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This article examines the drivers and obstacles behind the first large-scale cross-agency coordination in digital platform regulation in Brazil. Drawing on elite semi-structured interviews and document analysis, it investigates how the Brazilian National Data Protection Authority (ANPD) and other federal agencies worked together to scrutinize the legal implications of WhatsApp's privacy policy and terms of service changes announced in January 2021, including concerns regarding transparency, legitimate interest, and consent. The study reveals that while formal institutional arrangements such as cooperation agreements existed, informal factors like personal relationships played a significant role in facilitating coordination. However, capacity and autonomy issues within the involved bodies hindered more substantive coordination and may explain divergences in the interpretation of data protection legislation. The findings emphasize the importance of enhancing mechanisms for inter-agency coordination in digital platform regulation, especially considering capacity and autonomy issues within and across regulatory ecosystems, offering insights to other jurisdictions, particularly for developing countries facing public governance constraints similar to those experienced in Brazil. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

AbstractJapan’s diplomatic policy toward Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) has traditionally been understood in terms of economic complementarity, development assistance, and historical ties, including immigration. It has often been seen as subordinate to Japan’s broader diplomatic agenda and international developments. However, structural transformations over the past two decades, both within Japan and globally, have led to a strategic reassessment of Japan’s relationship with LAC. Japan’s conceptual approach to its relationship with LAC has evolved from an asymmetric, demand-driven official development assistance (ODA) diplomacy to a more coordinated partnership emphasizing shared values and enhanced connectivity. This reorientation is reflected in diplomatic practices, with the Prime Minister’s Office playing a more direct role in interagency coordination: an increased emphasis is made on policy dialogues; ODA is now applied more judiciously than generously; and the local Japanese community has assumed a significant role in public diplomacy. This article traces the evolution of Japan’s diplomatic policy toward LAC, primarily between the 1990s and the 2010s, to examine how its perceptions and practices have been developed and communicated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tourism policies and planning in Indonesia have been effective in prioritising tourism development and maintaining price competitiveness and international openness, but absent or ineffective in the crucial domains of terrorism risk management, infrastructure development, interagency coordination and cooperation, human resource development and management, and environmental sustainability. These shortcomings, despite Indonesia's democratic system of government, tourism policy and planning structures, and many tourism policy instruments, demonstrate that such mechanisms are necessary, but not sufficient, for the sustainable development of a country's tourism industry. Coverage of all crucial tourism policy and planning domains, and effective implementation of policies and plans, are also essential, and in the case of Indonesia will require the marshalling and effective deployment of substantial human and financial resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyzes the implementation of Egypt's targeted fiscal stimulus to the irregular workforce in response to the COVID-19-induced partial shutdown in 2020. We utilize theoretical insights from the literature on administrative campaigns and the interagency coordination literature, as well as insights from the polycentric governance literature, to identify the approach to coordinating the work of the multiple agencies that participated in implementing the initiative and situate it within the implementation literature. We conclude that the complexity of public administration initiatives in semi-authoritarian regimes could create a pretext for expanding access to decision-making and implementation. The need for input from diverse actors creates an environment conducive to expanding participation that combines the characteristics of top-down and bottom-up approaches to policy implementation. Access to decision-making and implementation structures by non-state actors, however, remains dependent on relations with state bureaucratic agencies, both civilian, security-, and military-affiliated. The regime's interest in maintaining control, especially control over data, and the participants' attention to following the official line, creates a need for a dominant actor to perform certain functions beyond the ability of the participating members to accomplish. This expansion in participation therefore does not reflect an expansion in political participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines one narrowly focused aspect of the government interagency cooperation on cyber defense that serves as a basis to achieve a cyber power. It reviews the civil-military interagency cooperation and aims to identify factors that could jeopardize it. First, it provides a theoretical background for the research and then according to interviews and surveys, the factors with the highest negative impact are recognized. Based on this research, the most significant challenges in bridging the gap between civilian and military worlds seems to be power and budget struggles and a lack of political direction on cyber matters from leaders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the hotspot approach has been one of the key EU responses to the 2015 migration crisis, it has not received much systematic attention from EU scholars. Addressing this research gap, this article examines the establishment and implementation of the EU hotspot approach in Italy and its operational reliance on EU agencies. Building on and extending the conceptual framework of the European Administrative Space (EAS), we show how Frontex and the European Asylum Support Office (EASO) have strengthened both their independent administrative capacity and integration within the EAS. To gain a more comprehensive understanding of the role of EU agencies within the Italian hotspots, we also discuss two important yet widely neglected features of administrative governance, namely the level of precision of the agencies' mandate and interagency cooperation. Our analysis draws on a broad range of primary sources as well as nineteen semi-structured expert interviews. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investigations into intelligence failures are frequently conducted by multiple parties in parallel, and in several important cases, their conclusions have been controversial. In addition, investigations into minor incidents, such as mishandling of sensitive information or equipment, tradecraft errors, or similar events where no major consequences have been detected, tend to be handled internally by the concerned agency, or through limited interagency cooperation. This can lead to missed opportunities to prevent them from developing into major failures. These issues are compared to the investigative procedures employed in the aviation safety sector, where an independent body is responsible for investigating both major failures and minor incidents, with a view specifically to develop proactive measures to prevent repetition. The conclusion presented is that the Intelligence Community could benefit from studying how aviation safety investigations are handled, in order to be more effective in addressing minor incidents at an early stage, and to avoid controversies in investigations of major events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Federal land managers in the United States are permitted to manage wildfires with strategies other than full suppression under appropriate conditions to achieve natural resource objectives. However, policy and scientific support for "managed wildfire" appear insufficient to support its broad use. We conducted case studies in northern New Mexico and southwestern Utah to examine how managers and stakeholders navigated shifting barriers and opportunities to use managed wildfire from 2018 to 2021. The use of managed wildfire was fostered through an active network of civil society partnerships in one case, and strong interagency cooperation and existing policies and plans in the other. In both, the COVID-19 pandemic, drought, and agency direction curtailed recent use. Local context shapes wildfire response strategies, yet centralized decision-making and policy also can enable or constrain them. Future research could refine the understanding of social factors in incident decision-making, and evaluation of risks and tradeoffs in wildfire response. Managers and stakeholders seeking to restore fire's ecological roles in their own landscapes through the use of managed wildfires could use these findings to cultivate supportive local environments for their objectives. Both case studies offer examples of how managed wildfires may be facilitated through civil society partnerships and interagency cooperation. Networks of civil society and agency partners can encourage policy change at multiple levels through concerted efforts over time, particularly by building a larger case through localized examples of collaborative projects and a body of regionally relevant scientific evidence. Strong interagency cooperation on both mitigation and response can also foster an environment of mutual understanding, even given differing missions and mandates for managed wildfire. Federal wildfire response must consider multiple objectives that may compete across scales, social-ecological contexts, and timeframes. These include minimizing negative impacts on human values, responding to immediate risks of fire exposure, managing land sustainably under longer timeframes; and meeting accomplishment targets, such as acres of hazardous fuels reduction, ecological restoration, and other resource objectives. Federal wildfires and land managers are permitted to manage wildfires for natural resource objectives but face challenges of ambiguous terminology, conflicting policies, drought, increasing numbers of homes in wildlands, and unanticipated events, such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Conditions, opportunities, and barriers to manage wildfire vary substantially by locality and are dependent on local actors, yet also subject to higher-level changes in policy direction. Beyond improved risk analytics and decision support tools, enabling social and internal institutional conditions may also facilitate opportunities for use of managed wildfire. Social science can provide evidence and frameworks including concrete lessons learned, expanded use of after-action reviews, process monitoring, briefings with leadership, and science application through boundary-spanning organizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Major emergencies and crises require action from all levels of government and the involvement of numerous organizations from the private and nonprofit sectors. Thus, interorganizational coordination is a crucial element of emergency and crisis management. This study first addresses how interagency coordination is structured in American policies and frameworks within the context of public health emergencies. Then, the significant coordination-related challenges that exist at the federal level are discussed, as well as how such challenges manifested in a severe shortage of critical medical resources at the outset of the pandemic. A series of government reports are then reviewed to further explore these coordination failures. Finally, recommendations are offered regarding ways to integrate network governance into the hierarchical governance structure for better crisis coordination. This research contributes to a broader understanding of interagency coordination in response to large-scale public health emergencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Calling for the government to rethink its security strategies, they explain 'Nigeria's internal security management posture has been predominantly reactive and ineffective' (p. 672). This anthology successfully explores issues surrounding the management of rural and urban internal security in Nigeria with attention to threats, actors and challenges. [Extracted from the article]

This article explores the Samba spy scandal to understand Indian counterintelligence and inter-agency intelligence coordination. The scandal publicly emerged in 1979 when dozens of Indian military intelligence officers were arrested for being Pakistani spies. The article examines the accused men's confessions of selling information to Pakistan's Field Intelligence Unit and how later they said the admissions were false and provided under torture. Then it describes senior intelligence and military leaders airing their suspicions that the men were innocent as well as a significant statement from a Pakistani spy a decade later. However, a 2014 Supreme Court ruling officially 'stamped' the men spies without any hope for clearing their names. The article analyses primary sources, interviews, news articles and court rulings, concluding that the scandal reveals poor Indian military counterintelligence and a lack of inter-agency cooperation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It [his execution] was completely devastating to me...."[47] The senior FBI official in charge of the Ames investigation, "angered by a CIA culture of concealment", threatened to bring obstruction of justice charges in the belief that the CIA was covering up the full extent of the damage Ames had caused.[48] I volunteered to the talk to the FBI because I had sat next to Ames and was able to answer questions about security clearances and the access he had. Vertefeuille complained to the chief of SE about the G-men's "inquisitiveness regarding CIA organization and activities."[36] "We were afraid that the FBI would gallop off in the wrong direction and we would not be able to influence their activity", she declared.[37] "Opening it all up to the FBI so that they know everything you know", a CIA veteran observed, was like committing "an unnatural sex act." During my career, I had the dubious experience of crossing paths with the two most notorious foreign intelligence penetrations ("moles") of the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC) during and after the Cold War: Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officer Aldrich (Rick) Ames and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent Robert Hanssen. The Russians had hoped to get Ames and Hanssen as well, but the CIA balked.[46] FEAR AND LOATHING AT LANGLEY The CIA-FBI kumbaya moment did not last long after Ames' arrest. [Extracted from the article]

This article presents and analyzes the mechanisms for cooperation used by wildlife officials in criminal wildlife matters in Canada, through qualitative in-depth interviews with ten Canadian experts. Canada has been used as a transit country for the illicit wildlife trade (IWT) and there is a domestic, regional, and international market for "product" derived from Canadian species. The majority of larger scale criminal cases have involved interagency or bilateral cooperation between criminal justice officials, particularly with the United States. An analysis of these cooperative efforts has been needed. This article's findings suggest that: (1) wildlife enforcement in Canada relies on cooperation due to scarce resources and lack of priority given to wildlife crimes; (2) interagency training aids forensic capabilities; (3) more prosecutorial dedication to wildlife crimes in Canada, larger budgets, and supported initiatives for enforcement and forensics may result in the detection and prosecution of more crimes; and (4) cooperation should be actively supported because it appears to be the backbone of criminal wildlife investigations in the country, which have exposed different levels of criminal sophistication and involvement in the IWT. The findings help identify Canadian enforcement obstacles and best practices that highlight the need for increased political will and public support for wildlife enforcement and wildlife forensics in combating and identifying wildlife crime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars in the field of International Relations increasingly pay attention to interorganizational cooperation. Currently we know, however, more about why international organizations cooperate with one another and have only a rudimentary understanding of the ways in which this cooperation is established. To shed light on this 'blind spot' in the literature, we draw on the linking pin concept, which originated in organizational studies and has more recently been applied to International Relations where its definition and value-added remain nonetheless unclear. Based on an analysis of security-related cooperation among humanitarian NGOs, we illustrate the merit of this concept and further refine it. We show that the different roles that linking pins play and the interplay between them and their organization are key in the initiation of interagency cooperation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses how variances in inter-agency coordination are affected by agencies' policy autonomy. Performance management has increased the focus on agency autonomy, but knowledge of how different levels of agency autonomy affect coordination amongst government agencies is limited. Theoretically, this article uses agency and stewardship theory to discuss why agencies might regard coordination as either desirable or undesirable. Empirically, this article analyses performance contracts between and annual reports of ministries and government agencies. Findings support the expectation derived from agency theory. Agencies with high autonomy coordinate less with other agencies than agencies with low autonomy do. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One critical element of interagency and international cooperation in the area of criminal justice is whether organizations – and more generally countries – can trust one another to follow through on agreements that have been mutually established, such as the utilization of a home country's alternatives to incarceration. This paper builds on the existing literature on mutual trust and adds more empirical data regarding how competent authorities in the European Union (EU) perceive the mutual trust concept in day-to-day practice. In our examination of mutual trust, we draw on an EU survey and three interviews with judiciary members in Spain. Based on our review of the survey findings and interview data, we find that, although mutual trust is essential for all mutual recognition instruments in the EU, its dimensions are far from being fully understood. Whilst the political discourse at the EU level presumes the "pure" existence of the mutual trust, both the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights recognize its limitations, especially when human rights standards are in question. Scholars have also started to challenge the absolute existence of mutual trust independent of any determinants. This paper adds to this debate by illustrating how mutual trust is not only complex and dynamic but also selective and differential. It seems that different problem-solving strategies in the field of criminal and juvenile justice demand different levels of mutual trust, and mutual trust appears to manifest itself more with some Member States than with others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A basic premise of inter-organisational research, from a number of different theoretical perspectives, is that selected organisations should work in harmony rather than competition with each other in order to enhance business success. From this perspective, a review of the literature reveals that three related topics are co-operation, coordination, and specific assets. Yet these constructs have not been examined together in empirical research. This study examines the relationship between these focal constructs and two antecedents (trust and commitment) and one consequent (satisfaction). As predicted, commitment leads to co-operation, coordination, and specific assets. Yet, only co-operation and coordination leads to satisfaction with the relationship. Although trust leads to co-operation, trust has a negative relationship with specific assets, which in turn, leads to lower levels of satisfaction with the relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Though nation-states have long utilized disinformation to influence foreign audiences, Russia's 2015 to 2017 campaign against the U.S.—executed by the Internet Research Agency (IRA) —is unique in its complexity and distribution through the digital communication ecology. The following study explores IRA activity on three social media platforms, Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit, to understand how activities on these sites were temporally coordinated. Using a VAR analysis with Granger Causality tests, results show that IRA Reddit activity granger caused IRA Twitter activity within a one-week lag. One explanation may be that the Internet Research Agency is trial ballooning on one platform (i.e., Reddit) to figure out which messages are optimal to distribute on other social media (i.e., Twitter). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the activities of the Malaysian External Intelligence Organisation (MEIO) or Research Division of the Prime Minister's Department to examine the key role played by intelligence organizations in government and politics. Other topics include the letter sent by MEIO director general Hasanah Abdul Hamid to U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Gina Haspel, MEIO's politicization, and its questionable efforts for regime protection.

This study assesses and explains interagency collaboration performance in the Chinese public sector. Through a comparative case study, it shows that inter-organizational relation is hard to start up; conflicting policies, incompatible procedures, power disparity, low issue salience, and lack of perceived interdependence may separately and jointly affect collaboration performance. The presence of vertical meta-governance plays a critical role in turning the tide; however, its presence is tied up with other factors such as high issue salience or bottom-up appeal. In addition, the highest level of performance not only depends on vertical meta-governance but also on horizontal meta-governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE), the most established avenue for collaborative resource management is the Greater Yellowstone Coordinating Committee (GYCC), a coordinating body comprising local units of the four federal land management agencies in the region. Coordinating ecosystem-scale land management activities has been a primary concern of the GYCC since its inception and has been the source of intense public scrutiny, especially following the 1991 “Vision Exercise” which sought a coordinated ecosystem management plan for the region. As collaborative processes remain an important tenet of modern resource management, we revisit the current discourse surrounding the emergent public opinion of interagency collaboration in the Greater Yellowstone. Using Q-method and semi-structured interviews, we identify three themes within the discourse. We consider these themes in light of continued interest in collaborative management and programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The different legal worldviews of WTO and UNESCO on trade and culture vividly illustrate the formidable challenges we face nowadays to deliver legal and policy coherence in global governance. Bridging the trade and culture policy divide in this area requires stronger inter-agency dialog and cooperation, starting with joint initiatives for improved policy-oriented statistics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Participants in interorganizational collaborations must manage tensions between the competing goals of efficiently accomplishing their objectives and creating participatory decision-making. For this study, structuration theory provided a lens for examining how collaboration members communicatively created initial structures and then used their agency to modify those structures. Findings from observations and interviews examined how the initial and modified communication structures both enabled and constrained group members. As members produced and reproduced the system, they modified the balance of participation and efficiency. These findings emphasize the need for members of collaborations to carefully manage their communication to maintain the desired balance of participation and efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Top-down methods of interagency coordination are inadequate in contemporary public administration, where multiple departments and agencies interact across loosely coupled networks to solve complex problems. The concept of metagovernance suggests governments can employ combinations of coordination instruments to steer dispersed actors toward common goals. This article asks how officials in Australian and British statistical administration addressed problems with traditional coordination methods. Interviews with senior official statisticians show a transition from traditional interagency coordination to metagovernance, driven by failures and learning. Metagovernance captures how interagency coordination is increasingly practiced, though existing theories should give more attention to learning and adaptation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines the operational, legal, organizational, and funding aspects of interagency and intra-agency coordination of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) elimination missions conducted by the United States. To illustrate the demands and complexities of these operations, it discusses the requirements of a WMD elimination mission in North Korea following the collapse of the Kim Jong-un regime. It recommends that the US Department of Defense and the broader US government re-examine and expand pre-crisis planning assumptions and associated concepts of operation, and also work to defuse interagency conflicts by establishing clear priorities and encouraging international partners to take a more active role in WMD elimination missions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This study examines an unusually sustained reduction in suicide rates in a local London prison during the three year period 2008–2011. The likelihood of this reduction taking place by chance was <2:100,000, and its perceived success was such that the prison service recommended an evaluation of its characteristics. This study arose from that recommendation, and it used a retrospective case study multi-method approach (including factor identification, qualitative interviews and triangulation with official documentation) to identify factors which had been associated with the reduced suicide rates. The results endorsed a number of factors which have already been internationally identified as best practice, along with some local innovation factors. Two further pivotal factors emerged through analysis, and they are the key to service improvements. These factors – senior management support for cultural change and cross-professional collaborative working – indicate that positive leadership and multi-agency integration are vital ingredients. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper examines the importance of grass-root emergency response groups in emergency preparedness. Consistent with the Institutional Collective Action framework, we highlight key constraints associated with local government strategies of mutual resource exchange and barriers to intergovernmental collaboration. We examine local governments’ emergency preparedness using survey data collected in the North Central Texas region. We employed a simple OLS analysis to determine mutual exchange and Poisson estimations on the likelihood of local governments receiving and providing external assistance. Findings showed that the presence of grass-root organisations in a jurisdiction is associated with emergency preparedness, highlighting the importance of norms of volunteerism. Local political institutions and participation in federally funded programmes also have an effect on local government decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Major disasters, such as bushfires or floods, place significant stress on scarce public resources. Climate change is likely to exacerbate this stress. An integrated approach to disaster risk management (DRM) and climate change adaptation (CCA) could reduce the stress by encouraging the more efficient use of pooled resources and expertise. A comparative analysis of three extreme climate-related events that occurred in Australia between 2009 and 2011 indicated that a strategy to improve interagency communication and collaboration would be a key factor in this type of policy/planning integration. These findings are in accord with the concepts of Joined-up Government and Network Governance. Five key reforms are proposed: developing a shared policy vision; adopting multi-level planning; integrating legislation; networking organisations; and establishing cooperative funding. These reforms are examined with reference to the related research literature in order to identify potential problems associated with their implementation. The findings are relevant for public policy generally but are particularly useful for CCA and DRM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Implementation and scale-up of evidence-based practices (EBPs) is often portrayed as involving multiple stakeholders collaborating harmoniously in the service of a shared vision. In practice, however, collaboration is a more complex process that may involve shared and competing interests and agendas, and negotiation. The present study examined the scale-up of an EBP across an entire service system using the Interagency Collaborative Team approach. Participants were key stakeholders in a large-scale county-wide implementation of an EBP to reduce child neglect, SafeCare®. Semistructured interviews and/or focus groups were conducted with 54 individuals representing diverse constituents in the service system, followed by an iterative approach to coding and analysis of transcripts. The study was conceptualized using the Exploration, Preparation, Implementation, and Sustainment framework. Although community stakeholders eventually coalesced around implementation of SafeCare, several challenges affected the implementation process. These challenges included differing organizational cultures, strategies, and approaches to collaboration; competing priorities across levels of leadership; power struggles; and role ambiguity. Each of the factors identified influenced how stakeholders approached the EBP implementation process. System-wide scale-up of EBPs involves multiple stakeholders operating in a nexus of differing agendas, priorities, leadership styles, and negotiation strategies. The termcollaborationmay oversimplify the multifaceted nature of the scale-up process. Implementation efforts should openly acknowledge and consider this nexus when individual stakeholders and organizations enter into EBP implementation through collaborative processes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

People with mental illness (PMI) have increased dramatically, and these individuals are at greater risk for repeated contact with the criminal justice system. Mobile crisis units (MCUs) have been heralded as effective partners with law enforcement to provide appropriate interventions to PMI and reduce the possibilities of criminalization of this population. The purpose of this research is to examine a partnership between law enforcement and a county-wide MCU to determine (1) the nature of interactions between police-referred calls to the MCU and (2) to determine the outcomes of these calls and the factors that might influence the outcomes. Significant differences in the type of PMI calls from law enforcement–referred calls to MCUs are found; the PMI are twice as likely to be violent, intoxicated, psychotic, mood-order diagnosed, and in emergent need of care. The type of referral is no longer significant when the model includes risk factors. Policy implications of the partnership between law enforcement and MCUs are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

One of the outstanding features of China's domestic politics is the prominence of the bureaucracy in the policy-making process. Arguably, bureaucracy is the next major player in the policy-making process in China after the top leaders. In this article, the three following aspects of the role of bureaucracy in the Chinese foreign policy-making process are examined: (1) the structure of the bureaucracy, especially the main agencies of the bureaucracy involved in foreign policy making; (2) the respective responsibilities of these agencies and their roles in the process; and (3) inter-agency coordination including the resolution of conflict among them. It observes that while the Ministry of Foreign Affairs plays a key role in the process, other ministries and bureaucratic agencies have significant and even growing input in an increasing number of functional areas, such as trade, finance, economy, climate change, soft power and military affairs. In addition, coordination among these agencies has become a key in the policy-making process. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In 2009, a review of the New Zealand intelligence community, the Murdoch Report, recommended increased coordination and reform to the operation of agencies. Since then, the experience of increasing coordination in New Zealand has been more constructive than in other capitals. Reorganizing the intelligence community revolves around relocating multiple agencies within Pipitea House and the creation of a ‘one community, many agencies’ dynamic. The creation of the Intelligence Coordination Group and an expanded role for the National Assessments Committee plays a vital role in aligning agency priorities. Agencies have also begun to slowdown the assessment process and are introducing new procedures for the analysis and discussion of intelligence products. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article discusses the role of fisheries in the East China Sea and the South China Sea as an aspect of China's food security policy. Topics include the notion of wild fish as a strategic natural resource in light of fishery depletion, a 1974 conflict between China and South Vietnam regarding fishing rights in the Paracel Islands area, and maritime boundary disputes with the Philippines, Japan, and Indonesia. Also addressed are problems with Chinese maritime security interagency cooperation, possible international cooperation in resolving fisheries disputes, and efforts to avoid international conflict over fisheries.

Despite a wealth of evidence showing the benefits of early childhood education and care (ECEC), in Turkey participation remains low and inequitably distributed, even though access to services is soaring. Drawing from previous findings, this paper will focus on different stakeholders’ views on a more integrated system of ECEC governance in Turkey. The research shows that Turkey, a country at the crossroads of forming the foundations of early childhood services, should consider the adverse effects of the current split system and focus on the integration of services to foster holistic development with the aim of offering quality and equity for all children. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An introduction is presented that discusses issue articles on topics including integrated early years services (IEYS), integrated services for young children and families in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, and integrated services for young children in Turkey.

This paper deals with the implementation of integrated services providing early support for young children and their families. The integration of services is considered to have highly positive effects on the development of children and on the prevention of child neglect and maltreatment. Therefore, childcare centres have been developed into family centres offering different services in order to foster this integration. The implementation of integrated services requires adequate governance structures on different levels. The external level concerns the framework the state offers for the integration of services. On an intermediate level, the cooperation between different institutions on the local level is to be considered. The internal level is related to questions of management, organisational development and team building. Based on experiences from family centres in the Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany), the paper focuses on these different aspects of the governance of integrated services. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper reports on an Australian initiative Developing and Sustaining Pedagogical Leadership in Early Childhood Education and Care Professionals, where academics and professionals shared knowledge, experience and research about transdisciplinary practice. The project aimed to develop an understanding of the strategies and skills early childhood professionals and practitioners required to strengthen pedagogical leadership when working in multi-agency organisations. The conceptual framework underpinning the design, analysis and evaluation of the project was bricolage. Bricolage enabled the researchers, professionals and practitioners and other organisational members to consider the principles of multiplicity, complexity, relationality and criticality. The use of bricolage created an opportunity for a more comprehensive level of analysis to occur. A model of professional development emerged from the analysis of the data and was subsequently used to develop an open source learning website. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Information about the first meeting of the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific (CSCAP) Study Group on Maritime Security held in Singapore on June 7-8, 2013 is presented. The meeting, co-chaired by CSCAP Singapore, CSCAP Indonesia, and CSCAP New Zealand, gathered 28 participants from 13 countries. The topics discussed in the meeting include the current maritime condition, the development of principles for good order at sea, and the interagency cooperation.

Hoarding behaviors endanger individuals and their communities. Although there is a growing literature on clinically referred and elderly hoarders, there is limited information about hoarding behaviors beyond these contexts. This study examines the frequency, characteristics, and outcomes of cases involving hoarding encountered by code enforcement officials and social service staff. Prior to an in-service training, 236 social service staff members completed a 43-item survey about their experiences with cases involving hoarding. Respondents reported encountering between two and three cases per year. Although these hoarding cases were estimated to cost more than $3,700 in cleaning fees, 83% of respondents reported having received no prior training on dealing with hoarding. Survey responses suggested that hoarding situations were difficult to resolve and involved multiple community agencies. Collectively, hoarding behaviors appear to be a problem regularly encountered by social service members, who often serve as the initial point of contact. Along with increased training, future research is needed to develop and evaluate collaborative interagency protocols to manage this multifaceted problem. Empirically informed interagency protocols may facilitate the timely referral of community hoarders to mental health professionals and may lead to improved outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers advice to the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC) regarding purported failures in light of the September 11, 2001 U.S. terrorist attacks and information related to purported weapons of mass destruction (WMD) held by Iraq. Advice includes the relation of the IC to policymakers, the nature of intelligence analysis as an intellectual activity, and the role of objectivity in that process. Also noted are the role of collaboration and information sharing, the relation between analysis and data collection, and political aspects of IC reform efforts.

This paper constitutes a report from an on-going research project aimed at comparing diffusion and governance of Barnahus in the Nordic countries. Barnahus can be considered as one of the main policy ventures related to children as crime victims in recent years, building on close inter-agency collaboration under one roof. The project's focus is on how forms of diffusion and governance affect the tension between criminal and welfare law in the respective countries. In addition, variations regarding the role of governmental and voluntary or informal actors in the processes of diffusion and governance are of central concern, as well as interactions between the countries. The paper primarily presents the theoretical framework for the study, building on institutional theory, a sociology of law perspective on governance, and a power perspective. Moreover, methodological and empirical considerations are discussed in relation to the framework. Finally, the paper reflects on what the project brings to future criminological research, highlighting the knowledge on institutional circumstances, governance structures, and the balance between punishment and treatment concerning children as crime victims in the Nordic countries. More generally, the interdisciplinary framework contributes with a possibility of understanding and analyzing contemporary changes in criminal and welfare policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After the 9/11 attacks, the law enforcement and intelligence communities adopted the rhetoric and goals of enhanced information sharing and interagency collaboration, particularly within the context of fusion centers. Although the 9/11 terrorist attacks benchmarked a turning point within the domestic law enforcement community, there has been little research investigating what changes have occurred over the past decade. Drawing on data collected from 49 interviews with individuals working with four state fusion centers and the federal government, this article concludes that there have been many positive strides with respect to information sharing and interagency collaboration; however, interpersonal relationships and trust lie at the core of true change. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Despite aptly capturing the EU as a multi-principal model, the principal–agent literature has neglected the question of under what conditions a particular institution may become a principal. This article proposes a research framework that defines a principal not only through its involvement in the legal procedure establishing the agent, but also through its impact on the day-to-day work and institutional development of this agent. Using the case of the European Parliament and agency control in the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice, it is argued that the Parliament has managed partially to compensate in the post-delegation phase for constrained ex ante legal involvement. The key conditions allowing the Parliament to enter the circle of principals have been altered default conditions through the introduction of co-decision in Justice and Home Affairs policy, and the strategic behaviour of the agent in the principals' competition for leadership and control. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article focuses on efforts by the U.S. Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) to help the community correctional field grow and evolve through innovation and evidence-based practices. A website was launched by the Office of Justice Programs to help organizations determine effective programs and practices. Information on BJA's Field-Initiated solution is provided. A partnership was formed with the National Institute of Justice to implement and test demonstration field experiments.

This article provides an overview of the state of inter-organizational coordination and corruption in urban policy implementation in Bangladesh. Based on a study carried out in one of the seven large cities in Bangladesh, the available data illustrate that there are major coordination problems between the Rajshahi City Corporation (RCC) and other government departments. This is due to a lack of formal coordination mechanisms, partisan leadership, and a fragmented organizational culture of patron-clientage, which dispenses undue favor and involves nepotism. These pathologies breed corruption and seriously impede inter-organizational coordination. Ordinary citizens suffer as a result. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

‘Leadership’ and ‘collaboration’ are integral to twenty-first century governance and management but, despite a growing literature, understanding about leadership for collaboration is hampered by a lack of specificity and nuance in theory and empirical research. This article responds to these limitations by working within an interpretive framework and employing Q-method to uncover different interpretations of leadership for collaboration operant among public managers in Wales. The article uses the concept of situated agency to explain why public managers offer diverse interpretations of leadership for collaboration despite working within the same governance framework, and to identify challenges to public managers in determining appropriate leadership for collaboration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research has indicated that young people experiencing homelessness live with high rates of psychological distress and mental illness, yet often do not access mental health services due to a number of barriers. Access may be enhanced through greater interagency collaboration, adopting principles of early intervention, outreach and youth cultural competence. The St Vincent's Hospital Program for Early Intervention and Prevention of Disability (PEIPOD) has implemented these recommendations in an innovative outreach clinic being conducted at Oasis Youth Support Network in Sydney (Oasis). The purpose of this article is to describe the clinic and to present the perspectives of Oasis youth workers and the PEIPOD clinical team arising from focus groups regarding the extent to which the clinic has: (i) facilitated access to mental health services for young people; (ii) provided a positive experience of a mental health service for young people; and (iii) enhanced the capacity for Oasis staff to work with young people living with complex needs and mental illness. This article also reports the results of a file audit of all case notes and triage forms for the 29 clients who attended the clinic between January 2010 and January 2011. Findings suggest that the highly transient behaviour of the Oasis clients is a key challenge to linking young people to (mental health) services. This article describes several service strengths, including the close partnership between Oasis and PEIPOD staff and access to a mental health assessment for young people at a youth-friendly location. Recommendations arising from the staff interviews include expanding the outreach clinic model to other service sites, improving handover information from the Oasis youth support staff and involving medical staff in the clinic assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the concept of a U.S. Intelligence Community science and technology interagency database of innovations, inventions, classified scientific results and current projects. It suggests that the information-sharing environment could be expanded to include commercially available databases concerning domestic and foreign patents, inventions, and journals. It comments on database security and talks about interagency cooperation in the past, including between the National Reconnaissance Office, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to design a satellite to transmit high-resolution images of the Moon's surface in preparation for the Apollo landings. It mentions how information sharing can help improve efficiency and reduce costs.

Decision-making in emergencies requires non-traditional approach and tools characterized by non-hierarchical structure and flexibility. The dynamic environment of disasters makes it imperative to invest in inter-sector and inter-agency cooperation and coordination. Focusing on the Emergency Management Assistance Compact's (EMAC) response to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005, this article examines the decision-making structure of the agreement. EMAC is an inter-state mutual aid agreement that facilitates sharing of resources during and after disasters. While EMAC's overall decision-making performance was relatively satisfactory and flawless, investment in communication, trust-building, and eradication of inter-agency value differences and discrepancies is imperative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]