St. Louis County CPPW Evaluation Final Report

This report presents final evaluation results from the Communities Putting Prevention to Work (CPPW) Initiative, implemented from February 2010 through June 2012. The final results show CPPW partners implemented a number of activities to achieve the main objectives of the Initiative. In particular, advocacy and policy change, cessation, and media outreach were important areas of focus.https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/cphss/1055/thumbnail.jp

Private Schools: Baseline Policy Assessment

This report presents the findings from a baseline assessment of tobacco policies in private schools in St. Louis County Districts 1 through 4. These findings were provided to the St. Louis County Department of Health and other CPPW stakeholders, including the Leadership Team and initiative grantees, to help inform intervention efforts for strengthening school tobacco policies.https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/cphss/1048/thumbnail.jp

Public School District: Baseline Policy Assessment

This report from the CPPW project presents the findings from a baseline assessment of tobacco policies in all St. Louis County public school districts. These findings are provided to stakeholders to help inform intervention efforts for strengthening school tobacco policies.https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/cphss/1049/thumbnail.jp

Higher Education: Baseline Policy Assessment

This report from the CPPW project presents the findings from a baseline assessment of tobacco policies in a sample of institutions of higher education in St. Louis County and City. A comprehensive evaluation plan has been developed to examine both process and outcome measures for the Communities Putting Prevention to Work grant, including changes in college/university tobacco policies.https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/cphss/1078/thumbnail.jp

Interpersonal influence among public health leaders in the United States Department of Health and Human Services

Background. In public health, interpersonal influence has been identified as an important factor in the spread of health information, and in understanding and changing health behaviors. However, little is known about influence in public health leadership. Influence is important in leadership settings, where public health professionals contribute to national policy and practice agendas. Drawing on social theory and recent advances in statistical network modeling, we examined influence in a network of tobacco control leaders at the United States Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). Design and Methods. Fifty-four tobacco control leaders across all 11 agencies in the DHHS were identified; 49 (91%) responded to a web-based survey. Participants were asked about communication with other tobacco control leaders, who influenced their work, and general job characteristics. Exponential random graph modeling was used to develop a network model of influence accounting for characteristics of individuals, their relationships, and global network structures. Results. Higher job ranks, more experience in tobacco control, and more time devoted to tobacco control each week increased the likelihood of influence nomination, as did more frequent communication between network members. Being in the same agency and working the same number of hours per week were positively associated with mutual influence nominations. Controlling for these characteristics, the network also exhibited patterns associated with influential clusters of network members. Conclusions. Findings from this unique study provide a perspective on influence within a government agency that both helps to understand decision-making and also can serve to inform organizational efforts that allow for more effective structuring of leadership

Why U.S. Efforts to Promote the Rule of Law in Afghanistan Failed

Promoting the rule of law in Afghanistan has been a major U.S. foreign policy objective since the collapse of the Taliban regime in late 2001. Policymakers invested heavily in building a modern democratic state bound by the rule of law as a means to consolidate a liberal post-conflict order. Eventually, justice-sector support also became a cornerstone of counterinsurgency efforts against the reconstituted Taliban. Yet a systematic analysis of the major U.S.-backed initiatives from 2004 to 2014 finds that assistance was consistently based on dubious assumptions and questionable strategic choices. These programs failed to advance the rule of law even as spending increased dramatically during President Barack Obama's administration. Aid helped enable rent seeking and a culture of impunity among Afghan state officials. Despite widespread claims to the contrary, rule-of-law initiatives did not bolster counterinsurgency efforts. The U.S. experience in Afghanistan highlights that effective rule-of-law aid cannot be merely technocratic. To have a reasonable prospect of success, rule-of-law promotion efforts must engage with the local foundations of legitimate legal order, which are often rooted in nonstate authority, and enjoy the support of credible domestic partners, including high-level state officials