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The study suggests that the AICPA's efforts to investigate the use of statistical sampling appear to have been catalyzed by the confluence of the growing dissatisfaction with the traditional approach to sampling and the widespread recognition of the benefits of statistical sampling which were being realized in other professions and in industry. The fact that large corporations had begun to use statistical sampling in accounting and auditing lent additional urgency to the need to address the issue. In addition, some doubted the tenability of traditional sampling if challenged in court by a statistician.
The study also examines the research efforts of the AICPA which include case studies, legal opinions, a review of the mathematical underpinning of statistical sampling, and the initiation of an interdisciplinary collaborative effort with the American Statistical Association. The research suggests that from the very beginning, the AICPA was most cognizant of the legal implications of statistical sampling and that the legal opinions obtained played a key role in the profession's eventual acceptance of this new technology. The study also indicates that the AICPA's research led it to reexamine basic auditing concepts and challenge existing standards.
The national CPA firms shared information regarding their individual in-house experimentation with statistical sampling which suggests that a spirit of collegial cooperation existed rather than competition-related secrecy. Lastly, the research demonstrates the importance of individual leadership in the profession's efforts to adopt new technology; here, the study provides a glimpse of two Accounting Hall of Fame members, Robert M. Trueblood and Oscar Gellein, and the first recipient of the Distinguished Service in Auditing Award, Kenneth W. Stringer, making one of their many professional contributions. The study suggests that without the strong leadership provided by these three individuals, the profession's adoption of this technology would have taken significantly longer.

The article examines the communication activities of government bodies aimed at forming a positive image of government, analyzes and generalizes theoretical and practical aspects of the public relations system of government bodies. The modern innovative communication environment requires public relations specialists to introduce new technological methods and use modern forms of providing information to the general public of civil society in order to influence the formation of public opinion. Therefore, the article examines the tools of imageology, the use of which by the authorities in the system of public relations is effective during the periods of building a democratic society. ; В статье рассмотрена коммуникационная деятельность органов государственного управления, направленная на формирование положительного имиджа власти, проанализированы и обобщены теоретико-практические аспекты системы связей с общественностью органов государственной власти. Современная инновационная комункационная среда требует от специалистов паблик рилейшнз внедрять новые технологические методы и использовать современные формы предоставления информацииширокой общественности гражданского общества, чтобы влиять на формирование общественного мнения. Поэтому в статье рассматриваются инструменты имиджелогии, использование которых органами власти в системе связей с общественностью эффективны в периоды созидания демократического общества. ; У статті розглянуто комунікаційну діяльність органів державного управління, що спрямована на формування позитивного іміджу влади, проаналізовано та узагальнено теоретико-практичні аспекти системи зв'язків з громадськістю органів державної влади. Сучасне інноваційне комунікаційне середовище вимагає від фахівців паблік рилейшнз впроваджувати нові технологічні методи та використовувати сучасні форми надання інформації широкому загалу громадянського суспільства, щоб впливати на формування громадської думки. Відтак у статті розглядається низка інструментів іміджології, використання яких органами влади у системі зв'язків з громадськістю є ефективними у періоди творення демократичного суспільства.

"Same-sex marriage, a politically and culturally untenable idea only a quarter century ago, has become one of the most controversial issues in American life. Social conservatives are adamantly opposed to it and vote-conscious liberal politicians tiptoe around it, but an emerging majority's support for it makes it seem all but inevitable. While most observers seem to think that the legalization of gay marriage across the nation will occur at some point in the near future, in the meantime it continues to generate a sharp political backlash that has helped its opponents score political victories (even if they prove to be short-lived). If most young people support gay marriage, and if there are clear indicators that a majority of the population will support it in the very near future, why is the backlash so strong? As Michael Klarman will show in From the Closet to the Altar, it is because its proponents have adopted a court-centered approach for advancing their cause. In many states, advocates have taken to the courts and argued that bans on gay marriage are denials of civil rights. They have followed the path of earlier civil rights advocates, who also chose the court rather than the political arena as a forum to decide issues. But as Klarman shows, this tactic comes with clear costs. Using the courts to leapfrog public opinion can actually set a cause back because court decisions generate backlashes. Usually, judges are neither elected nor beholden to public opinion, and they are easily pegged as unaccountable elites by opponents. Klarman, who has examined virtually every state-level judicial decision and all of the legislative attempts to overturn same-sex marriage, contends that the movement has in many respects not only hurt its own cause by generating populist backlash, but has created a countervailing social movement that works against progressive causes on a host of other issues. Given the irreversible tectonic shift in public opinion regarding the issue, he argues that it will occur anyway. By providing such fuel to its opponents (much like with Roe v. Wade), the movement is in danger of creating a powerful countermovement that will use the issue for proponents of gay rights for years to come. Concise yet sweeping in scope, From the Closet to the Altar is not only a worthy successor to his Bancroft Prize-winning From Jim Crow to Civil Rights, it will reshape how we think about the issue"--

Author's Note: This paper was originally written and presented in 1999 as both a critical reflection on Public Administration's ongoing "identity crisis" and a rather (often too harsh) assessment of several recently published works that seemed exemplary of the problem being highlighted. Although some aspects of the argument made in the paper did find an outlet (see Dubnick, 2000), its length and contentious tone meant it was unlikely to find a mainstream outlet for publication. Nevertheless, it did circulate among colleagues and generated some collegial and published reaction (see Bogason et al., 2000). Eventually relegated to a location at the author's website, it continued to circulate via intermittent downloads, with notable increases in "hits" at the beginning of each academic term. It seems that over the years it became required reading in a number of doctoral seminars at various institutions, and as some graduates of those programs have taken up positions at other institutions, the paper's life and influence (for good or bad) has been sustained. With the advent of online journals such as the Journal of Public and Nonprofit Affairs (JPNA), it became logistically possible to consider publishing a lengthy piece such as "Demons…," and I was pleasantly surprised when the editors approached me about revisiting the paper for possible publication. As flattering as the suggestion seemed, the prospect of undertaking what might be regarded as the longest "revise and resubmit" in history was daunting, not merely due to the length and complexity of the paper and its thesis, but also because my views of the field and works (and "gatekeepers") I critiqued have modified and mellowed somewhat. What we did agree on was to have JPNA publish the original paper (with a few very minor tweaks) along with some external commentary. The result is that what you are about to read has not been "updated" as to facts, and especially as to opinion; moreover, you will not find a reference in the bibliography more recent than 1999. That said, I hope some of the arguments offered can still prove valuable to those who, like me, are committed to the future of our field. ABSTRACT: For the past half-century, those defining the field of Public Administration in their role as its leading "theorists" have been preoccupied with defending the enterprise against the evils of value-neutral logical positivism. This polemical review of that period focuses on the Simon-Waldo debate that ultimately leads the field to adopt a "professional" identity rather than seek disciplinary status among the social sciences. A survey of recent works by the field's intellectual leaders and "gatekeepers" demonstrates that the anti-positivist obsession continues, oblivious to significant developments in the social sciences. The paper ends with a call for Public Administrationists to engage in the political and paradigmatic upheavals required to shift the field toward a disciplinary stance.

Despite the centrality of national identity in the exclusionary discourse of the European radical right, scholars have not investigated how popular definitions of nationhood are connected to dispositions toward Muslims. Moreover, survey‐based studies tend to conflate anti‐Muslim attitudes with general anti‐immigrant sentiments. This article contributes to research on nationalism and out‐group attitudes by demonstrating that varieties of national self‐understanding are predictive of anti‐Muslim attitudes, above and beyond dispositions toward immigrants. Using latent class analysis and regression models of survey data from 41 European countries, it demonstrates that conceptions of nationhood are heterogeneous within countries and that their relationship with anti‐Muslim attitudes is contextually variable. Consistent with expectations, in most countries, anti‐Muslim attitudes are positively associated with ascriptive – and negatively associated with elective (including civic) – conceptions of nationhood. Northwestern Europe, however, is an exception to this pattern: in this region, civic nationalism is linked to greater antipathy toward Muslims. It is suggested that in this region, elective criteria of belonging have become fused with exclusionary notions of national culture that portray Muslims as incompatible with European liberal values, effectively legitimating anti‐Muslim sentiments in mainstream political culture. This may heighten the appeal of anti‐Muslim sentiments not only on the radical right, but also among mainstream segments of the Northwestern European public, with important implications for social exclusion and political behaviour.

Beginning with insiders like Philip Guston and Joan Mitchell, the annexation of Abstract Expressionist (AbEx) territory is reaching a fevered pitch. Contemporary artists including women, queers, people of color, and other marginalized groups, now have their own small plots of land and can lend their voices to the cacophony that makes our world a richer, more verdant place. It is in these hands that this land will realize its potential to change the world. This totally queer annexation of AbEx territory is the New (re)Public. Political theorist Hannah Arendt believes that the vita activa is composed of labor, work, and action. Labor and work are of the private realm. Only when a person takes action, or enters the public realm to speak and act, is that person's potential fully realized. However, Hannah Arendt fails to see art as action, as part of the public realm. But in an age and in a country where the public sphere has all but disappeared into the social realm (where discussing politics is a faux pas, and what needs to be said increasingly must be said in 140 characters or less), art is now emerging as the new public space. The New (re)Public is being built on the annexed territory of Abstract Expressionism by marginalized groups: queers, women, and people of color. This space is free, usable, democratic, and political; it is a space for action and change. Citizens of the New (re)Public honestly disclose their identities and publicly share their political opinions. They must be willing to become part of a common world with a collective identity. Finally, individuals must possess negative capability which allows them to begin something they cannot control; this is the very essence of action and of art. This argument is bolstered by the art-actions of three artists from the past fifty years: Philip Guston, Amy Sillman, and Sharon Hayes. Each of these artists have claimed some space of Abstract Expressionism, repurposing it for their own ends. For these artists, art is a manifestation of their agency and citizenship, allowing them to enter the public realm, identify themselves, and "speak" in their own particular style. I will also examine my own practice as it relates to and is a part of the New (re)Public. I utilize my agency as I negotiate my own awkward habits of mark making to create the strongest possible compositions, unifying seemingly dissimilar elements. This unity, this coming together and negotiation of disparate parts into a working and agreeable whole, is the goal not only of my artmaking, but also the mark of a highly functional society. It is the New (re)Public.

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the adverse consequences created by an infodemic, specifically bringing attention to compliance with public health guidance and vaccine uptake. COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy is a complex construct that is related to health beliefs, misinformation exposure, and perceptions of governmental institutions. This study draws on theoretical models and current data on the COVID-19 infodemic to explore the association between the perceived risk of COVID-19, level of misinformation endorsement, and opinions about the government response on vaccine uptake. We surveyed a sample of 2697 respondents from the US, Canada, and Italy using a mobile platform between 21–28 May 2021. Using multivariate regression, we found that country of residence, risk perception of contracting and spreading COVID-19, perception of government response and transparency, and misinformation endorsement were associated with the odds of vaccine hesitancy. Higher perceived risk was associated with lower odds of hesitancy, while lower perceptions of government response and higher misinformation endorsement were associated with higher hesitancy.

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the adverse consequences created by an infodemic, specifically bringing attention to compliance with public health guidance and vaccine uptake. COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy is a complex construct that is related to health beliefs, misinformation exposure, and perceptions of governmental institutions. This study draws on theoretical models and current data on the COVID-19 infodemic to explore the association between the perceived risk of COVID-19, level of misinformation endorsement, and opinions about the government response on vaccine uptake. We surveyed a sample of 2697 respondents from the US, Canada, and Italy using a mobile platform between 21–28 May 2021. Using multivariate regression, we found that country of residence, risk perception of contracting and spreading COVID-19, perception of government response and transparency, and misinformation endorsement were associated with the odds of vaccine hesitancy. Higher perceived risk was associated with lower odds of hesitancy, while lower perceptions of government response and higher misinformation endorsement were associated with higher hesitancy.

"This book studies war narratives and their role in the political arenas of post-conflict societies, with a focus on the former Yugoslavia. How do politicians in post-war societies talk about the past war? How do they discursively represent vulnerable social groups created by the conflict? Does the nature of this representation depend on the politicians' ideology, personal characteristics, or their record of combat service? The book answers these questions by pairing natural language processing tools and large corpora of parliamentary debates collected in three southeast European post-conflict societies (Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, and Serbia). Using the latest advances in computer science, the book explores patterns in the war discourse of the political elites of these countries and discusses how politicians talk about war in terms of common narratives and shared frameworks. Mapping over twenty years of parliamentary debates, the book presents a new perspective on the role of the legacies of war in public space and develops theoretical arguments about reconciliation in post-conflict societies. The wars of the 1990s and the breakup of Yugoslavia have created three totally different settings for remembering the past conflicts in these countries, despite their common history. It is a story of victorious battles (Croatia), past grievances (Bosnia-Herzegovina) and denial (Serbia), showing the different flavours of past wars in various national contexts that are symptomatic of many post-conflict societies in different parts of the world. This book will be of much interest to students of war and conflict studies, South-Eastern European politics, discourse analysis, and International Relations"--

Propagandistische Einflussnahme auf definierte Zielgruppen ist seit jeher eine Begleiterscheinung von Krisen, Konflikten und Kriegen. Mit der Modernisierung wurde die Kriegspropaganda zu Beginn des 20sten Jahrhunderts zunehmend institutionalisiert und professionalisiert. Wohingegen die klassische Propaganda im Grunde ausschließlich auf der politisch-diplomatischen Ebene agitierte, finden sich heute selbst innerhalb der Streitkräfte Spezialtruppen, die mit Hilfe eigener Massenmedien den psychologischen Kampf führen. Zudem haben sich die Formen der Einflussnahme auf die öffentliche Berichterstattung und das öffentliche Mediensystem insgesamt intensiviert, was die ehemals negative Zensur in eine positive transformierte. Die Einflussnahme auf das Denken, Fühlen und Handeln mit Hilfe kommunikativer Mittel und Methoden ist ein unverzichtbarer Bestandteil des Krisenmanagements und der Kriegführung geworden, von der politischen über die strategische bis hin zur operativ-taktischen Ebene. Informations- und Medienhoheit sind entscheidende Erfolgsfaktoren. Wer das Propagandaprinzip verstehen will, muss die funktionalen und komplexen Strukturen identifizieren und die Zusammenhänge kennen. Die rasante Entwicklung der Informations- und Kommunikationstechnologien ermöglicht eine umfassende, massen- und multimediale Einflussnahme auf bestimmte Zielgruppen, die zunehmend genauer erfasst werden können, wodurch sich die Wirksamkeit potenziert. Gleichzeitig wird über die öffentliche Kommunikation ein globales Weltbild mittels massenmedialer Kommunikation entwickelt, was den Schluss zulässt, dass unser Bild von der Welt in letzter Konsequenz ein medial konstruiertes sein muss. Der Wahrheitsbegriff wird dabei obsolet und vollkommen relativ. Als Wahrheit gilt oftmals nur noch die mediale Projektion von Wirklichkeit, die sich nicht einmal mehr auf die Ereignisrealität beziehen muss, sondern sich auch der Fiktion bedient, ohne dabei ihren Wahrheitsanspruch einzubüßen. Der Propagandist versucht hierbei, mit Hilfe kommunikativer Mittel und Methoden massenwirksam an den Wirklichkeitsentwürfen einer Zielgruppe anzusetzen und deren Wahrnehmung im Sinne eines Reframings zu verschieben. Grundelemente sind dabei stets die starke Uniperspektivierung bei einer gleichzeitigen Förderung der Selektivität in der Wahrnehmung, was letztlich zu einem - im Grunde wirklichkeitsfremden - bipolaren Bewertungssystem führt, das in der Lebenswelt des Rezipienten dennoch Bestand hat, da es sich als viabel zeigt. Die Propaganda versteht es, die Komplexität und Unübersichtlichkeit der überinformierten Welt im Sinne der eigenen Interessen für die Zielgruppe zu ordnen und führt eine vermeintlich logische Argumentation, die ohne hohen kognitiven Aufwand nachvollziehbar ist. Der Wahrheitsbegriff spielt für den Propagandisten nur insofern eine Rolle, da von ihm die Glaubwürdigkeit und damit Wirksamkeit abhängt. Der Mensch mag sich im vielfältigen und unüberschaubaren, grenzen- und tabulosen Informationsraum freier fühlen - vielleicht auch aufgeklärter - doch letztlich bleibt es bei dem Gefühl, und wir haben in den hochtechnisierten Informations- und Kommunikationsstrukturen die Dimension des informativen Verlorenseins bereits erreicht. Daraus resultiert ein Relevanz-, Selektivitäts- und Kontextproblem, das in einem Wirklichkeitsproblem endet. Zwischen Mensch und Ereignisrealität steht zunehmend eine massenmedial erzeugte, vormedial gestützte und geplant manipulative Propagandamauer, die sich - zumeist unentdeckt - in gewohnt unterhaltsamer Art und Weise in die entertainisierte Medienoberfläche integriert. Sie zu identifizieren, hinter sie zu blicken und mit kritischem Verstand die komplexen Propagandamuster zu erkennen, ist eine Herausforderung, der sich insbesondere die Medienpädagogik in ihrer Bildungspraxis stellen muss. ; The influence of propaganda on defined target audiences is a phenomenon of crisis, conflict and war during the history. At the beginning of the 20th century, in context of modernization, warpropaganda was increasingly institutionalized and professionalized. When the classic form of propaganda was exclusively executed on the politcal and diplomatic sphere, today there are also specialists for psychological warfare within the armed forces, doing tactical warpropaganda with own massmedia. Not to forget the increasing effort in taking influence on warreporting and the public mediasystem at all. The former negative way of cencorship was transformed in a positive one, that is much more difficult to recognize.Today the influence of communicative means and methods on thinking, feeling and behaviour is an absolut necessary task in crisis-management and warfare, from the political to the tactical sphere. The control of information and public media is the decisive secret behind the success in crisis, conflict and war. To understand the principles of propaganda, it ist necessary to identify the complicated structures and to know about their functional connections. The rapid development of information- and communication-technologies made it possible to manipulate target-audiences with mass- and multimedia influences in a higher quality and quantity ever seen before. Furthermore it is possible to analyse the target-audiences in a much more detailed and well-founded way, so that the success of influence ist more likely than in the past. The public communication tells us how to see the world and the mankind, it is constructing a system to help us decide between amp;quot;the goodamp;quot; and amp;quot;the badamp;quot; and it forms a binding ethic-morale assessment. This public system of communication is nearly the only window to the world, so we can conclude that the world we know is only a media-construction, seen through a window-called screen. The truth is superfluous and absolutely relative. In most cases it ist only a medial projection of one possible reality, that does not need even a factional reality but can also concern on a viable fiction, without loosing the claim to be the truth. An in this medial construction of reality the propagandist uses the recepients imagination of reality for manipulating him and the masses. With support of intended information given to the recipients, the concept of reality and the perspective of perception will be transformed and reframed in the way the propagandist wants. The basic elements are nearly always the Uniperspectivation and the pushing of a special kind of selectivity in perception. The result is an - at least unreal - bipolar system of assessment, but it fits viable in the recipients livelyhood and that is why it is taken as a true reality. Propaganda knows how to use the complicated and confusing structur of information-age determinations. The information-overflow is dirigated in a functional way and offers a logical, simple and comprehensive argumentation to explain the world. The so called truth is - concerning the propaganda - simply a guarantee for effectivness, because only believable information is able to convince, to persuade and to manipulate. The information age people may feel free in the chaos of multiple, uncencored and boundless information without taboos. But it is only the feeling and not the real way it works. In the waves of information-overflow the normal recipient is lost in all the information depths and used by lots of propagandists. Between the recipient and the factional reality there is more and more an intended propaganda-wall, hiding the pre-medial sphere behind some kind of alltime present entertainment. It has to be the task of media-educational sciences to know about the principles of postmodern propaganda and to help the recepients in working with all the intended media-influences. We must break down the propaganda-wall and take a look behind the medial screen of entertainment - especially in times of crisis, conflict and war.

This article describes and shows the development of public sector accounting reforms in Indonesia in strengthening accountability, and creating transparency concerning public sector accounting to help promote better governance. This article also provides insight into the application of New Public Management Practices (NPM) in Indonesia, including the introduction of an accrual accounting system for local governments. The application of NPM practices is part of the political, economic, and public sector reforms introduced after 1998, which addresses the background and barriers to reform and the nature of the accrual accounting system adopted by Indonesian local governments. The main contribution of this study is to show how the political traditions of a nation accept the adoption of New Public Management Practices (NPM) and engage the wider public in discourse about accounting reform in the public sector. The results of our observations indicate that the development of public accounting reforms cannot be maximized because it is hindered by a lack of staff with adequate accounting skills and shows undesirable results due to the rush to copy public sector financial management techniques from different country contexts, especially when there are differences of opinion significant regarding the precise design of these reforms among influential policy-making institutions. Apart from that, this study also provides an understanding of the public sector reform society in the context of a diverse nation that has long been subject to colonialism and military leadership. The problem is rooted in the central government being reluctant to modernize the human resource management systems used in local governments and rapid changes in the rules imposed by the central government regarding local government accounting systems. In other words, the new reporting rules have not been supported by the appropriate modernization of the human resource management system. Even though Indonesia has introduced a decentralization policy for local governments, reporting and human resource management are still controlled by the central government. Our Government needs to recognize the need for modern human resources and a new public management system to make this change work. Keywords: Accounting Reform, Public Accounting Sector, New Public Management, Unintended Outcome

We extend the logic of the democratic peace to query whether information about a foreign country's regime type affects US citizens' opinions of that country. We contrast this with the suggestion in other areas of international relations theorizing, such as the "clash of civilizations" thesis and constructivist frameworks, that a country's culture, especially its dominant religious tradition, may be more salient in citizen attitudes toward foreign countries. We designed a survey experiment to test the effects of randomly assigned cues regarding the regime type (democracy/nondemocracy) and religious culture (Islam/Christianity) of a foreign country on respondents' attitudes. Religious cultural cues outperformed regime type cues in determining respondents' perceptions of threat or expressions of trust, but respondents' views did not conform to maximalist claims of either the democratic peace or the clash of civilizations frameworks. These findings suggest that the need for a more synergetic approach to understanding the microfoundations of public foreign policy opinion formation. Adapted from the source document.

Introduction -- Part I: Background. The Rise of the Celtic Tiger. -- Part II: The Lure of Free Markets. Ideology and Financial Innovation ; Asset Bubbles and Financial Crises. -- Part III: The Build up to the Irish Crisis. The Banks and the Property Bubble ; The Failure of Irish and European Regulation ; The Makings of the Fiscal Crisis ; The Climate of Public Opinion: Politicians, Economists, and the Media. -- Part IV: The Crash. The Storm Clouds Gather ; The Bank Guarantee of End: September 2008 ; From the Guarantee to the Bail Out. -- Part V: After the Crash. What of the Future? ; Conclusions.

Many political theorists extol the virtues of deliberation in efforts to reconcile differences in opinion and prevent group fracture. On August 21, 2009, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) voted narrowly to reverse standing policy by allowing gay and lesbian people in committed relationships to serve openly as clergy. In the aftermath of this decision, numerous congregations began thinking about leaving the denomination. We surveyed a sample of ELCA clergy in the fall of 2009 and spring 2010 to assess their commitment to deliberative norms and practice, their implementation of such practices in congregational meetings designed to discuss the ELCA's vote, and the outcomes of those more or less deliberative forums. We found considerable commitment both to deliberative practice itself and belief in the efficacy of such practice. Despite the assumption that religious doctrine and public deliberation are incompatible, religious organizations often find deliberative processes essential to their survival.