflict of interest between adults and children in fashioning social policy, and outlining the parameters of a feminist family policy. The second section examines the linkage between ideology and action. Among the topics covered are the link between state political culture and family policy, latchkey children, treatment of the nation's elderly and its link to a mythical past, abortion, and family policy in the People's Republic of China. The final section analyzes a number of specific policies, including AFDC program cutbacks, the decline in family planning resources, nonfamily-based care, and joint custody arrangements, and attempts to trace their impact. A concluding chapter examines the future of family policy. This work will be a valuable resource for both students and professionals in the fields of public policy studies and sociology, as well as an important addition to public and academic libraries.

In their introduction, the editors of New Ways of Doing Business assert that in retrospect, it will be apparent that today's government, that of the early years of the 21st century, "was undergoing its most significant transformation since the decade of the 1930's when direct government-delivered services grew significantly as part of the New Deal." This newest volume in the IBM Endowment for the Business of Government series is an invaluable guide to navigating the sometimes controversial changes taking place in the internal operations of government, the delivery of services to citizens, and the delivery of environmental programs. Possibly the most monumental change taking place in our modern government is the lessening allegiance to the old model of in-house, in-departmental performance of tasks. The new model asks "how and by whom can the tasks of government best be performed?" The answer sometimes lies with another inter-governmental department, leading to an in-house atmosphere of healthy competition and entrepreneurship, and sometimes with outside contractors. New Ways of Doing Business provides descriptions and guidelines for successfully navigating management under the new model. There are also dramatic new ways in which services to the public can now be delivered: via the Internet, via contracts with private organizations, and via faith-based initiatives and business improvement districts. Experts provide valuable checklists and guidelines and case studies exploring the merits and disadvantages of these new service delivery routes. Finally, New Ways of Doing Business explores what the editors call one of the most highly experimental policy arenas in government, that of the delivery of environmental programs. The authors of these articles explain via case study analysis many of the innovative programs currently in existence, and postulate that the traditional "command-and-control" stance of government to businesses will be superceded by a flexibility that will allow for incre

Why is it so difficult to design and implement fundamental educational reform in large city schools in spite of broad popular support for change? How does the politics of race complicate the challenge of building and sustaining coalitions for improving urban schools? These questions have provoked a great deal of theorizing, but this is the first book to explore the issues on the basis of extensive, solid evidence. Here a group of political scientists examines education reform in Atlanta, Baltimore, Detroit, and Washington, D.C., where local governmental authority has passed from white to black leaders. The authors show that black administrative control of big-city school systems has not translated into broad improvements in the quality of public education within black-led cities. Race can be crucial, however, in fostering the broad civic involvement perhaps most needed for school reform.

In each city examined, reform efforts often arise but collapse, partly because leaders are unable to craft effective political coalitions that would commit community resources to a concrete policy agenda. What undermines the leadership, according to the authors, is the complex role of race in each city. First, public authority does not guarantee access to private resources, usually still controlled by white economic elites. Second, local authorities must interact with external actors, at the state and national levels, who remain predominantly white. Finally, issues of race divide the African American community itself and often place limits on what leaders can and cannot do. Filled with insightful explanations together with recommendations for policy change, this book is an important component of the debate now being waged among researchers, education activists, and the community as a whole.