title: Institutional work and the interplay of stability and change in public budgeting reform: the case of public universities in Iran

authors: Aliabadi, F. Jalali

subjects: Social Sciences

abstract: Purpose: The purpose of this study is to understand the efforts of key social actors in influencing the reform of Iranian public universities budgeting system, from incremental to performance-based budgeting (PBB), the tensions that arose as competing efforts of institutional change were undertaken, and ultimately the impact of these efforts on of the extent to which the Iranian government transitioned to a system of PBB in public universities.
Design/methodology: Data comprises of semi-structured interviews with managers and experts involved in the budget setting process and an analysis of budgetary policy documents, reports and archival material such as legislation. An institutional work lens is employed to interpret the findings. 
Findings: While actors advocating the change were engaged in institutional work efforts of disrupting the old budgetary rules by disassociating the rules moral foundations and creating new budgetary rules (through new legislation), universities undertook subtle resistance by engaging in extended evaluation of the new proposed PBB rules to maintaining the old budgetary rules. The reforms undertaken to introduce PBB in Iranian universities achieved minimal success whereby incremental budgeting continued to constitute by far a larger percentage of the budget allocation formula for university budgets. This finding illustrates change and continuity in university budgetary systems resulting from institutional work of actors competing for control of resource allocation basis under the proposed PBB but proposing contradicting models. 
Practical implications: The findings highlight the importance of understanding the interplay of institutional work undertaken by competing social actors as they seek to advance their goals in shaping the budgetary reform in the public-sector. Such an understanding may inform policy makers who intend to introduce major reforms in public-sector budgeting approaches.  
Originality: Unlike prior studies that largely focused on how organisation-level budgeting practices responded to changes in public budgeting rules (i.e., at the site of implementation of the rules ), this paper highlights how strategies of change and resistance are played out at the site of setting budgetary norms.

text: Institutional work and the interplay of stability and change in public budgeting reform: the case of public universities in Iran Purpose: The purpose of this study is to understand the efforts of key social actors in influencing the reform of Iranian public universities budgeting system, from incremental to performance-based budgeting (PBB), the tensions that arose as competing efforts of institutional change were undertaken, and ultimately the impact of these efforts on of the extent to which the Iranian government transitioned to a system of PBB in public universities.
Design/methodology: Data comprises of semi-structured interviews with managers and experts involved in the budget setting process and an analysis of budgetary policy documents, reports and archival material such as legislation. An institutional work lens is employed to interpret the findings. 
Findings: While actors advocating the change were engaged in institutional work efforts of disrupting the old budgetary rules by disassociating the rules moral foundations and creating new budgetary rules (through new legislation), universities undertook subtle resistance by engaging in extended evaluation of the new proposed PBB rules to maintaining the old budgetary rules. The reforms undertaken to introduce PBB in Iranian universities achieved minimal success whereby incremental budgeting continued to constitute by far a larger percentage of the budget allocation formula for university budgets. This finding illustrates change and continuity in university budgetary systems resulting from institutional work of actors competing for control of resource allocation basis under the proposed PBB but proposing contradicting models. 
Practical implications: The findings highlight the importance of understanding the interplay of institutional work undertaken by competing social actors as they seek to advance their goals in shaping the budgetary reform in the public-sector. Such an understanding may inform policy makers who intend to introduce major reforms in public-sector budgeting approaches.  
Originality: Unlike prior studies that largely focused on how organisation-level budgeting practices responded to changes in public budgeting rules (i.e., at the site of implementation of the rules ), this paper highlights how strategies of change and resistance are played out at the site of setting budgetary norms.

year: 2021-03-02

title: A reduced magnetohydrodynamic model of coronal heating in open magnetic regions driven by reflected low-frequency waves

authors: Oughton, Sean

subjects: MHD

abstract: A reduced magnetohydrodynamic (RMHD) description is employed to examine a suggestion made by W. H. Matthaeus and colleagues in 1999 that coronal heating might be sustained by a cascade of low-frequency MHD turbulence. Here RMHD simulations show that the low-frequency cascade to high transverse wavenumbers can be driven by an externally maintained flux of low-frequency propagating Alfvén waves, in combination with reflection caused by an inhomogeneous background medium. The simulations show that the suggestions made previously on the basis of a phenomenology are indeed realizable. In addition, the effect is seen to sensitively depend on the presence of reflection, as the background turbulence level needed to maintain the cascade can be sustained only when reflection is imposed. The steady level of turbulence is insensitive to the initial seed turbulence level (provided it is nonzero). Consequences of this model for realistic models of coronal heating in open field-line regions are discussed.

text: A reduced magnetohydrodynamic model of coronal heating in open magnetic regions driven by reflected low-frequency waves A reduced magnetohydrodynamic (RMHD) description is employed to examine a suggestion made by W. H. Matthaeus and colleagues in 1999 that coronal heating might be sustained by a cascade of low-frequency MHD turbulence. Here RMHD simulations show that the low-frequency cascade to high transverse wavenumbers can be driven by an externally maintained flux of low-frequency propagating Alfvén waves, in combination with reflection caused by an inhomogeneous background medium. The simulations show that the suggestions made previously on the basis of a phenomenology are indeed realizable. In addition, the effect is seen to sensitively depend on the presence of reflection, as the background turbulence level needed to maintain the cascade can be sustained only when reflection is imposed. The steady level of turbulence is insensitive to the initial seed turbulence level (provided it is nonzero). Consequences of this model for realistic models of coronal heating in open field-line regions are discussed.

year: 2001

title: Addressing diversity: Race, ethnicity, and culture in the classroom

authors: Bishop, Russell

subjects: New Zealand

abstract: The widely accepted educational goals for Maori, established at the first Hui Taumata Matauranga held in 2001, are that Maori ought to be able to live as Maori, actively participate as citizens of the world, and enjoy both good health and high standards of living (Durie, 2001). Together with the government goals of equipping learners with twenty-first century skills and reducing systemic underachievement in education, these goals inform the new 2008-2012 Maoni Education Strategy, Ka Hikitia Managing for Success (Ministry of Education, 2007), which has as its main strategic outcome: Maori students enjoying education success as Maori. Within this frame, there are four student outcomes for Maori: learning to learn, making a distinctive cultural contribution, contributing to Te Ao Maori, and contributing to Aotearoa/New Zealand and the world.

text: Addressing diversity: Race, ethnicity, and culture in the classroom The widely accepted educational goals for Maori, established at the first Hui Taumata Matauranga held in 2001, are that Maori ought to be able to live as Maori, actively participate as citizens of the world, and enjoy both good health and high standards of living (Durie, 2001). Together with the government goals of equipping learners with twenty-first century skills and reducing systemic underachievement in education, these goals inform the new 2008-2012 Maoni Education Strategy, Ka Hikitia Managing for Success (Ministry of Education, 2007), which has as its main strategic outcome: Maori students enjoying education success as Maori. Within this frame, there are four student outcomes for Maori: learning to learn, making a distinctive cultural contribution, contributing to Te Ao Maori, and contributing to Aotearoa/New Zealand and the world.

year: 2009