Are We Kidding Ourselves That Research Leads Practice?

The importance of learning from practice is underscored by the analysis in the articles on innovation and development in urban planning of this journal’s thematic issue

Mediation of Environmental Enforcement: Overcoming Inertia

This Article aims to examine the claims for the usefulness of environmental mediation in the context of enforcement through consideration of two environmental enforcement cases processed by the Florida Department of Environmental Regulation (DER) during 1990-1991. Specifically outlined is a pilot mediation program designed to improve the resolution of the cases. Next, two DER cases are described and compared, in detail; the two cases are quite similar except that one underwent mediation and one did not. Finally, this Article draws conclusions about environmental enforcement dispute resolution processes. Particularly examined is the success of mediation at overcoming the reluctance of environmental enforcement partisans to move their cases to settlement - to overcome the inertia of non-settlement

State and Local Programs for Flood Hazard Management in the Southeast

Flooding is a serious national problem. It affects every state, over half of the communities, and an estimated seven percent of the land area in the United States. In an effort to slow escalating flood losses and reduce mounting expenditures for structural protective works and flood disaster assistance, federal flood hazard mitigation policy has increasingly stressed the need for a balanced approach to flood problems. Such an approach employs both structural and non-structural measures. While structural measures, such as dams, levees, and channel alterations have a long history of successful application, a number of non-structural measures have drawn increasing attention. They include land use regulations, floodproofing, flood forecasting, flood insurance, and post flood recovery planning. Most of these non-structural measures cannot be implemented by the federal government acting alone; they require a cooperative effort among federal, state, and local governments

Is Inequality Among Universities Increasing? Gini Coefficients and the Elusive Rise of Elite Universities

One of the unintended consequences of the New Public Management (NPM) in universities is often feared to be a division between elite institutions focused on research and large institutions with teaching missions. However, institutional isomorphisms provide counter-incentives. For example, university rankings focus on certain output parameters such as publications, but not on others (e.g., patents). In this study, we apply Gini coefficients to university rankings in order to assess whether universities are becoming more unequal, at the level of both the world and individual nations. Our results do not support the thesis that universities are becoming more unequal. If anything, we predominantly find homogenization, both at the level of the global comparisons and nationally. In a more restricted dataset (using only publications in the natural and life sciences), we find increasing inequality for those countries, which used NPM during the 1990s, but not during the 2000s. Our findings suggest that increased output steering from the policy side leads to a global conformation to performance standards