Explaining Failure Through Success: A critical analysis of reduction in road and stroke deaths as an explanation for Australia’s low deceased organ donation rates.

ABSTRACT: During the past 20 years Australian federal and state governments have funded many initiatives to bolster organ donation. Despite large investments of time, effort and money, Australia’s deceased donation rate is amongst the world’s lowest and has only slightly increased from 11.9 donors per million people (pmp) in 1990 to 13·8 donors pmp in 2010. An often-cited explanation for this situation is that Australia’s success in increasing levels of public health and safety has reduced the number of potential deceased organ donors. We refer to this as the “Failure Because of Success” hypothesis. Although commonly accepted, this hypothesis is largely untested. Analysis of health data on road trauma and stroke deaths from Australia and other OECD countries reveals that improvements in public health and safety do not provide an adequate explanation for Australia’s low organ donor rates. Keywords: Organ donation, Public safety, Brain death, Traffic fatalities, Strok

Explaining Failure Through Success: A critical analysis of reduction in road and stroke deaths as an explanation for Australia’s low deceased organ donation rates.

ABSTRACT: During the past 20 years Australian federal and state governments have funded many initiatives to bolster organ donation. Despite large investments of time, effort and money, Australia’s deceased donation rate is amongst the world’s lowest and has only slightly increased from 11.9 donors per million people (pmp) in 1990 to 13·8 donors pmp in 2010. An often-cited explanation for this situation is that Australia’s success in increasing levels of public health and safety has reduced the number of potential deceased organ donors. We refer to this as the “Failure Because of Success” hypothesis. Although commonly accepted, this hypothesis is largely untested. Analysis of health data on road trauma and stroke deaths from Australia and other OECD countries reveals that improvements in public health and safety do not provide an adequate explanation for Australia’s low organ donor rates. Keywords: Organ donation, Public safety, Brain death, Traffic fatalities, Strok

Problem definition and re-evaluating a policy: the real successes of a regeneration scheme

This article seeks to problematize notions of objective policy evaluation using the techniques of interpretive policy analysis, and use the findings to develop a new evaluation and new proposals for policy improvement. It presents evidence from ethnographic fieldwork on the same set of urban regeneration (or renewal) policies in two Scottish neighborhoods between 1989 and 2009. The analysis showed that the policy was variously understood as a failure or a success in four different ways: as a failure within the rationality of official evaluation; as a failure because of the stigma in wider society against deprived neighborhoods; as a failure in some ways by local community activists describing their lived experience through local knowledge; and as a success through local knowledge of the improvements to the physical environment. It demonstrates how policy problem definition and evaluation are closely intertwined and therefore for a policy to be judged a success requires a nuanced understanding of policy problems within their wider social context

Conceptualising success and failure for social movements

The paper discusses some of the most significant conceptions of success and failure present in the social movement literature, and highlights the gaps present in these theories. Through a seven-pronged critique, the paper stresses that the prevalent conceptions of movement success or failure are inherently unable to grasp the overall consequences and essence of a social struggle. Moreover, it is argued here that the problem lies not just in these conceptions, but also the concept of success or failure, because in its application to an entity as dynamic and complex as a struggle, it is unable to transcend beyond its black-and-white confines. It trivialises the concept of failure, which is an opportunity for learning from experiences, a chance for error correction and a prospect to rise higher than ever before

Transforming failure into success through organisational learning: An analysis of a manufacturing information system

This paper describes the idiosyncracies of a case study company, through highlighting issues and problems experienced during their attempts to evaluate, implement and realise the holistic implications of a manufacturing information system. Although the Information System (IS) was operational for a period of time, it was eventually deemed a failure. The reason for this was that a range of human and organisational factors prevented the organisation from embracing the full impact of the system. The eventual success of their information system was realised through a bespoke implementation, based upon a traditional systems development lifecycle that indirectly addressed learning issues following the earlier failed deployment. The paper highlights key issues relating to business success and failure, and then contrasts them alongside the presented case study. In doing so, the authors conclude by proposing methods through which manufacturing information systems can be transformed for business success. This is described achievable through both a realisation in the positioning of the organisation relative to technology management, and the related mapping of human and technological constructs that support information systems related succes

Success through Failure: Wittgenstein and the Romantic Preface

I argue that the Preface to Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations represents a form of preface found in several other major works of Romanticism. In essence, this kind of preface says: ‘I have tried very hard to write a work of the following conventional type … . I failed, and have thus been compelled to publish, with some reluctance, the following fragmentary, eccentric, unfinished or otherwise unsatisfactory work.’ It sometimes transpires, however, that a work which appeared unfinished and unsatisfactory to the author and his contemporaries, later comes to be seen as both complete and startlingly original. Indeed, not initially recognizing what you have achieved is sometimes a mark of the greatness-through-originality so highly prized by Romantic writers. Besides the Investigations, I concentrate on Coleridge’s Preface to ‘Kubla Khan’, and the first 269 lines of Wordsworth’s Prelude (in both the 1805 and 1850 versions), discussing exactly why all three authors found their projects so recalcitrant, why their solutions were so original, and why the magnitude of their achievements was not appreciated from the first. I end with some reflections on why Wittgenstein’s work on aesthetics, the aesthetic impact of his work, and the cognitive impact of his work should not be separated

Implant survival and success rates in patients with risk factors: results from a long-term retrospective study with a 10 to 18 years follow-up

OBJECTIVE: Risk factors for implant therapy are represented by all general and local conditions that through various mechanisms can increase either short-term and long-term failure risk. The aim of this study is to assess the implant survival and implant success rates with single and multiple risk factors. PATIENTS AND METHODS: To address the research purpose, a retrospective cohort study was designed and implemented, including a sample of 225 patients with a total of 871 implants placed. The following risk factors were considered: smoking, bruxism, bone augmentation procedures and the presence of load risk (implants with crown/implant relation > 0.8; angulation > 25°; presence of cantilever). Follow-up ranged from 10 years to 18 years (average follow-up 13.6 years). Failures were subdivided into short-term failures, before the prosthetic phase, and long-term failures, after definitive prosthesis. The success criteria published by Albrektsson and Zarb were adopted. A Cox proportional hazard regression model was used to calculate hazard ratio, with a statistically significant p-value <0.05. RESULTS: Out of the 871 implants placed, 138 did not meet the success criteria, (success rate 84.16%), sixty (43.47%) were classified as "early failure" and seventy-eight as "late failure" (56.53%). A total of 70 dental implants were removed, with a survival rate of 91.96%. CONCLUSIONS: The presence of a single risk factor does not imply a marked increase of failure risk. Among the analyzed factors, the one that proved to be the most dangerous was bruxism, even when presented as the only risk factor. Bruxism with load risk proved to be the most dangerous association (success rate 69.23%) and could be included among the absolute contraindications for implant treatment

Shaping urban traffic patterns through congestion charging: What factors drive success or failure?.

Congestion costs are emerging as one of the most important challenges faced by metropolitan planners and transport authorities in first world economies. In US these costs were as high as 78 million dollars in 2005 and are growing due to fast increases in travel delays. In order to solve the current and severe levels of congestion the US department of transportation have recently started a program to initiate congestion pricing in five metropolitan areas. In this context it is important to determine those factors helping its implementation and success, but also the problems or difficulties associated with charging projects. In this article we analyze worldwide experiences with urban road charging in order to extract interesting and helpful lessons for policy makers engaged in congestion pricing projects and for those interested in the introduction of traffic management tools to regulate the entrance to big cities.Congestion, Road Pricing, Urban Transportation, Traffic Demand Management.