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Measuring Productivity Change In Higher Education: An Application Of Hicks-Moorsteen Total Factor Productivity Index To Malaysian Public Universities, Amir Arjomandi, Mad Ithnin Salleh, Abbas Mohammadzadeh
Measuring Productivity Change In Higher Education: An Application Of Hicks-Moorsteen Total Factor Productivity Index To Malaysian Public Universities, Amir Arjomandi, Mad Ithnin Salleh, Abbas Mohammadzadeh
Faculty of Business - Papers (Archive)
This paper offers an in-depth analysis of efficiency and productivity changes using the Hicks-Moorsteen total factor productivity index, in the context of higher education institutions. Unlike the Malmquist method, this approach makes no assumptions about firms' returns to scale conditions. We assume that the production technology exhibits variable returns to scale, which is more plausible than the constant returns to scale assumption, because universities usually operate at suboptimal scales. Three major groupings of Malaysian public universities are used in our case study: research, comprehensive, and focused universities. The results show that technical efficiency has improved after the 2007 National Higher …
Public Perceptions Of Future Threats To Humanity And Different Societal Responses: A Cross-National Study, Melanie J. Randle, Richard Eckersley
Public Perceptions Of Future Threats To Humanity And Different Societal Responses: A Cross-National Study, Melanie J. Randle, Richard Eckersley
Faculty of Business - Papers (Archive)
There is growing scientific evidence that humanity faces a number of threats that jeopardize its future. Public perceptions of these threats, both their risks and reactions to them, are important in determining how humanity confronts and addresses the threats. This study investigated the perceived probability of threats to humanity and different responses to them (nihilism, fundamentalism and activism), in four Western nations: the US, UK, Canada and Australia. Overall, a majority (54%) rated the risk of our way of life ending within the next 100 years at 50% or greater, and a quarter (24%) rated the risk of humans being …
In War As Well As In Peace: From The Displacement Effect To Incrementalism In Public Expenditures, Giuseppe Eusepi, Edgar Wilson
In War As Well As In Peace: From The Displacement Effect To Incrementalism In Public Expenditures, Giuseppe Eusepi, Edgar Wilson
Faculty of Business - Papers (Archive)
The paper will study the trend in public expenditure starting from the Peacock and Wiseman (1961)'s contribution known as displacement effect. In our view, the notion of displacement effect is important not for its capability to capture essentials in the mechanisms governing taxing and spending areas in public economy, but rather for what it does not explain: incrementalism in public expenditure. According to Peacock and Wiseman, wars allow governments to drastically increase expenditure without constraining government to go back to the pre-war levels once the war is over. Our main point is that the unbridled increase in public expenditure during …
Re-Organizing Australian Public Sector Work: Conditions For Innovating-In-Practice, Mary C. Johnsson, Oriana Price, Marie Manidis
Re-Organizing Australian Public Sector Work: Conditions For Innovating-In-Practice, Mary C. Johnsson, Oriana Price, Marie Manidis
Faculty of Business - Papers (Archive)
Public sector organizations continue to re-organize in response to reform imperatives but are they more innovative when they transform to market or customer orientations? This paper examines what we call innovating-in-practice in a hospital emergency department, a local government council and a corrections centre by analyzing how work organization dualities are negotiated using a practice theory lens. In public sector work, work dualities and tensions are often created when reform initiatives are introduced, requiring existing work practices to be challenged and changed. Our empirical illustrations expose the messiness and enmeshing of various practitioner interests, relations, materialities and purposes of practice …
Ethnic Or Political Fractionalisation? A District Level Analysis Of The Provision Of Public Goods In Sri Lanka, Arusha Cooray
Ethnic Or Political Fractionalisation? A District Level Analysis Of The Provision Of Public Goods In Sri Lanka, Arusha Cooray
Faculty of Business - Papers (Archive)
This study investigates the influence of ethnic and political fractionalisation on the provision of public goods at a district level in Sri Lanka. Evidence shows that political fractionalisation has a greater negative impact on the provision of public goods compared with ethnic fractionalisation. Similarly, political polarisation has a greater negative effect on the provision of public goods compared with ethnic polarisation. The interaction between ethnic and political measures suggests that political fractionalisation (political polarisation) exacerbates the negative effects of ethnic fractionalisation (ethnic polarisation) on the provision of public goods. The ethnolinguistic fractionalisation (ELF) index assumes greater statistical significance under fixed …
Australian Online Public Information Systems: A User-Centred Study Of An Evolving Public Health Website, Helen Hasan, Joseph Meloche, Sumayya Banna
Australian Online Public Information Systems: A User-Centred Study Of An Evolving Public Health Website, Helen Hasan, Joseph Meloche, Sumayya Banna
Faculty of Business - Papers (Archive)
The strategic, transformational nature of many information systems projects is now widely understood. Large-scale implementations of systems are known to require significant management of organisational change in order to be successful. Moreover, projects are rarely executed in isolation - most organisations have a large programme of projects being implemented at any one time. However, project and value management methodologies provide ad hoc definitions of the relationship between a project and its environment. This limits the ability of an organisation to manage the larger dynamics between projects and organisations, over time, and between projects. The contribution of this paper, therefore, is …
The Truth Games Of Public Relations Politics, Judy M. Motion, Shirley Leitch
The Truth Games Of Public Relations Politics, Judy M. Motion, Shirley Leitch
Faculty of Business - Papers (Archive)
This article employs thematic analysis to examine the relationships between public relations practitioners, their women politician clients, and the media they seek to influence in order to create and popularise particular truths. The six key themes considered within this article are truth, news values, coterie communication, gatekeepers, media training, and informalization. The article draws upon interviews conducted with women elected to New Zealand's national Parliament in 1994 and women who held mayoral office in 1996. It also draws upon interviews with the public relations practitioners who undertook media relations work for these women politicians.
Public Relations On The Edge Of Puzzlement: A Defence Of Scholarly Research, Shirley Leitch, Judy M. Motion
Public Relations On The Edge Of Puzzlement: A Defence Of Scholarly Research, Shirley Leitch, Judy M. Motion
Faculty of Business - Papers (Archive)
In this article we offer a defence of the scholarly research contained in the special edition of the Australian Journal of Communication on public relations. In particular, we respond to the critique of the special edition offered by Steiner.