Autonomy and Control of State Agencies:Comparing States and Agencies

Do public organizations with similar tasks or structures differ across states with respect to their autonomy and control? If so, why? By comparing the autonomy, control and internal management of state agencies, this book shows how New Public Management doctrines actually work in three small European states with different politico-administrative regimes. Using a unique set of similar survey data on 226 state agencies in Norway, Ireland and Flanders, this study explains differences in agency autonomy, control and management by referring to international isomorphic pressures, state-specific politico-administrative regimes and characteristics of agencies. Therefore, organization theory and neo-institutional schools are used to formulate four competing theoretical perspectives and hypotheses are tested through simple and advanced statistical techniques. By comparing practices between states and between types of agencies, this study substantially enhances scientific knowledge about why public organizations are granted autonomy, why they are controlled in specific ways, and how autonomy affects internal management.

Autonomy and regulation of state agencies:Reinforcement, indifference or compensation?

This paper analyses the relationships between the autonomy and regulation of state agencies in Norway, Ireland and Flanders (Belgium). The empirical basis is provided by broad surveys of public sector organizations carried out in 2002-2004. Three hypotheses on these relationships are formulated and examined, indicating different patterns. The reinforcement hypothesis, stating a negative relationship does not get any support. On the other hand, the compensation hypothesis, stating a positive relationship gets some support. In general, however, the indifference hypothesis, stating low or no correlations seems to be the most adequate. The hypotheses are also linked to prevalent administrative doctrines, and the empirical findings indicate how relevant they are. © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2008.

Dimensions of Financial Autonomy in Low-/Moderate-Income Couples from a Gender Perspective and Implications for Welfare Reform

The ‘unitary household’ lives on in policymakers’ assumptions about couples sharing their finances. Yet financial autonomy is seen as a key issue in gender relations, particularly for women. This article draws on evidence from semi-structured individual interviews with men and women in thirty low-/moderate-income couples in Britain. The interviews explored whether financial autonomy had any meaning to these individuals; and, if so, to what extent this was gendered in the sense of there being differences in men's and women's understanding of it. We develop a framework for the investigation of financial autonomy, involving several dimensions: achieving economic independence, having privacy in one's financial affairs and exercising agency in relation to household and/or personal spending. We argue that financial autonomy is a relevant issue for low-/moderate-income couples, and that women are more conscious of tensions between financial togetherness and autonomy due to their greater responsibility for managing togetherness and lower likelihood of achieving financial independence. Policymakers should therefore not discount the aspirations of women in particular for financial autonomy, even in low-/moderate-income couples where there remain significant obstacles to achieving this. Yet plans for welfare reform that rely on means testing and ignore intra-household dynamics in relation to family finances threaten to exacerbate these obstacles and reinforce a unitary family model.

Parallel Robot

Parallel robot (PR) is a mechanical system that utilized multiple computer-controlled limbs to support one common platform or end effector. Comparing to a serial robot, a PR generally has higher precision and dynamic performance and, therefore, can be applied to many applications. The PR research has attracted a lot of attention in the last three decades, but there are still many challenging issues to be solved before achieving PRs’ full potential. This chapter introduces the state-of-the-art PRs in the aspects of synthesis, design, analysis, and control. The future directions will also be discussed at the end.

Food Labels, Autonomy and the Right (Not) to Know

Food labelling has been overlooked in the emerging body of literature concerning the normative dimensions of food and drink policies. In this paper, I argue that arguments normally advanced in bioethics and medical ethics regarding the “right to know” and the “right not to know” can provide useful normative guidelines for critically assessing existing and proposed food labelling regimes. More specifically, I claim that food labelling ought to respect the legitimate interests and the autonomy of both consumers who seek knowledge about their food in order to make informed dietary choices and consumers who prefer to remain ignorant about the contents and effects of their food in order to avoid the emotional and psychological harm, or more simply the loss of enjoyment, which may result from receiving that information.

ECJ Fundamental Rights Jurisprudence between Member States' Prerogatives and Citizens' Autonomy

This chapter provides an analysis of the European Court of Justice's Fundamental Rights Jurisprudence, focused on the potential of Member States to maintain any positive regulatory role in supporting citizens' autonomy on the one hand, and on the impact of the Court's case law on citizens' opportunities to actually enjoy human rights within societies (substantive autonomy). It first sketches the notion of autonomy which is proposed as base of fundamental rights protection and promotion within a social reality characterized by not democratically legitimated dominance based on wealth and economic power. It proceeds to contextualize ECJ case law on fundamental rights. This section starts with a quantitative appetizer, which will formalize some assumptions and test them on a total of 150 cases before the European judiciary. The paper then offers a more conceptual recount around fundamental rights to equality and non-discrimination on the one hand and around fundamental rights of workers to actively shape employment and labor relations on the other hand. In conclusion some suggestions are made of how ECJ fundamental rights doctrine could develop more positively in order to moderate diverging interests of different parts of the citizenry in protecting fundamental rights.

Robot and insect navigation by polarized skylight

A study of a large number of published experiments on the behaviour of insects navigating by skylight has led to the design of a system for navigation in lightly clouded skies, suitable for a robot or drone. The design is based on the measurement of the directions in the sky at which the polarization angle, i.e. the angle χ between the polarized E-vector and the meridian, equals ±π/4 or ±(π/4 + π/3) or ±(π/4 - π/3). For any one of these three options, at any given elevation, there are usually 4 such directions and these directions can give the azimuth of the sun accurately in a few short steps, as an insect can do. A simulation shows that this compass is accurate as well as simple and well suited for an insect or robot. A major advantage of this design is that it is close to being invariant to variable cloud cover. Also if at least two of these 12 directions are observed the solar azimuth can still be found by a robot, and possibly by an insect.

Children, Adults, Autonomy and Well-Being

I explore the implications of a view – that children and adults enjoy a markedly different moral and political status, wherein the latter can and should be permitted to make choices as to how they lead their lives, whereas the former should not be permitted to make such choices – for how we think about the relationship between autonomy and welfare, and in particular, in consequence, for how we evaluate paternalism. I discuss the problem of drawing a line and the ‘threshold problem’, and consider how one might, as the UNCRC requires, give a weighted role to the views of the child on matters affecting its own interests.

The Intersection of Religious Autonomy and Religious Symbols: Setting the Stage

Two sets of issues in the area of law and religion have generated a large share of attention and controversy across a wide number of countries and jurisdictions in recent years. The first set of issues relates to the autonomy of churches and other religiously affiliated entities such as schools and social service organisations in their hiring and personnel decisions, involving the question of how far, if at all, such entities should be free from the influence and oversight of the state. The second set of issues involves the presence of religious symbols in the public sphere, such as in state schools or on public lands, involving the question of how far the state should be free from the influence of religion. Although these issues – freedom of religion from the state, and freedom of the state from religion – could be viewed as opposite sides of the same coin, they are almost always treated as separate lines of inquiry, and the implications of each for the other have not been the subject of much scrutiny. In this Introduction, we consider whether insights might be drawn from thinking about these issues both from a comparative law perspective and also from considering these two lines of cases together.

Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence: a defence of autonomy and personhood.

Curriculum for Excellence, Scotland’s 3-18 curriculum, has been described as ‘the most significant curricular change in Scotland for a generation’ (McAra, Broadley and McLauchlan, 2013:223). The purpose of the curriculum is ‘encapsulated’ in four capacities in order that learners become i) successful learners, ii) confident individuals, iii) responsible citizens, and iv) effective contributors. With particular reference to these capacities, we explore the principle of autonomy as it pertains to both individual and collective flourishing seeking to disarm commonplace criticisms of autonomy by arguing that it might be put to work in CfE as a potentially multi-dimensional, context-sensitive concept that is relational as well as individual. We conclude that the four capacities lend themselves to re-consideration and re-mapping in pursuit of autonomy and flourishing premised on the principles of liberal personhood.