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Are you a current or aspiring Ph.D. student determined to overcome the challenges that lie ahead? Do not let statistics discourage you, because this comprehensive guide is here to help you defy the odds and reach the pinnacle of academic achievement. With failure rates hovering between 40% and 50%, it is crucial to equip yourself with the right skills to ensure your success. In this book, you will embark on a transformative journey toward becoming a confident and accomplished scholar. This book takes a meticulous approach, addressing the six essential skills every Ph.D. student must possess: research, writing, presentation, time management, persistence, and collaboration. Each chapter delves into the significance of these skills within the Ph.D. process, explores the necessary competences, and provides practical strategies for their acquisition. Armed with numerous tips, tricks, and actionable advice, this invaluable resource empowers you to optimize your performance throughout your Ph.D. journey. Within these pages, you will discover how to assess your current skill set, identify areas for improvement, and develop a personalized academic development plan. With the aid of many informative figures and tables, you will find quick and easy access to expert guidance. Do not let uncertainty and self-doubt hinder your progress. “Unlocking PhD Success” is your roadmap to triumph, supporting you every step of the way as you conquer the challenges of doctoral studies. Embrace this book as your trusted companion, and unlock your full potential as an exceptional Ph.D. candidate.

In diesem Open-Access-Buch präsentiert Sandra Binder-Tietz eine umfassende Analyse der Kommunikation von Aufsichtsratsvorsitzenden börsennotierter Unternehmen. Deren komplexe kommunikative Rolle wird dabei erstmals systematisch erschlossen. Aus der externen Perspektive werden die vielschichtigen Anforderungen der relevanten Stakeholder wie Investoren, Aktionärsschützer, Stimmrechtsberater und Journalisten an die Kommunikation aufgezeigt. Aus der internen Perspektive von Aufsichtsratsvorsitzenden, Investor-Relations- und Public-Relations-Verantwortlichen werden die internen und externen Kommunikationsmaßnahmen von Aufsichtsratsvorsitzenden identifiziert. Auf dieser Basis wird die Notwendigkeit begründet, warum und wie die Kommunikation zu einem festen Bestandteil des Kommunikationsmanagements von Unternehmen werden sollte. Für Forschung und Praxis werden dafür Implikationen und Empfehlungen entwickelt, wie eine erfolgreiche Kommunikation von Aufsichtsratsvorsitzenden aussehen kann.

This book is a useful resource for government policy analysts, academics, students of higher education and business practitioners interested in African economies and the key economic issues these economies are facing in 2020. In the face of weak governance and growth globally, there is still a window of opportunity for countries in Africa to build on not only their traditional industrial capabilities, but also pave the way for positive developments in international trade and in the way governments tackle poverty and inequality. By focusing on four areas: (1) agriculture and livestock, (2) consumption, poverty and inequality, (3) financial services, employment and corporate governance, and (4) economic integration, international trade and foreign direct investment (FDI), this book presents a series of empirical studies that examine important contemporary economic issues facing Africa. The book incorporates a range of methodological approaches, with some chapters providingcase study analyses while others embrace more traditional forms of econometric testing.

Political Science Abstracts is an annual supplement to the Political Science, Government, and Public Policy Series of The Universal Reference System, which was first published in 1967. All previous volumes are still available.

Political Science Abstracts is an annual supplement to the Political Science, Government, and Public Policy Series of The Universal Reference System, which was first published in 1967. All back issues are still available.

This volume is the proceedings of a symposium entitled'Bottom Line Results from Strategic Human Resource Planning'which was held at Salve Regina University, Newport, Rhode Island on June 11-14, 1991. The meeting was sponsored by the Research Committee of the Human Resource Planning Society (HRPS). In developing the agenda, the Research Committee continued the approach used in previous HRPS research symposia. The focus of these meetings is on the linkage ofthe state-of-practice with the state-of-the-art. Particular attention was placed on research studies which were application oriented so that member organizations can see examples of ways to extend current practices with the knowledge presented by the applications. The meeting had sessions on: (1) The Strategic Role of Human Resources, (2) Globalization, (3) Downsizing, (4) Quality as a Strategic Human Resource Issue, (5) Forecasting Human Resource Needs, and (6) Managing People to Build Competitive Advantage. Twenty six papers were presented with discussion periods at appropriate points in the meeting. This volume contains twenty two ofthese papers along with an introductory paper. A short summary is also provided at the beginning of each major subdivision into which the papers are arranged. Thanks are in order for all who contributed to the success of the meeting.

The theme ofthe conference at which the papers in this book were presented was'Systems Thinking in Europe'. Members of the United Kingdom Systems Society (UKSS) were conscious that the systems movementflourishes notonly in the UK, America and the Antipodes, but also in continental Europe, both East and West, and in the USSR, a nation increasingly being welcomed by the European comity. Membership of the UKSS had not perhaps had the opportunity, however, of hearing important new ideas from continental Europe, and this conference provided an opportunity to do so. Some interesting papers are to be found here from both the West and the East, if the editors may be forgiven for perpetuating what may be an increasingly irrelevant dichotomy. One lesson to be learned from this conference, though, is that systems thinking is truly international. This is not to say that there is one systems paradigm unifonnly applied, however. Perhaps the core of systems thinking is that one is interested in complex'wholes'with emergent properties, to which cybernetic ideas can be applied. Examples of such systems thinking can be found in these proceedings, for example in the section entitled'Applications of Systems Thinking'. Attempts to bring about change with these ideas, however, have given rise to a diversity of approaches, as is evidenced by the papers dealing with the application of methodologies in the'hard'and'soft'systems traditions.

This volume is the proceedings of a symposium entitled'Human Resource Strategies for Organizations in Transition'which was held at Salve Regina College, Newport, Rhode Island on May 30 - June 2, 1989. The meeting was sponsored by the Research Committee of the Human Resource Planning Society (HRPS). In developing the agenda, the Research Committee built upon the format of the previous HRPS research symposia. The intent in these meetings is on the linkage of the state-of-practice with the state-of-the-art. Particular attention was placed on research studies which were application oriented so that member organizations can see examples of ways to extend current practices with the knowledge presented by the applications. The meeting has sessions on: (1) Reshaping the Organization for the Twenty-first Century, (2) Coping with Major Organizational Change, (3) Organization Downsizing, (4) Evaluating the Human Resource Function and (5) The Impact of Corporate Culture on Future Human Resource Practices. Thirty papers were presented with discussion sessions at appropriate points in the meeting. This volume contains twenty one of these papers along with an introductory paper. A short summary is also provided at the beginning of each major subdivision into which the papers are arranged.

Offshore finance has transformed many small jurisdictions into high income economies and has facilitated the growth of global financial markets, deregulation and the convergence of economic policies worldwide. However, the volatility and fickle nature of global capital has also become apparent. This major new multi-disciplinary and international collection explores the development of offshore finance and is an extremely valuable resource for all those considering the issues involved in this important area.

Russia has embarked upon a difficult process of systemic transformation and economic opening up. While the initial strong GDP decline seemed to have ended in 1997, the real development was facing even more difficult problems as output declined sharply after the Ruble and banking crisis of August 1998: inflation started to increase again, exports and imports were falling, capital flight increasing and unemployment rising. There is broad disappointment in Russia regarding the transformation failure in 1998 since so many people had hoped that the end of the Soviet command economy would bring democracy, prosperity and international integration. While Poland has been able to double per capita income in the 1990s it has fallen by 50% in Russia and this despite considerable IMF involvement and some (modest) support from other international organizations. What were the reasons for transformation failure in the 1990s? What are the ingredients for long term sustainable transformation? What are the internal and international requirements to avoid a second - possibly tragic - failure of transformation in Russia? An international group of researchers has focussed on these problems during a two-year research project financed by the Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach Foundation. A series of papers were presented at workshops in Potsdam, Bonn and Moscow in 1999 where this book is devoted to four important issues: the Russian transformation crisis, the topic of restructuring, the need for stabilizing Russia and the requirements for modernizing Russia.

The'world'is becoming more and more intractable. We have learned to discern'systems'in it, we have developed a highly sophisticated math­ ematical apparatus to'model''them, large computer simulation programs handle thousands of equations with zillions of parameters. But how ade­ quate are these efforts? Part One of this volume is a discussion containing some proposals for eliminating the constraints we encounter when approaching complex systems with our models: Is it possible, at all, to design a political or econom­ ic system without considering killing, torture, and oppression? Can we adequately model the present state of affairs while ignoring their often symbolic and paradoxical nature? Is it possible to explain teleological concepts such as'means'and'ends'in terms of basically 17th century Newtonian mechanics? Can we really make appropriate use of the vast a­ mount of systems concepts without exploring their relations, without de­ veloping a'system of systems concepts'? And why do more than 95% of all system modelling efforts end in just a heap of printed paper, and nothing else? Leading scientists from different disciplines, who have different viewpoints and use very different styles in presenting their message were invited to present their approaches to these and to other problems of equal importance: Either as Plenary Lectures at the Seventh European Meeting on Cybernetics and Systems Research at the University of Vienna, Austria, (Professors Stafford Beer, Helga Nowotny, and Robert Rosen (Ross Ashby Memorial Lecture)) or as Invited Lectures to the Austrian Society

“A visionary roadmap for people who believe they can change the world—and invaluable advice about bringing together the partners and technologies to help them do it.” —President Bill ClintonA radical, how-to guide for using exponential technologies, moonshot thinking, and crowd-powered tools, Bold unfolds in three parts. Part One focuses on the exponential technologies that are disrupting today's Fortune 500 companies and enabling upstart entrepreneurs to go from “I've got an idea” to “I run a billion-dollar company” far faster than ever before. The authors provide exceptional insight into the power of 3D printing, artificial intelligence, robotics, networks and sensors, and synthetic biology. Part Two draws on insights from billionaires such as Larry Page, Elon Musk, Richard Branson, and Jeff Bezos and reveals their entrepreneurial secrets. Finally, Bold closes with a look at the best practices that allow anyone to leverage today's hyper-connected crowd like never before. Here, the authors teach how to design and use incentive competitions, launch million-dollar crowdfunding campaigns to tap into tens of billions of dollars of capital, and finally how to build communities—armies of exponentially enabled individuals willing and able to help today's entrepreneurs make their boldest dreams come true.

Warum braucht nicht nur der Staat die Marktwirtschaft, sondern die Marktwirtschaft auch den Staat? Warum bewirken Gesetze häufig anderes, als der Gesetzgeber erwartet? Wie entsteht Wohlstand? Kaspar Villiger verdichtet seine Erfahrungen aus 46 Jahren Berufsleben als Unternehmer, Verwaltungsrat global tätiger Konzerne, Verteidigungs- und Finanzminister sowie Schweizer Bundespräsident in zwölf Thesen und sucht Antworten auf diese und andere Fragen. Er fragt, warum sich die Wirtschaft auch von ethischen Kriterien leiten lassen soll und wie der Föderalismus strukturiert sein muss, damit auch die Gliedstaaten Selbstverantwortung wahrnehmen. Und er analysiert, warum Demokratien Selbstbindungen brauchen, um nicht im Schuldensumpf zu versinken. Dabei untermauert Villiger seine erfahrungsbasierten Einsichten mit Erkenntnissen der modernen Ökonomik. Seine Überlegungen sind ein leidenschaftliches Plädoyer für eine freiheitliche Gesellschaftsordnung.

This book is a venture in the worlds of modeling and of metamodeling. At this point, I will not reveal to readers what constitutes metamodeling. Suf­ fice it to say that the pitfalls and shortcomings of modeling can be cured only if we resort to a higher level of inquiry called metainquiry and metadesign. We reach this level by the process of abstraction. The book contains five chapters from my previous work, Applied General Systems Theory (Harper and Row, London and New York, First Edition 1974, Second Edition 1978). More than ten years after its publication, this material still appears relevant to the main thrust of system design. This book is dedicated to all those who are involved in changing the world for the better. In a way we all are involved in system design: from the city manager who struggles with the problems of mass transportation or the consolidation of a city and its suburbs to the social worker who tries to provide benefits to the urban poor. It includes the engineer who designs the shuttle rockets. It involves the politician engaged in drafting a bill to recycle containers, or one to prevent pesticide contamination of our food. The politician might even need system design to chart his or her own re-election campaign.

Rarely if ever have the political, economic, and military foundations of the Western Alliance been in such a state of flux. Walter Laqueur and Leon Sloss, therefore, deserve credit not just for the quality of the analysis in this superb book but also for the timeliness of its appearance. As Laqueur says in his chapter'Touring the Western European Defense Hori­ zon,'if the likely development of European defense policies is not particularly reassuring, at least it gives no grounds for despair. The list of problems we face is a daunting one. First there is the spiralling cost of defense expenditures, particularly in the absence of significant NATO or inter-European cooperation. This is particu­ larly serious in light of the reluctance to increase, or even maintain, current expen­ ditures in the midst of Mikhail Gorbachev's'peace offensive'and the extraordinary changes in Eastern Europe, both of which have had a dramatic impact on Western public opinion. There is also a problem in the perceived relative economic decline of the United States vis-a-vis Western Europe and Japan, which only exacerbates calls to reduce the number of American troops in Europe. Other dangers to the political cohesion and military credibility of the alliance include demographic trends that threaten current manpower levels, transatlantic acrimony over the burden-sharing issue, and political pressures (particularly in West Germany) toward denucleariza­ tion and even neutralism.

hope of obtaining a comprehensive and coherent understand­ ing of the human condition, we must somehow weave together the biological, sociological, and psychological components of human nature and experience. And this cannot be done­ indeed, it is difficult to even make sense of an attempt to do it-without first settling our accounts with Darwin, Marx, and Freud. The legacy of these three thinkers continues to haunt us in other ways as well. Whatever their substantive philosophical differences in other respects, Darwin, Marx, and Freud shared a common, overriding intellectual orientation: they taught us to see human things in historical, developmental terms. Phil­ osophically, questions of being were displaced in their works by questions of becoming. Methodologically, genesis replaced teleological and essentialist considerations in the explanatory logic of their theories. Darwin, Marx, and Freud were, above all, theorists of conflict, dynamism, and change. They em­ phasized the fragility of order, and their abiding concern was always to discover and to explicate the myriad ways in which order grows out of disorder. For these reasons their theories constantly confront and challenge the cardinal tenet of our modern secular faith: the notion of progress. To be sure, their emphasis on conflict and the flux of change within the flow of time was not unprecedented; its origins in Western thought can be traced back at least as far as Heraclitus.

The question of how to use police resources productively, par­ ticularly in this era of tight municipal budgets, is a major con­ cern for police chiefs and others responsible for crime control. In Crime Control: The Use and Misuse of Police Resources, David J. Farmer provides new insights into this question and sug­ gests a practical resource allocation approach for police poli­ cymakers and administrators. The book documents the results of current police resource allocation practices and describes the major research studies that have identified a need to restructure police field operations. It very usefully outlines the development and nature of allocation techniques and ana­ lyzes the political contexts which influence resource alloca,., tion. After describing planning at the neighborhood level that should inform the allocation process, the author provides a comprehensive'planning-budgeting-resources allocation'approach to managing a productive police department. This comprehensive approach is illustrated by an account of the Manpower Allocation Review System (MARS), which the author developed and introduced in the New York City Police Department in 1972 when I was commissioner. As I can vii FOREWORD viii attest, the MARS approach had practical utility. For the author, it served as a forerunner to the more elaborate system he describes in this book.

The topic of this book, the commercialization of public-sector technology, continues to grow in importance in the United States and sirnilarsocieties. The issues involved are relevant to many roles including those of policy makers, managers, patent attorneys, licensing agents, and technical staff members of public technology sources. Institutions increasingly involved in the process include federal and other governmentallaboratories and their related agencies, public universities and their state governments, public and private transfer agents and, of course, all the private recipients of public technology. Scarcely a day goes by without a significant event related to technology transfer and commercialization. The popular business press is regularly carrying articles addressing the issues, explaining new initiatives and describing events of notable success or failure.[l] As an example of current important events, the Technology Reinvestment Project (TRP) is forrnu­ lating its initiatives totransfer public technology and promote technology-based publiclprivate partnerships as a collaboration between the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the National Science Foundation (NSF) the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and the Department of Energy, Defense Programs (DOE/DP).

The term singular spectrum comes from the spectral (eigenvalue) decomposition of a matrix A into its set (spectrum) of eigenvalues. These eigenvalues, A, are the numbers that make the matrix A -AI singular. The term singular spectrum analysis· is unfortunate since the traditional eigenvalue decomposition involving multivariate data is also an analysis of the singular spectrum. More properly, singular spectrum analysis (SSA) should be called the analysis of time series using the singular spectrum. Spectral decomposition of matrices is fundamental to much the­ ory of linear algebra and it has many applications to problems in the natural and related sciences. Its widespread use as a tool for time­ series analysis is fairly recent, however, emerging to a large extent from applications of dynamical systems theory (sometimes called chaos theory). SSA was introduced into chaos theory by Fraedrich (1986) and Broomhead and King (l986a). Prior to this, SSA was used in biological oceanography by Colebrook (1978). In the digi­ tal signal processing community, the approach is also known as the Karhunen-Loeve (K-L) expansion (Pike et aI., 1984). Like other techniques based on spectral decomposition, SSA is attractive in that it holds a promise for a reduction in the dimen- • Singular spectrum analysis is sometimes called singular systems analysis or singular spectrum approach. vii viii Preface sionality. This reduction in dimensionality is often accompanied by a simpler explanation of the underlying physics.

Political Science Abstracts is an annual supplement to the Political Science, Government, and Public Policy Series of The Universal Reference System, which was first published in 1967. All back issues are still available.

Curious about the images of the city that have been evolving in the different social sciences, we did what academics often do in such a situa­ 1 tion: we set up a seminar on'Images of the City in the Social Sciences.'From the start, we counted on the help of specialists in other fields to pursue their interests. Of the persons who agreed to participate, all but two came from the United States, and their analyses, in the main, reflect the experience of Western countries and the United States. In our formal instructions to our collaborators, we took fi>r granted that a variety of images of the city could be found or inferred in their fields of expertise. We asked them to identify these images and their functions, to explain how and why they have changed over time, and to relate these images to the distinct intellectual traditions and techniques-analytical or otherwise-in their respective fields. The definition of image was left to the judgment of the participants.

Daß die vorliegende Arbeit nicht nur Zustimmung finden, sondern auch Widerspruch und lebhafte Kontroversen auslösen wird, läßt sich unschwer voraussagen. Wenn sie von der theoretischen Voraussetzung ausgeht, »daß die Einfügung des Moments Wer­ bung in das Wettbewerbs modell dieses in sein Gegenteil verkehrt«, so bedeutet das zweifellos eine Provokation, jedoch, wie ich meine, eine fruchtbare und eine not­ wendige. Was die Verfasserin, untermauert durch eine Fülle von Belegen, über die übertragung von Methoden der Wirtschafts werbung auf die Werbung der politischen Parteien aus­ zusagen hat, kann den wachen Beobachter der bundesrepublikanischen Wahlkämpfe kaum überraschen. Inhaltliche Entleerung, Entpolitisierung und psychologische Aus­ richtung auf die Konsumentenmentalität sind beherrschende Symptome, die nicht zu übersehen sind. Hingegen dürfte der minutiös geführte Nachweis, in welch bemerkens­ wertem Maße sich die ökonomische Werbung gleichzeitig als politische Schleichwer­ bung dekuvriert, die ganz bestimmte politisch relevante Wertvorstellungen vermittelt, manchen Leser auf den ersten Blick schockieren. Scheinen doch, nimmt man die in dieser Studie nachgewiesenen Tendenzen ernst, weder das politische noch das wirtschaftliche System der Bundesrepublik dem einzelnen eine Chance einzuräumen, sich im Konkur­ renzkampf der Parteien und der Produzenten als mündiger Bürger zu behaupten. Indessen würde man die Intentionen dieser Studie gründlich mißverstehen, wenn man ihr unterstellte, daß es ihr unter dem Vorzeichen einer speziellen Fragestellung darum ginge, Parteienstaat und Marktwirtschaft in einem Atemzuge ad absurdum zu führen.

Work occupies a pivotal role in the daily activities and over the course of a lifetime of members of modern societies. In anticipation, work influ­ ences education and training; it has much to do with shaping current earned income and status in the community; and in retrospect, it influ­ ences retirement income and activities. It is a powerful force affecting personal associations. In our society work is deeply encased in moral and religious values: As Poor Richard says, A Life of Leisure and a Life of Laziness are two Things. Do you imagine that Sloth will afford you more Comfort than Labour? No, for as Poor Richard says:... Industry gives Comfort, and Plenty and Respect. Study to show thyself approved unto God a workman that needeth not to be ashamed. But few words have as many different meanings and nuances as'work': to forge or to shape, to stir or to knead, to solve, to exploit, to practice trickery for some end, to excite or to provoke, to persuade or to influence, to toil, and the like. A need for precision in meaning is requisite with respect to work, not only in common discourse, but, even more so, in scholarly communication.

This book is a welcome reassertion of an old tradition of interdisdplinary research. That tradition has tended to atrophy in the last decade, largely because of an enormous expansion of the domain of neoc1assical economics. The expansion has fed on two sdentific developments: first, human capital theory; second, contract theory. Both developments have taken phenomena critical to the operation of the economy but previously understood in terms of categories separate and distinct from those with which economists generally work and sought to apply the same analytical techniques that we use to understand other economic problems. Human capital theory has applied conventional techniques to questions of labor supply. It began this endeavor with the supply of trained labor and then expanded to a general theory of labor supply by broadening the analysis to the allocation of time over the individual's life, the interdependendes of supply decisions within the family, and finally to the formation of the family itself. Similarly, contract theory has moved from a theory that explains the existence of c10sed economic institutions to a theory of their formation and internaioperation. The hallmark of both of these developments is the extension and applica­ tion of analytical techniques based on purposive maximization under con­ traints and the interaction of individual decision makers through a com­ petitive market or its analogue.

A reprint of the classic volume originally published by Harper & Brothers in 1947, this scholary work provides important insights for understanding contemporary issues in African-American business and business education as well as in the rebuilding of American communities today.

John Mingers'new volume, Self-Producing Systems: Implications and Ap­ plications of Autopoiesis, is a much-needed reference on autopoiesis, a subject penetrating many disciplines today. I can genuinely say that I enjoyed reading the book as it took me stage by stage through a clear and easy-to-grasp understanding of the concepts and ideas of auto­ poiesis and then, as the book's title suggests, on through their applica­ tions. I found the summary in Chapter 12 particularly useful, helping to crystalize the main points of each chapter. The book conveyed enthusi­ asm for the subject and stimulated my interest in it. At times the book is demanding, but only because of the breadth of the subject matter, the terms and concepts associated with its parts, and the challenge of keep­ ing hold of all this in the mind at once. This is an exceptional text. ROBERT L. FLOOD Hull, UK Preface In recent years Maturana's and Varela's concept of autopoiesis, origi­ nally a biological concept, has made a remarkable impact not just on a single area, but across widely differing disciplines such as sociology, policy science, psychotherapy, cognitive science, and law. Put very briefly, the term autopoiesis connotes the idea that certain types of sys­ tems exist in a particular manner-they are self-producing systems. In their operations they continuously produce their own constituents, their own components, which then participate in these same production pro­ cesses.

Der vorliegende Text gehört zu einer Reihe von fünf Bänden, die zwar zu­ sammengehören, von denen aber auch jeder für sich gelesen werden kann. Denn die Kurzfassung des zusammenfassenden Berichts sowie des hierauf fußenden Forschungs-und Reformprogramms, das im Band 1 ausführlich be­ schrieben wird, wurde - als gemeinsames Resümee - auch den Bänden 2 bis 5 vorangestellt, die im übrigen Einzelbeiträge verschiedener Experten ent­ halten. Alle Bände betreffen ein aktuelles Thema: Die Notwendigkeit, zeit­ lebens zu lernen, sich immer wieder neue Kompetenzen anzueignen, auch Überzeugungen zu prüfen und zu revidieren, liegt angesichts der schnellen Veränderungen unserer heutigen Lebensverhältnisse auf der Hand. Das gilt gerade auch für berufliche Tätigkeiten und die erforderlichen Fähigkeiten und Orientierungen. Seit Jahrzehnten erscheinen deshalb immer neue Veröffentlich­ ungen zu diesem Themenbereich -unter wechselnden Etiketten. Doch ganz gleich, ob von'education permanente','recurrent education'oder schlicht von'ständiger Weiterbildung'die Rede ist: Meist ist Ähnliches gemeint. Wir ler­ nen nie aus, ja, es gibt im Laufe eines einzigen Menschenlebens immer mehr Neues zu lernen, und was früher bloße,Kür'gewesen sein mag, ist längst zum Muss geworden, wenn wir menschenwürdig überleben möchten. Mit der zunehmenden Notwendigkeit permanenten Lernens geht aber zu­ gleich die wachsende Möglichkeit einher, die eigenen Kräfte fortgesetzt wei­ terzuentwickeln. Diese Chance wird jedoch vorerst von verschiedenen Men­ schen sehr unterschiedlich genutzt. Das hängt einmal mit deren unterschied­ lichen objektiven Lerngelegenheiten zusammen. Hierauf bezieht sich ein gro­ ßer Teil der einschlägigen sozialwissenschaftlichen Literatur.

In the second half of the twentieth century, a number of researchers have conceptualized modern society as a social system composed of differenti­ ated yet interrelated institutional spheres. Commonly identified institu­ tional spheres are the family, religion, the economy, the polity or state, medicine or health care, religion, law, and education. The institutional perspective has sometimes been linked to a structural-functional frame­ work; it has often been asserted that institutions must be understood as parts of a larger whole operating at the societal level. Equally important have been recent institutional theory and research focusing on the more microscopic dynamics of intrainstitutional change. The concern here has been processes governing the institutionalization of rules and practices and the formation and decline of particular social structures. Although valid and useful, neither of these perspectives has yielded a systematic comparative assessment of societal institutions. The aim of this edited volume is to meet this critical need. It brings together recent theo­ retical and empirical research on societal institutions in a time of rapid change. The chapters focus on how these institutions adapt to societal change and what the outcomes of these changes are.

Contents 11. 2. 2. Four Main Areas of Dispute 247 11. 2. 3. Summary... 248 11. 3. Making Sense of the Issues.. 248 11. 3. 1. Introduction.... 248 11. 3. 2. The Scientific Approach 248 11. 3. 3. Science and Matters of Society. 249 11. 3. 4. Summary. 251 11. 4. Tying It All Together.... 251 11. 4. 1. Introduction.... 251 11. 4. 2. A Unifying Framework 251 11. 4. 3. Critical Systems Thinking 253 11. 4. 4. Summary 254 11. 5. Conclusion 254 Questions... 255 REFERENCES................... 257 INDEX...................... 267 Chapter One SYSTEMS Origin and Evolution, Terms and Concepts 1. 1. INTRODUCTION We start this book with Theme A (see Figure P. I in the Preface), which aims to develop an essential and fundamental understanding of systems science. So, what is systems science? When asked to explain what systems science is all about, many systems scientists are confronted with a rather daunting task. The discipline tends to be presented and understood in a fragmented way and very few people hold an overview understanding of the subject matter, while also having sufficient in-depth competence in many and broad-ranging subject areas where the ideas are used. Indeed, it was precisely this difficulty that identified the need for a comprehensive well-documented account such as is presented here in Dealing with Complexity.

Das Gesundheitswesen in Deutschland steht nach der Gesundheitsreform vor neuen Herausforderungen. Katja Ahlstich untersucht die gesundheitspolitischen Einstellungen und das Gesundheitsverhalten der deutschen Bevölkerung in den achtziger und neunziger Jahren. Die Autorin beschreibt die von der Bevölkerung zugeschriebene Verantwortung des Staates im Gesundheitsbereich, die wahrgenommene Leistungsfähigkeit von medizinischen Einrichtungen sowie die Qualität der Gesundheitsversorgung. Das Vertrauen der Bevölkerung in das Gesundheitswesen sowie die individuelle Zahlungsbereitschaft für eine bessere gesundheitliche Versorgung werden analysiert. Es wird gezeigt, welche Ausprägungen die gesundheitspolitischen Orientierungen aufweisen und welchen Stellenwert sie in der politischen Agenda einnehmen. Darüber hinaus wird der Einfluss des Wertewandels und weiterer Bestimmungsfaktoren auf die gesundheitspolitischen Präferenzen und das Gesundheitsverhalten herausgearbeitet.

Zu den Kernproblemen parlamentarischer Demokratien zählt das Spannungsverhältnis von Interessenrepräsentation und -integration. In der Bundesrepublik Deutschland ist das Parlament mit der Herstellung der deutschen Einheit vor zusätzliche Integrationsaufgaben gestellt worden. Am Beispiel des Berliner Abgeordnetenhauses untersucht Helmar Schöne die Auswirkungen der politischen und kulturellen Differenzen zwischen alten und neuen Bundesländern auf die parlamentarische Willensbildung. Auf der Grundlage zahlreicher Experteninterviews analysiert er den Prozess der kulturellen und der institutionellen Integration.

Organizing consists of making other people work. We do this by manip­ ulating symbols: words, exhortations, memos, charts, signs of status. We expect these symbols to have the desired effects on the people con­ cerned. The success of our organizing activities depends on whether the others do attach to our symbols the meanings we expect them to. Whether or not they do so is a function of what I have sometimes called'the programs in their minds'-their learned ways of thinking, feeling, and reacting-in short, a function of their culture. The assumption that organizations could be culture-free is naive and myopic; it is based on a misunderstanding of the very act of organizing. Certainly, few people who have ever worked abroad will make this assumption. The dependence of organizations on their people's mental pro­ grams does not mean, of course, that we do not find many similarities across organizations. Some characteristics of human mental program­ ming are universal; others are shared by most people in a continent, a country, a region, an industry, a scientific discipline, or even a gender.

In der globalisierten Welt gilt die klassische Arbeitsteilung zwischen Wirtschaft und Politik nicht mehr. Die Unternehmen unterliegen keiner zentral definierten politischen Rahmenordnung, vielmehr können sie unter alternativen Rechtssystemen nach ökonomischen Gesichtspunkten auswählen und so das Primat der nationalstaatlichen Politik aushebeln. Zugleich sind die transnationalen Institutionen, wie etwa die UNO oder die ILO, nicht in der Lage, die von ihnen formulierten Regeln durchzusetzen. Vor diesem Hintergrund muss die Frage nach der Verantwortung der Unternehmen gestellt werden. In kritischer Auseinandersetzung mit dem Ökonomismus und dem Postmodernismus versucht dieses Buch, eine republikanische Perspektive zu entwickeln: Die Unternehmen dürfen sich nicht mehr ausschließlich auf ihre ökonomische Rolle zurückziehen, sondern müssen sich als verantwortliche politische Akteure an der Fortentwicklung der Rahmenordnung in den entstehenden Politiknetzwerken beteiligen.

Contemporary Systems Thinking is a series of texts, each of which deals comparatively and/or critically with different aspects of holistic thinking at the frontiers of the discipline. Traditionally, writings by systems thinkers have been concerned with single theme propositions such as General Systems Theory, Cybernetics, Operations Research, System Dynamics, Soft Systems Methodology and many others. Recently there have been attempts to fulfil a different yet equally important role by comparative analyses of viewpoints and approaches, each addressing disparate areas of study such as: modeling and simulation, measurement, management,'problem solving'methods, international relations, social theory and last, but not exhaustively or least, philosophy. In a recent book these were drawn together within a multiform framework as part of an eclectic discussion -a nearly impossible task as I discovered (see Dealing With Complexity -An Introduction to the Theory and Application of Systems Science, R. L. Flood and E. R. Carson, Plenum, New York, 1988). Nevertheless, bringing many sources together led to several achievements, among which was showing a great diversity of approaches, ideas and application areas that systems thinking contributes to (although often with difficulties remaining unresolved). More important, however, while working on that manuscript I became aware of the need for and potential value in a series of books, each focusing in detail on the study areas mentioned above.

The author thoroughly describes and analyzes the most significant systems methodologies-`organizations as systems,'hard, soft, cybernetic, and critical-and demonstrates the complementary strengths of different systems approaches.

Modern statistics consists of methods which help in drawing inferences about the population under consideration. These populations may actually exist, or could be generated by repeated· experimentation. The medium of drawing inferences about the population is the sample, which is a subset of measurements selected from the population. Each measurement in the sample is used for making inferences about the population. The populations and also the methods of sample selection differ from one field of science to the other. Social scientists use surveys tocollectthe sample information, whereas the physical scientists employ the method of experimentation for obtaining this information. This is because in social sciences the factors that cause variation in the measurements on the study variable for the population units can not be controlled, whereas in physical sciences these factors can be controlled, at least to some extent, through proper experimental design. Several excellent books on sampling theory are available in the market. These books discuss the theory of sample surveys in great depth and detail, and are suited to the postgraduate students majoring in statistics. Research workers in the field of sampling methodology can also make use of these books. However, not many suitable books are available, which can be used by the students and researchers in the fields of economics, social sciences, extension education, agriculture, medical sciences, business management, etc. These students and workers usually conduct sample surveys during their research projects.

The bright side of the 1980s, or the'Hispanic decade,'as it was dubbed early on, may ironically turn out to be the detail and sophistication with which the economic and social reversals affecting most Latinos in this period have been tracked, with a fresh cohort of Latino scholars playing an increasingly prominent role in this endeavor. As this volume conveys, these analyses are steadily probing more deeply into the fine grain of the processes bearing on the social conditions of U. S. Latinos and particularly into the diversity of the experiences of the several Latino-origin nationalities until recently generally treated in the aggre­ gate as'Hispanics.'Though still fragmented and tentative in perspective, as are the disciplines on which they draw and the research apparatus on which they rest, the quest among these new voices for a unifying perspective also comes across in this collection of essays. There is manifestly more under way here than a simple demand for inclusion of neglected instances on the margin of supposedly well understood larger or'mainstream'dynamics. The 1990s open with a more confident assertion of the centrality of the Latino presence and Latino actors in the overarching transformations reshaping U. S. society, and especially in the playing out of these restructurings in the regions and cities of Latino concentra­ tion.

This book has its origins in an M.I.T. research project that was funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Our immediate objective was to prepare a set of case studies that examined bargaining and negotiation as they occurred between government, environmental advocates, and regulatees throughout the traditional regulatory process. The project was part of a larger effort by the EPA to make environmental regulation more efficient and less litigious. The principal investigator for the research effort was Lawrence Sus­ skind of the Department of Urban Studies and Planning. Eight case studies were prepared under the joint supervision of Susskind and the authors of this book. Studying the negotiating behavior of parties as we worked our way through an environmental dispute proved enlightening. We observed missed oppor­ tunities for settlement, negotiating tactics that backfired, and strategies that ap­ peared to be grounded more in intuition than in thoughtful analysis. At the same time, however, we were struck by how often the parties ultimately managed to muddle through. People negotiated not out of some idealistic commitment to consensus but because they thought it better served their own interests. When some negotiations reached an impasse, people improvised mediation. These disputants succeeded in spite of legal and institutional barriers, even though few of them had a sophisticated understanding of negotiation.

Much of the research on which this book is based was funded almost a decade ago by separate grants from two different agencies of the U. S. Public Health Service, of the then still consolidated Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. The first grant was from the Bureau of Community Environmental Management (Public Health Service Research Grant J-RO J EM 0049-02), and the second from the Center for Studies of Metropolitan Problems of the National Institute of Mental Health (Public Health Service Grant ROJ MH 24904-02). These separate grants were necessary because of budget cuts that truncated our original effort. We were fortunate to receive subsequent assistance from NIMH to conclude the research, as it is doubtful that a project of the scope and intent of our effort--even as completed in abbreviated form-will be funded in the 1980s. The original intent of this project, as formulated by our colleagues Ira Robinson and Alan Kreditor, and as conceptualized earlier by their predeces­ sors-members of an advisory committee of planners and social scientists ap­ pointed by the American Public Health Association (APHA)-was to rewrite Planning the Neighborhood, APHA's recommended standards for residential design. In particular, it was proposed that the new study take the point of view of the user in terms of residential standards. Hitherto, the private sector had domi­ nated these considerations (i. e., the designer's predilections, the requirements of builders and material suppliers, and lenders'needs for mortgage security).

Korruption ist überall da anzutreffen, wo Menschen sind. Sie ist ein alltägliches Phänomen und beschäftigt die Wissenschaft ebenso wie die öffentliche Meinung. Dennoch ist es schwierig, Korruption zu definieren, ihre Erscheinungsformen und Folgen systematisch zu erfassen und Maßnahmen zu Vorbeugung und Bekämpfung zu entwickeln. Die Autoren des vorliegenden Bandes setzen sich nicht nur aus aktueller Betroffenheit mit der Korruption auseinander, sondern rücken deren gesellschaftliche Bedingungen und Verwurzelung in der menschlichen Natur in den Mittelpunkt. Die Beiträge aus philosophischer, wirtschafts- und rechtswissenschaftlicher und kriminologischer Perspektive untermauern die Einsicht, dass schärfere Gesetze zur Korruptionsbekämpfung nicht ausreichen, sondern dass umfassende flankierende Maßnahmen - von der strukturellen Veränderung bis zur individuellen Aufklärung - notwendig sind.

Over thirty years ago, Alfred North Whitehead wrote:'If America is to be civilized, it has to be done (at least for the present) by the business class who are in possession of the power and the economic resources.... If the American universities were up to their job, they would be taking business in hand and teaching it ethics and professional standards.'• To the intellectual elites of his time, there was something of a minor in Whitehead's view. Few of them saw business as a civilizing force heresy and even fewer, feeling that business was not to be tamed, relished the role of the lion tamers. Not many today doubt Whitehead's wisdom. Organiza­ tions of wealth and power have accepted their corporate social responsibili­ ties, and universities have launched major efforts to provide ethical instruc­ tion for business personnel. So far as the scholars are concerned, they quickly came to realize the difficulty of an undertaking that seeks to redefine and apply moral criteria to a very complex corporate world. Philosophers, in particular, have learned (or perhaps have relearned) how their speculations on ethics must take into account the'living ethic'expressed in the American culture­ and here anthropologists, sociologists, and theologians were needed to provide an expertise that the moral manuals did not.

Judith Clifton, Francisco Comín and Daniel Díaz Fuentes in Privatisation in the European Union reject the two dominant explanations provided in literature, which include a simple'Americanisation'of policy and a'varied'privatisation experience without a common driving force. Using a systematic comparative analysis of privatisation experiences in each country from the 1980s to the beginning of the twenty first century, the authors show how the process of European integration and the need for internationally competitive industries have constituted key driving forces in the quest for privatisation across the EU. As privatisation slows down at the turn of the millennium, what future can citizens expect for public enterprises? Privatisation in the European Union is essential reading for researchers, students and policy-makers interested in privatisation, EU policy and the history of public enterprises.

Contemporary Systems Thinking is a series of texts, each of which deals comparatively and/or critically with different aspects of holistic thinking at the frontiers of the discipline. Traditionally, writings by systems thinkers have been concerned with single theme propositions such as general systems theory, cybernetics, operations research, system dyna­ mics, soft systems methodology, and many others. Recently there have been attempts to fulfil a different, yet equally important, role by com­ parative analyses of viewpoints and approaches, each addressing dispa­ rate areas of study such as modeling and simulation, measurement, management,'problem-solving'methods, international relations, so­ cial theory, and last, but not exhaustively or least, philosophy. In a recent book these were drawn together within a multiform framework as part of an eclectic discussion-a nearly impossible task as I dis­ covered (see Dealing with Complexity-An Introduction to the Theory and Application of Systems Science by R. L. Flood and E. R. Carson). Neverthe­ less, bringing many sources together led to several achievements, among which was showing a great diversity of approaches, ideas, and application areas that systems thinking contributes to (although often with difficulties remaining unresolved). More important, however, while working on that manuscript I became aware of the need for and potential value in a series of books, each focusing in detail on the study areas mentioned above.

The systems movement, now 40 years old, is made up of many associations of systems thinkers from different disciplines all over the world. The United Kingdom Systems Society (UKSS) was formed in 1978. Today it has over 300 members and is committed to the development and promotion of'systems'philosophy, theory, concepts and methodolo­ gies for improving decision making for the benefit of organizations and wider society. The first UKSS International Conference was held at the University of Hull in July ofHuddersfield 1989. Since then we have held International Conferences at the Universities (1991) and Paisley (1993). The UKSS International Conferences are now an established biannual event and this, our fourth international conference, will be jointly hosted by the Universities of Hull and Humberside. Systems science is considered to be a trans-discipline which promotes critical and effective intervention in complex organisational and social problem situations. As such it traverses'hard', through'soft'to'critical'systems thinking and methodologies. Yet, despite the currently robust state of the UKSS the systems movement cannot be described as an international movement: different subdisciplines are at different stages of development and are often engaged in pursuing their own particular interests and themes with little'conversation'between the subdisciplines despite their common interest in systems.