Institutionalization, the Ombudsman, and Bureaucracy

1974 ◽  
Vol 68 (3) ◽  
pp. 1075-1085 ◽  
Author(s):  
Larry B. Hill
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Social Science ◽  
Control Mechanism ◽  
Science Writing ◽  
Environmental Challenges ◽  
Bureaucratic Control ◽  
Structural Integration ◽  
Authority Figure ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Sociometric Analysis

This article proposes an authority based conception of the phenomenon of institutionalization. Whereas most social science writing on the subject focuses either upon the organization's internal structural integration (such criteria as well-boundedness, universalism, complexity, and coherence often are employed) or upon its ability to cope with environmental challenges (the concepts of adaptability and autonomy have been suggested), I propose that an organization'soffensive capabilitiesvis à vis environmental actors be viewed as a measurement of its institutionalization.Principally based upon fieldwork in New Zealand bolstered by additional research in Scandinavia, Britain, and Hawaii, this study focuses upon the institutionalization of the ombudsman—an increasingly popular bureaucratic control mechanism. A sociometric analysis of ombudsman-bureaucratic interaction is undertaken, and four questions are investigated: How extensive is the interaction? How consequential is the threat posed by complaints? What demands does the ombudsman make? How cooperative is the agency in responding? The investigation provides answers which are indicative of the ombudsman's successful institutionalization. That is, the office performs its mission and has established itself with the environmental actors as an authority figure.

scholarly journals Reflexive Poetry

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-81
Author(s):  
Eric Van Giessen
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Academic Language ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
Science Research ◽  
Research Process ◽  
Faith Communities ◽  
Science Writing ◽  
Data Presentation ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Sacred Stories

These four poems are excerpts from a multifaceted project entitled Queerly Faithful: A Queer-Poet Community Autoethnography on Identity and Belonging in Faith Communities. This project attempts to bolster and critique contemporary studies of queer and faith identities as they manifest in the lives of queer people of faith by approaching the subject with a queer sensibility (Holman Jones & Adams 2010: 204). One facet of this approach involved my use of poetry as a personal reflexive medium on the research process itself. The poems invite the reader into my experience as I wrestle with articulating methodology, theory framing, data presentation, and the questions and challenges of producing a fixed document to present the findings of a queer project that resists fixedness. By blurring the lines between poetry/narrative/storytelling and social science writing, I invite the readers “to become coparticipants, engaging the storyline morally, emotionally, aesthetically, and intellectually” (Ellis & Bochner 2000: 745). The poems, which are scattered throughout the research paper, nuance the traditional academic language and prose analysis in the paper and serve to challenge conceptions of ‘proper’ social science writing and position the writing itself as a method of inquiry (Prendergast, Leggo & Sameshima 2009; Richardson & St. Pierre 2005; Richardson 1993). The poems in isolation, as presented here, invite the reader to consider the strengths and challenges of social science research and articulate my struggle to honour the sacred stories of my participants through fixed language. The poems play with the questions: what does it mean to be a social justice researcher and how might our work, methodologically as well as topically, critique and undermine oppressive epistemologies that elevate and prioritize certain voices over others?

Racism and silencing in the media in Aotearoa New Zealand

2021 ◽  
pp. 117718012110154
Author(s):  
Liana MacDonald ◽  
Adreanne Ormond
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Indigenous Peoples ◽  
Media Industry ◽  
Racial Discourse ◽  
European Descent ◽  
Aotearoa New Zealand ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Subject ◽  
New Zealanders

Racism in the Aotearoa New Zealand media is the subject of scholarly debate that examines how Māori (Indigenous Peoples of New Zealand) are broadcast in a negative and demeaning light. Literature demonstrates evolving understandings of how the industry places Pākehā (New Zealanders primarily of European descent) interests at the heart of broadcasting. We offer new insights by arguing that the media industry propagates a racial discourse of silencing that sustains widespread ignorance of the ways that Pākehā sensibilities mediate society. We draw attention to a silencing discourse through one televised story in 2018. On-screen interactions reproduce and safeguard a harmonious narrative of settler–Indigenous relations that support ignorance and denial of the structuring force of colonisation, and the Television Code of Broadcasting Practice upholds colour-blind perceptions of discrimination and injustice through liberal rhetoric. These processes ensure that the media industry is complicit in racism and the ongoing oppression of Indigenous peoples.

The exclusion of prison informant evidence for unreliability in new Zealand

2021 ◽  
pp. 136571272110112
Author(s):  
Anna High
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Social Science ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
England And Wales ◽  
Social Science Evidence ◽  
Science Evidence

Prison informant or ‘jailhouse snitch’ evidence is a notoriously unreliable category of evidence. In light of reliability concerns, the New Zealand Supreme Court has adopted a progressive approach to the exclusion of prison informant evidence, centred on greater use of general exclusionary provisions as a threshold of reliability for the admission of suspect evidence. In so doing, the court has shifted the emphasis from deference to the jury as arbiter of ultimate reliability and towards more robust judicial gatekeeping as a safeguard against false testimony. This article critically analyses the New Zealand approach, including by way of comparison with Canada, Australia and England and Wales. The New Zealand approach is presented as a principled and important example of adapting fundamental evidentiary principles and provisions in line with emerging social science evidence. However, in light of the general concerns surrounding this class of evidence, ultimately further safeguards are still needed

Newsmaking criminology in Australia and New Zealand: Results from a mixed methods study of criminologists’ media engagement

2019 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary Iliadis ◽  
Imogen Richards ◽  
Mark A Wood
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
News Media ◽  
The United States ◽  
Mixed Methods Study ◽  
The Past ◽  
Professional Duty ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Survey Responses ◽  
Insight Into ◽  
Newsmaking Criminology

‘Newsmaking criminology’, as described by Barak, is the process by which criminologists contribute to the generation of ‘newsworthy’ media content about crime and justice, often through their engagement with broadcast and other news media. While newsmaking criminological practices have been the subject of detailed practitioner testimonials and theoretical treatise, there has been scarce empirical research on newsmaking criminology, particularly in relation to countries outside of the United States and United Kingdom. To illuminate the state of play of newsmaking criminology in Australia and New Zealand, in this paper we analyse findings from 116 survey responses and nine interviews with criminologists working in universities in these two countries, which provide insight into the extent and nature of their news media engagement, and their related perceptions. Our findings indicate that most criminologists working in Australia or New Zealand have made at least one news media appearance in the past two years, and the majority of respondents view news media engagement as a professional ‘duty’. Participants also identified key political, ethical, and logistical issues relevant to their news media engagement, with several expressing a view that radio and television interviewers can influence criminologists to say things that they deem ‘newsworthy’.

Reducing Pessimism's Sway in The Environmental Ethics Classroom

2004 ◽  
Vol 8 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 213-226 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Sheppard
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Policy ◽  
Environmental Education ◽  
Environmental Ethics ◽  
Career Paths ◽  
William James ◽  
General State ◽  
Environmental Challenges ◽  
The Subject ◽  
State Of The Environment

AbstractIncreased awareness of the breadth and depth of existing environmental challenges is part of an environmental education. One effect of this increased awareness that can manifest itself in the environmental ethics classroom is pessimism. I outline two varieties of pessimism that have a tendency to hold sway in the environmental ethics classroom: 1) pessimism about the general state of the environment; and, 2) pessimism about being able to do anything about the general state of the environment. After outlining a few of the potential educational and vocational consequences of allowing pessimism to take root, I offer a pedagogical method for reducing the sway of pessimism in the classroom. I argue that William James' and John Dewey's writings on the subject of meliorism offer a framework that, when combined with some of the insights of incrementalism theory in environmental policy, can not only help students to reduce the sway of pessimism in the classroom, but also in their chosen career paths by, among other things, highlighting the "possibility of possibility".

The Long-Term Regulation of Safety Standards: The Case of the Electricity Industry in Australia and New Zealand

2012 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 312-332
Author(s):  
Malcolm Abbott
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Electricity Industry ◽  
Political Context ◽  
Safety Standards ◽  
Safety Regulations ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Organizational Approach

Throughout much of the history of the electricity industry in Australia and New Zealand the industry has been the subject of safety regulations. Although this regulation has been a constant throughout the life of the industry the organizational approach to regulation has changed over the years. Periodically in Australia and New Zealand history these questions have been raised in a political context, although notably the structure of safety regulators does not get much attention in the standard histories of the industry. The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to discuss some of the general issues that have arisen in the reform of regulation in the case of electricity safety over the longer term and how it relates overall to the development of the electricity industry.

Event spaces and the shaping of economic subjectivity: Inside the Social Enterprise World Forum

2021 ◽  
Vol 36 (5) ◽  
pp. 347-355
Author(s):  
Tom Baker ◽  
Ryan Jones ◽  
Michael Mann ◽  
Nick Lewis
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Social Enterprise ◽  
Affective Responses ◽  
Subject Position ◽  
Social Entrepreneur ◽  
Economic Sectors ◽  
The Social ◽  
New Knowledge ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Global Conference

Drawing on observations at the 2017 Social Enterprise World Forum (SEWF) – a global conference held in Christchurch, New Zealand – this paper examines the significance of localised event spaces in shaping economic subjects and, by extension, economic sectors. Conferences such as the SEWF are sites and moments that provide access to new knowledge, foster collective action and shape the subjectivities of economic actors. We describe how the SEWF cultivated sympathetic affective responses towards social enterprise and the subject position of the social entrepreneur, and demonstrate how the local specificities of Christchurch, as a place, were key to the cultivation of social-entrepreneurial subjectivity at the SEWF.

scholarly journals Społecznie konstruowane ciała i performatywna magia: Teoria socjologiczna Pierre’a Bourdieu w badaniach performatywnych

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucyna Kopciewicz
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Social Science ◽  
Performance Studies ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Cultural Anthropology ◽  
The Body ◽  
Communication Studies ◽  
Spatial Practices ◽  
Theatre Studies ◽  
The Subject

Social construction of the body and the performative magic: Pierre Bourdieu’s sociological theory in performance studiesPerformance studies are a developing field of social science which draws on the insights of sociology, ethnography, cultural studies, cultural anthropology, theatre studies and communication studies. The object of performance studies is human activity seen as expression which constitutes the process of production and reproduction of subjectivity. In this text the author analyses Pierre Bourdieu’s sociological theory from the perspective of performance studies: of questions about social agency, understood as constructing the subject within a specific field of power. The author focuses particularly on the following aspects of individual and collective practices as described by Pierre Bourdieu: spatial practices, bodily practices, and masculine domination. Społecznie konstruowane ciała i performatywna magia: Teoria socjologiczna Pierre’a Bourdieu w badaniach performatywnychPerformatyka jest rozwijającą się dziedziną badań społecznych, która korzysta z dorobku socjologii, etnografii, studiów kulturowych, antropologii kulturowej, teatrologii, studiów nad komunikowaniem. Przedmiotem badań performatywnych jest aktywność ludzka rozumiana jako ekspresja, która stanowi proces wytwarzania i reprodukowania podmiotowości. W niniejszym tekście autorka analizuje teorię socjologiczną Pierre’a Bourdieu w perspektywie performatyki: pytań o społeczną sprawczość rozumianą jako konstruowanie podmiotu w określonym polu władzy. Szczególnemu namysłowi autorka poddaje następujące aspekty indywidualnych i zbiorowych praktyk opisane przez Pierre’a Bourdieu: praktyki przestrzenne, praktyki cielesne, męska dominacja.

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